Stuck in neutral

[mgmyers]

I am in Oklahoma City, at my storage parking, so thankfully it's not an emergency. It's about 60 here, so not too cold.

Well the battery disconnect did not work, so I have disconnected the TCM & will let it set for about 30 minutes.

[jillie]

Same thing happened to us when we were at a National Rally with our 2007 Neptune. We got ready to leave but the transmission wouldn't shift out of neutral. Kept switching from N to D to R, turned the motor off and on. Nothing worked. Hubby walked over and caught a mechanic before he pulled out. The mechanic walked in, sat down, turned the ignition on, put it in drive and everything worked fine.

My advice is to have someone else try it. It always works when you tell someone else that it doesn't work.

[mgmyers]

Disconnecting the TCM did not work either. I am out of stuff to try, I even had my wife try it after I reconnected the TCM, as Jillie suggested. Still no dice, my wife, June, thought she was too close to the problem and that we needed someone new to try it.

Jillie - did you get the name of that mechanic? , he may have the magic touch.

I will try calling Allison and Holiday Rambler customer service tomorrow to see if they have any ideas. I really don't want to have to tow the MH to get if fixed.

I am going to have a pizza and will be checking to see if anyone has any ideas.

[Mike Canter]

If you don't have a red LED ECONO MODE light on with the MODE off then means that the transmission has NOT detected a fault. That should be good news. So it must be a safety interlock causing the problem or it is just confused. The onlt safety interlock that I know about is the idle speed unless somebody else knows of one. Disconnecting the chassis battery cables is the same thing as disconnecting the TCM.

[jillie]

Originally Posted by mgmyers

Disconnecting the TCM did not work either. I am out of stuff to try, I even had my wife try it after I reconnected the TCM, as Jillie suggested. Still no dice, my wife, June, thought she was too close to the problem and that we needed someone new to try it.

Jillie - did you get the name of that mechanic? , he may have the magic touch.

I remembered that we were having trouble with a loose ignition switch and had one of the on-site RV techs come over to work on it. He didn't have the tools he needed with him at the rally so he was improvising. I should have stopped him right there. He didn't fix the switch and when we tried later to start the generator, it wouldn't start. Seems his poking around had thrown the breaker on the generator.

So short story long, it's possible something was also thrown in the transmission so it wouldn't change gears. Now that I think about it, the mechanic who helped us get it working did mention something about resetting something. Sorry I can't be specific. We were in the middle of a huge fairground with neighbors rapidly disappearing down the road, leaving us alone in the heat and dust. I do remember that he kept switching gears and after several switches, it started. Good luck!

[rex]

Call John at Transmission Instruments 1-866-439-9779. He should be able to provide some guidance or answers.

[Bruce C]

This has happened to me once, although I'm not sure why but I moved my steering wheel from side to side with my foot on the brake and it finally shifted into gear. Just stabbing for something that may help you. Good luck.

[mgmyers]

Rex - Just called John at Transmission Instruments, he is like others on this post, thinks 750 RPM is too high. I will once again try to get the RPM down and try again. Thanks for the contact.

[rex]

There should be some sort of idle adjustment by a switch at your dash. May not be marked that way. Suggest you call Monaco Tech Support: 877-466-6226 and ask them how to adjust the idle. Have your coach number ready so they can look it up.

[mgmyers]

Here is the latest report. It is still not working. Although I don't have a smart wheel, I used the idea from Steve to set the idle with the cruise 'set/resume' button. By pushing SET several times, without the cruise turned on, I got the RPM down to an indicated 600 RPM.

I rechecked the battery connections again and all the fuses that are in-line from the positive and negative battery terminals.

I called HR customer support, very nice and helpful, but I had tried all that he suggested. When I told him I couldn't get error codes or oil level to display by pressing both arrow buttons on the shift pad simultaneously, he said it sounds like the shift pad is bad.

I called the local Allison shop and they are going to try and make it out tomorrow. I will keep you posted on the adventure. I am sure glad this happened BEFORE we got on the road this spring!!

[deSanford]

At this point in time if it is the "pad" that may be a good thing. I didn't know about the error codes or oil level display. Does that work on Cummins Diesel Engines? deSanford

[mgmyers]

Well, good news, it is fixed!

Just a recap:
Symptom:
2008 Holiday Rambler Neptune, 5.9L Cummings with Allison 2500MH transmission. Started the MH after sitting about 3 1/2 months in storage. The transmission would not shift out of neutral. Even with RPM = 600RPM.

Problem:
Shift motor mounted to the transmission was stuck or frozen, could turn the shift motor shaft, but apparently was stuck internal to the electric shift motor. The shift motor is located on the bottom, front, curbside of the transmission - has about 4 wires going into it.

Solution: Started the motor, had the park brake off and kept the floor brakes depressed. Have one person tap ( kinda hard) on the shift motor while another tries shifting the keypad, N - R- N - D- etc. It took about 3 -4 minutes of tapping and shifting but finally got an "RR" indication on the shift pad. Got the tapper guy (Allison tech) out from under the MH, then tried R, D - all worked. I felt much better.

Thanks to Greg of United Motors of Oklahoma City ( local Allison shop) for not giving up and trying everything they could think of.

Things I learned:
Lower the idle speed by pressing the SET on cruise control, while the cruise switch is off.

Transmission Control Module is located in the rear curbside compartment on the top of the compartment, above the inverter.

The transmission shift pad and apparently the whole electric shifting system is NOT Allison. The Allison tech was going to swap out shift pads, but the Allision pad had one connector, the shift pad in my Neptune has 2 connectors, neither of which will fit the Allision pad. I need to research that, just in case.

Seems like having a motor home is like paying for an education ( or maybe paying for a beating).

Hope this will be of help to someone.

[mgmyers]

Sanford - The error codes and oil level do not work in this model of shift pad. Does anyone know what shift pad was used on 2008 Holiday Rambler Neptunes?

[Mike Canter]

Mike, that is great. Another trick learned by all. Glad it ended up being cheap and fairly easy.