Need help-2003 Intrepid Valve Body Replacement

[Maggimay68]

I hope someone can help me. My husband & I just spent all day replacing the valve body in our 2003 Intrepid, and the engine runs, but won't shift without us revving the engine. We think that we may have put the overdrive and underdrive accumulators and springs in upside down (with the openings of the pistons going up, because there were rings of fluid that made it look like they should rest on the valve body before putting it back on).

When we took the old valve body off, the pistons and springs just fell out. We know that the each small spring goes inside each big spring, but what we don't know is which direction to put the pistons in, opening up, opening down, or one of each. The problem is that there is a screw on the face of the valve body where one of the pistons would rest (on the driver's side) and this made us think that maybe one goes in one way, and the one on the passenger's side goes in the opposite way??? And can anyone tell me which is which - they are identical - we just don't know which side is overdrive and which is underdrive, and we don't know if they go opening up, opening down, or one of each.

Is there someone out there who would know this? Our diagrams don't tell you how to put the pistons back in once they come out.

THANK YOU!!!!!!!

[Maggimay68]

It turns out that we DID put the pistons in correctly! We were just low on transmission fluid (we only added 4 1/2 quarts after we were done). Apparently that wasn't enough. We added 3 more quarts today and the car is running beautifully.

FYI - for anyone else who may have this problem...we have a 2003 Intrepid with a 3.5L engine and a 42L transmission. When we took the valve body off, the overdrive and underdrive accumulators and springs fell out, which we were told to expect, but it happened so quickly that we didn't see what position they were in before they fell out. But the rings on the surface of the valve body indicated that they HAD to go on with the opening down, and with the closed end of the piston resting on the springs, and be balanced on the surface of the new valve body until we got it up and into place. It ended up not mattering which piston ended up on which side, because they're identical. We ended up verifying this with a Dodge specialist today, who told us that the first thing to do was check the fluid, and thankfully, adding fluid fixed it.

This is ONLY for the 3.5L engine with the 42L tranny. It may be totally different in a 2.7, so make sure that when you go to drop the valve body, do it VERY slowly and WATCH hoe the pistons and springs come out. Some Dodge engins only have one spring in one of these accumulators.

Thanks anyway!