Okay I have a 1999 1500 4x4 with 110,000 miles. My truck is in preety darn good shape and receives pretty regular servicing. It probabaly never goes more than 5,000 miles without being serviced. I have a few questions and I wanted to hear some opinions before I brought my truck in to the dealer.

Question 1: The "Service 4WD" light periodically comes on. I have noticed recently that it comes on mainly when I'm on a rough/unpaved road and buoncing around a little bit. My 4WD still works fine, whether the light is on or not. It came on the other day and I purposly pulled off onto a muddy shoulder to engage 4WD and see if it worked and I can hear and feel it engage. Any suggestions as to why the light comes on?

Question 2: The "Low Coolant" light comes on. As I said before I have regular services done on my truck and the coolant is never low, and I check it myself from time to time. I have seen no evidence of leaks either. Could this be a bad sensor?

Question 3: This is the one I am actually slightly concerned about. At the 100,00, mile mark I had a transmission service done at a local Chevydealership.Ihave never had any issues with the tranny but have had the truck fora few years now andwhen I bought it it had 30,000 mileson it and now has 100 andI had never done any type of service to the tranny. So listening to the dealerships adviceI went ahead and had the tranny serviced. A week after the service was complete I had to drive from Sacramento, CAto Bend, Or. The drive was a bout 6hours and Ionly stopped once for gas. When I gotto Bend my tranny was shifting very hard, like someone was kicking me in the back. This has never happened and I figured it was hot so I pulled off for lunch and let it cool. Got back in about30 minutes later and the truck worked perfect and it ran fine the whole way home.The trannyservice wasdone last March andsince then my trannyhas had this problemmaybe three or four times. This past weekend was the worst though. I had to drive to Los Angeles, about another six hours from home and I pulled off for gas about mid way and the tranny was shifting very hard again. I did the same thing,I got gas and back on the freeway I went, a little while later the "Trans Fluid Hot" light actually came on so I pulled off and took a break letting the truck cool. Truck ran fine the rest of the weekend and all the way home. So the question is could the dealership have done something, I kick myself for not going back as soon as it did this the first time but I would like to hearsome other opinions about this problembefore I go in.

Thanks for anyopinions/answers you guys may be able to provide. I am fairly new around these forums and appreciate all the knowledge that is provided here and hoping to add some myself from time to time. Thanks again and sorry for the long post, but I feel like the more info you have the easier it is to have an opinion. Thanks.
Chris

 

Question #1 i had a 00 that the light did this and on the 4 wheel drive and the my switch were you switch it at the dash was going out. Not sure if you have push botton or even if its a new body style or old body style 99.

Question #2 not sure sorry

Question #3 did the dealer replace the tranny filter or just did a flush?

 

hunt4game29

Thanks for the reply. I have the new body style '99 and it does have push buttom 4wd. Don't worry about #3 because my truck is currently in a shop getting a new tranny as I type this.........yes this sucks!

 

Man that does suck so when you had the tranny serviced at the dealer did they change the filter or just go the flush?

And if you have the dealer check for codes it should have one saying something about replacing the push botton on your 4 wheel drive. That is what my 00 like i said was doing the service 4 wheel light would come one and then go off and on. You might check somewhere how much the switch is i heard it is easy to replace. When mine did it it was when i bought it so the dealer i bought it from replaced it.

 

The dealer replaced the filter as well as doing the flush. I don't remember if they scanned for codes then so they may not have seen the Service 4WD warning but another guy told me to replace the switch tooand I think that is what i am going to do. They are pretty reasonable in price but I am always worried I am going to break the dash when I take it off to get the switch out. Any easy way to take it off that you know about?

 

On these trucks the dash just pops right off trust me i have poped my 00 when i had my 05 now i pop off all the time showing people how easy it is. just start at the top and work it off.

 

Thanks I'll have to get a switch and give it a try.