This is a follow up to a previous post where I had an issue getting the car out of park because I'd messed things up a bit while I had the gearshift area pulled apart. I've been working with a soft trim shop on a full re-do of my interior. They pulled everything out and then I took the car back and have been doing a sound deadening and sound proofing job while the truck is bare, and then the shop is installing all new headliner, leather, and carpet. I particularly wanted to work on the center transmission hump area, because of all the well known heat issues. So I got a bit over aggressive with a wire brush rotary tool while I was cleaning up some surface rust, and ended up letting the drill pull itself into the shift controls and cause a few issues. First, i couldn't get the truck out of park. Second, i'd severed the switch wires for the overdrive defeat button. But I continued getting the sound treatment work done knowing that I wouldn't be using the overdrive defeat and some good folks here on Mud reminded me that I could get the car in gear with the shift lock override. I was too pressed for time because I only had the weekend to do the sound treatment. But even still I didn't finish it all, so I focussed on the roof and the front so they could at least get the headliner and front carpets in. I did finish all that and brought the truck to them on Monday morning and picked it up Tuesday night to continue the sound work.
When they put the center console and gear shift area back together to get it presentable for me to take home halfway done, somehow the whole issue with not getting the car out of Park fixed itself. The gear shift lever now moves as it should, when you press the button and have your foot on the break. Mystery problem, mystery fix.
However, now I have this new problem where I can't take the key out of the cylinder when I turn the truck off. I know that the cylinder lock is there to make sure the car is in park when you take the key out. So in my head I'm thinking there is a connection here to the original problem. Had a problem getting the car out of park, and now seemingly the key cylinder doesn't know the truck is in park. Maybe the two issues are connected... So last night after I got the truck home I pulled the trim out again and dug in.
I had intended to get in there anyway because I still had to fix the overdrive wire, which I did last night. So at least that problem is gone. But I dug in a bit further by pulling the gearshift trim and the shift lock control box to get to as much body metal as I could. I vacuumed it out and cleaned it with some degreaser on a rag, and then put some sound/heat insulation in to try and control the heat that radiates from down there. It worked, I highly recommend this!
But back to the issue.
While I was in there cleaning, I made sure everything was working properly with the gearshift. I cleaned out the 20 year old nasty grease and reapplied fresh. I tested the movement, used the override button to move the gear shift back and forth and make sure all mechanical movements we functioning correctly. Everything looks perfect. I tested the dashboard reactions to the various gear changes. The car definitely knows that it is in park. When I move the lever into park, I definitely hear whatever the sequence is that goes on behind the dash when the car gets put in park. If I heard nothing, I would be thinking that whatever sensor is in there that detects I'm in park had been damaged when I screwed up with the rotary brush. But hearing that noise makes me think all is just fine in the gear shift compartment.
Reading the forum, it seems that hearing those sounds is meant to be an indicator that the problem is in the cylinder, and after a painful extraction can be fixed by a locksmith. I understand that logic, but my problem is that I can't ignore the possibility that something has happened to whatever is between the gearshift and the lock cylinder. That's why I went into all the detail about the soft trim work. I brought the car into their shop on Monday morning, and had no problem shutting the car off and taking the key out. When I picked the car up Tuesday night, that's when I first noticed the issue. In between Monday morning and Tuesday night, the shop was busy fitting a new carpet in the front footwells, and could easily have jostled something leading into that key cylinder that is causing this.
Something just doesn't seem right in thinking that I've had this car for 20 years and 230,000 miles, and the ignition key cylinder all of a sudden picked the soft trim house to lay an egg. Sure, stranger things have happened. But knowing the amount of poking and prodding it must take to fit and trim new carpet under the footwells, to me it just seems more likely that something came loose.
Now I do intend to bring it back to the soft trim shop and say "hey, this wasn't like this when I gave it to you". But I'm thinking there's a hell of a lot more expertise here in figuring out what happened than there will be in the soft trim shop!
So I'm wondering if anyone has any good ideas to guide me along in trying to diagnose if I can rule out the cylinder itself or not? Thanks!
When they put the center console and gear shift area back together to get it presentable for me to take home halfway done, somehow the whole issue with not getting the car out of Park fixed itself. The gear shift lever now moves as it should, when you press the button and have your foot on the break. Mystery problem, mystery fix.
However, now I have this new problem where I can't take the key out of the cylinder when I turn the truck off. I know that the cylinder lock is there to make sure the car is in park when you take the key out. So in my head I'm thinking there is a connection here to the original problem. Had a problem getting the car out of park, and now seemingly the key cylinder doesn't know the truck is in park. Maybe the two issues are connected... So last night after I got the truck home I pulled the trim out again and dug in.
I had intended to get in there anyway because I still had to fix the overdrive wire, which I did last night. So at least that problem is gone. But I dug in a bit further by pulling the gearshift trim and the shift lock control box to get to as much body metal as I could. I vacuumed it out and cleaned it with some degreaser on a rag, and then put some sound/heat insulation in to try and control the heat that radiates from down there. It worked, I highly recommend this!
But back to the issue.
While I was in there cleaning, I made sure everything was working properly with the gearshift. I cleaned out the 20 year old nasty grease and reapplied fresh. I tested the movement, used the override button to move the gear shift back and forth and make sure all mechanical movements we functioning correctly. Everything looks perfect. I tested the dashboard reactions to the various gear changes. The car definitely knows that it is in park. When I move the lever into park, I definitely hear whatever the sequence is that goes on behind the dash when the car gets put in park. If I heard nothing, I would be thinking that whatever sensor is in there that detects I'm in park had been damaged when I screwed up with the rotary brush. But hearing that noise makes me think all is just fine in the gear shift compartment.
Reading the forum, it seems that hearing those sounds is meant to be an indicator that the problem is in the cylinder, and after a painful extraction can be fixed by a locksmith. I understand that logic, but my problem is that I can't ignore the possibility that something has happened to whatever is between the gearshift and the lock cylinder. That's why I went into all the detail about the soft trim work. I brought the car into their shop on Monday morning, and had no problem shutting the car off and taking the key out. When I picked the car up Tuesday night, that's when I first noticed the issue. In between Monday morning and Tuesday night, the shop was busy fitting a new carpet in the front footwells, and could easily have jostled something leading into that key cylinder that is causing this.
Something just doesn't seem right in thinking that I've had this car for 20 years and 230,000 miles, and the ignition key cylinder all of a sudden picked the soft trim house to lay an egg. Sure, stranger things have happened. But knowing the amount of poking and prodding it must take to fit and trim new carpet under the footwells, to me it just seems more likely that something came loose.
Now I do intend to bring it back to the soft trim shop and say "hey, this wasn't like this when I gave it to you". But I'm thinking there's a hell of a lot more expertise here in figuring out what happened than there will be in the soft trim shop!
So I'm wondering if anyone has any good ideas to guide me along in trying to diagnose if I can rule out the cylinder itself or not? Thanks!