transmission problems

Hi all, been having some problems with my transmission recently.
91 ford explorer 174k miles.

About a week ago my brother walks home and tells me the truck wouldn't go into any of the forward gears (reverse worked just fine) when he tried to drive it home, even though he was able to drive it just fine hours previous to that without any noticeable problems.

I went to go look at it, and was able to engage it into 2nd after shifting between the gears for a short while and took it home. After someone told me to check the trans fluid I did and noticed it was quite low so put some new fluid in. The dipstick said to put in Mercon fluid so thats what I did.

It now still does not engage into the OD/D/1 gears from parked/stopped, but goes into 2nd and R just fine. I am also able to shift it into OD and D (but not 1st) while moving and it works as long as I don't stop, then I have to go back into 2nd to get moving again.

If anyone could shed some light on this problem it would be greatly appreciated, or perhaps I just am going to have to take it into a repair shop to get it looked at which I'm not looking forward to =(

Keo

i think it is about due for an overhaul. sound like a couple of the clutches/ bands work, and a couple have had it. 175,000 is about time to overhaul.

what might be a reasonable price range to expect for an overhaul?

I was talking to a friend of mine who runs an Amaco. A rebuild with torque convertor runs around 1900 plus hard parts - somewhere in the neighborhood of 2000-2300.