1996 taurus wagon ELECTRICAL PROBLEM!

96 taurus wagon ......... car is on and running smooth, the radio is on and working fine, until i shift out of park. when in reverse, or drive, the radio display is on,... but no sound.... neutral and park, all power equiptment (windows, door locks, etc.) work just fine... also while driving the radio sometimes works, but not the power antenna, and or the windows wont work (but just for several seconds) a friend advised me who owned a ford truck that he had a similar problem and said to replace the fuses(both under the hood and under the dash that are directly linked to this problem.......sometimes while driving and everything is going haywire, a rapid clicking noise is heard from the interior fuse box. (sounds like one of the relays doesnt it?) now what gives? a short? neutral safety switch? -(car wont start in drive or reverse).......... other then taking it in for a diagnostic, what else can i do, other then look for corosion on the connections? could someone please help me, i sure would appreciate it.

Same thing happened on My taurus, turned out to be a switch on the transmission that had failed! Go figure! Call your local dealership, they should be able to get the part relatively cheap!

thanks for the quick reply, do you know what the name of the switch is?

I have a 1996 Taurus GL and you just name my problem exactly. Same thing...in park everything works fine. In drive and reverse there is no sound from radio, windows don't work, rear defroster doesn't work, intermittant wipers don't work and same clicking sound under dash. Did you ever find out what the problem was? I really hate to take it to the dealer if it's a quick fix.

Hey ya'll,

This is awesome! I followed this information and the part on the transmission is the transmission range sensor. After replacing that, the problem is fixed.

Thanks!

THANK YOU VERY MUCH ! this saved me time and money!