Got a question on the parking pawl or w.e its called

hanzbe420 · Post by **hanzbe420** » 23 Feb 2012, 07:13

hi my car this morning i parked at this place, i remember putting it in park, i got out poped the hood and i put a new dipstick i got from fcp in. and then i proceeded to rev the engine from under the hood and to my surprise some how it got into reverse and rolled down the hill knocking down 2 big bushes bottom scrapped the grass and the passengers mirror hit 1 of those clothes donation box's, when it was at this point i ran past the bushes and jumped in the car while it was rolling backwards and applied the break and i was about 2 inches maybe not even away from smashing into a meiniki side building. it was kinda scary. But my question is i notice my gear selector when in drive u have to wiggle it for it to lock in. like it doesn't click in all the way and lock, now there's no problems with the trans. its just the locking in gear problem i guess. this never happened to me before but its quite dangerous and was wondering if anyone would no about it. thanks lol.

Post by **jblackburn** » 23 Feb 2012, 07:27

Well that's scary.

PNP switch needs to be aligned. Easiest thing is to use someone behind the car (or a mirror/window) to see when the lights come on - you can do this without the engine on.

ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS use the parking brake on hills.

Post by **rspi** » 23 Feb 2012, 07:34

LOL, man, thanks for sharing. Kinda scary??? Would have been a lot of scary to me.

These 850 have all kind of shifter problems that are not apparent. The yellow sedan I had would shift through all gear without pushing any button, on or off. took me about 3 months to figure that out.

Post by **jimmy57** » 23 Feb 2012, 08:00

The other thing THAT MUST BE DONE is to assure the linkage is properly adjusted. With car on level ground and parking brake securely firmly set do the following:
You remove air cleaner box to get ready access and view of the cable and the shifter lever. Remove the cable from lever. Make sure the lever is all the way forward in park. Move it to the rear and put in back in Park to be sure it goes into the the position and the detent engages on the shifter linkage inside. If it is in this position the pawl will be enaged into drum. Now attempt to place the cable end onto the shifter lever pin. The cable end should be a touch forward of the pin. The cable should preload the lever a faint amount or technically the rubber bushed end when installed on the lever pin should compress the rubber. If it doesn't then the bracket holding the cable to gearbox needs to be loosened and slid forward to achieve this.
The linkage that pushes the pawl into the side of the output drum inside trans has a double taper sleeve with a spring behind it. The first taper is maybe 25 degrees and the second taper is maybe 10 degrees. The first taper pushes the pawl over into drum and the shallower taper is behind pawl when it is in the drum as the sleeve gets larger in diameter. The shallow taper is done to assure the sleeve will be easily moved back out of P position. The spring behind this tapered pin is why you have noticed over the years of driving auto trans fitted cars that you have put it in P and then the car rolled a bit and you heard a pop and the car stopped. You had put it in P and the square toothed gear profile of the drum was not aligned for the pawl to drop into the drum and the car had to move a touch for it to happen. When you put it in park the sleeve was loaded by the spring and when the drum moved the spring moved sleeve and the pawl engaged.
I have seen the drum worn a couple times (not volvos, chevies) from persons putting the vehicle into P while it was rolling repeatedly (they were trucks used by electrical meter readers) and the pawl would come out of drum on hills and let the vehicle roll. IF your car suffered from this you would have known it as the car would have rolled a few clicks of the drum before now.

hanzbe420 · Post by **hanzbe420** » 23 Feb 2012, 13:38

it does move a bit forward after u release the break but i don't think its that bad it just surprised the hell out of me that it went from park to reverse when i hit the throttle under the hood maybe it moved the lever into reverse when i revved it maybe the pawl wasn't set and it didn't click in. but the car was stopped so i dunno. was a pretty scary experience and dare devilish but i saved the Volvo! from extreme rear damage and probably saved money not slamming into the meinikie wall lol. that would of so sucked. anyways on a lighter note i got both my oil cooler hoses done today buy a guy on volvospeed named Jdlc. he lived in my state not far so i went to his house and he makes his own oil cooler hoses that come with all the o rings the pressure o-rings the clips and clamps and the rectangular o-ring for the thermostat. very good quality hoses hose all resistance to pressure and heat. probably better then the ones from ipd. they cost 288 for the set for my car so if i can get a even better or same quality hoses for 100$ and have the guy help me install them. then i think that's a deal! why do u think revving it from under the hood made it some how slip into reverse? is it cause it didn't fully engage the pawl?

loveMy850 · Post by **loveMy850** » 09 Apr 2021, 17:46

I'm having this problem and it's from reverse to park and out of park as well. It's happening more frequently. It does roll a tad after parking. So I think this may be my answer. So am I understanding that my linkage needs adjustment? TY