tranny slip?

Hi all, I have a 94 ford taraus sw 3.8 with the axod transmision. I just put new head gaskets on this car and gave it my mom. It had a rather harsh downshift 2-1 but runs great, so she drove it for about a month and the trans is whining like the pump is shot, it slips into neutral world just like if the pump was bad "it goes for a minute and then if the rpm get to high it don't shift from 1-2 and then you got nothin "engine running car won't go" but if you shut it off and wait 5-10 sec and start it back up it will catch 1st gear, If you can get it into 2nd you can cruise on the freeway but if the engine rpm get to high you loose it. So the fluid is brown and burnt and I was wondering if a cloged filter would make it whine, but then I thought what would clog the filter metal shavings??? wich would mean I need new hard parts. I'm going to pull the pan in the morning. Then I got to wonder if maybee the throttle valve cable "tv cable" was mis adjusted from when I had it apart, so I got out the book and my 3.8 is not like the one in the book, in the book the tv cable goes from the throttle to the trans like a solid cable, on mine the cable runs from the throttle to a vaccum diafram? wich is mounted on the driver side shock tower. how do I adjust this? The speedometer in the car only works for a couple of seconds every now and then, does the vehcle speed sensor control any aspect of shifting? Sorry about all the questions as I'm kinda just rambling, I'm not looking for a solution, unless you got one, but any info would be great as I am not very familiar with front wheel drive transmissions, I hate em, but its a clean car and my mom likes it so. don't really want to buy a bunch of tranny fluid and filter and gasket just to find out it is scrap, they got one at the junk yard 81000 mile 225.oo but then I saw you have to remove the sub frame and everything that touches it to get the trans out "why I hate front wheel drive" asked a couple shops about putting in the trans from the junk yard cheapest is 650 to install so I'll do it for 650.00 staying in my pocket, new 1300+. Any info would be greatly apreciated and I will post back after I remove the pan in the morning. Thanks

A lot of your thread is beyond the scope of my knowledge. The fluid needs changing so when you drop the pan you only get out 6 qts and it holds 15 so the torque converter has to be flushed. Lots of threads how to do it so do a search.

I'm not much of a snake oil person but a lot of people have used this and claim good results: http://lucasoil.hodgsoncorp.com/slipping_transmission.htm Other than changing the fluid I don't know what else to suggest. Make sure you use Mercon V because it is half synthetic, more expensive but worth it.

The cable from the throttle to the diaphram is NOT the TV cable. That's the cruise control cable. You have either the AX4N or the AX4S, neither of which has a TV cable. The transmission gets its shifting information from the throttle position sensor and the VSS vehicle speed sensor. The VSS is located on the tail of the transmission and takes the place of the old speedometer gear. If that's bad, you'll get crazy shifting. Check that before thinking about replacing the transmission.