You didn't state if you were the original owner or not, but a Banks Transcommand will make the shift points be very firm (by design). I have had one motorhome with the Transcommand (my current HR), and one without. They feel completely different. On our most recent trip in very hot weather and lots of hill climbing, my trans reverted back to the original Ford programming (with the mushy shift points). When we left our destination a few days later, the shift points were back to normal (i.e. firm).
Ray
1998 Holiday Rambler Endeavor
2003 Subaru WRX toad
We have a 1998 HR Vacationer, and I seem to be having a problem with our unit as well, particularly in hilly terrain driving where shifting from lower gear into the main drive gear seems to take quite an effort. For example, we just returned from an 800 mile trip in East TN, and on the way there we got 7.5 mi per gallon on average, however, on the way back to Nashville we got only 6.34.
I am the second owner of this unit, which we bought from a retired medical doctor with 28,000 miles on it. To the best of our knowledge the previous owner did not do any modifications to the unit.(Presently, we have 43,500 mi on it.) It is in excellent shape otherwise. But transmission shifting automatic or manual overdrive makes quite a bit of noise, and it seems like it takes forever to shift into a higher gear. Any thoughts about what might be the problem would be appreciated.
----
Nick & Joyce
1998 Holiday Rambler Vacationer
2005 Ford Focus TOAD
Possible intermittent ignition switch. Had the same problem, 2000 Tropical. The switch does not always make full contact. When it doesn't and I try to drive away two things occur. 1) The transmission goes into some kind of limp mode and shifts extremely hard. 2) The speedometer also does not work. The first couple of times this happened the check engine light came on and would not reset by itself but it drove just fine once I restarted. Took it to Ford dealer after a couple of weeks when we returned home (we were in Wyoming at the time). They replaced the speed sensor and reset the check engine light. A couple of weeks later it happened again. It was then that I realized the ignition switch problem. Occasionally (every few starts) I noticed that the jacks had no power. I had to shut off and restart engine, then I would have power to the jacks. The reason I did not connect the dots right away was because when traveling and stopping for breaks, lunch etc I don't set the emergency brake or use the jacks. I just start the engine and drive away and occasionally would have the problem. Now every time every time I stop I set the emergency brake and before I take off again I start the rig and verify good contact by turning jacks on and off (emergency brake needs to be on). I don't actually have to put jacks down, I just need to make sure the jack light comes on. About every four or five starts it doesn't make good contact and I have to turn engine off and restart. I believe if I changed ignition the switch the problem would go away. However it doesn't seem worth the trouble since I have had no other problems because of the switch and I have been using this proceedure over three years.
Offline
