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I'll be brutally honest: I halfway expected things to be worse than when I started off. This is one of the more intimidating repairs I've ever attempted. Not "difficult", just "scary".
I was actually pretty impressed that the car moved forwards and backwards at ALL, and spent the first 5 minutes of the first test ride just backing up about 200', then driving forwards 200' (alternating between L and D), then doing it again and again. Drive seemed to be slow to engage, and slip a bit on take off, but it seemed to get better which gave me enough confidence to leave the street and head out into the neighborhood.
The car DOES indeed shift through all three gears (which for those still following, was the initial problem . . . no 3rd gear shift). Needless to say, that first 2-3 shift made me smile.
It's not all roses, however. The 2-3 shift seems to occur at a higher speed than I would expect (but, at least it HAPPENS now). Not like an obnoxiously high speed, just higher than I think I'm used to. I have my speedo disconnected at the moment, so I'll have to take another drive with the GPS to compare to the expected values in the green book.
Also, after going WOT and getting the "kick down" effect, it seems like it WON'T make the 2-3 shift again. If I stop, pop the hood, and nudge the throttle valve cable back into the outer housing, it seems to solve the problem.
So, my problems seem to be at least partially cured. I think a bulk of the remaining issues are related to the throttle valve cable adjustment, and not an internal transmission problem. Progress, at least.
It was 5 pm when I was doing the test drive (lots of parents in the neighborhood, heavy traffic on surrounding secondary roads), so I really couldn't get a sense for how things were working much above 30-40 mph. I think tomorrow I'll have to go out in the late morning so I can see how things go over a wider speed range.
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