Pinz died then came back!

[Hawkeye Pinz]

I wanted to drive the Pinz to work this morning, so after letting it warm up for about ten minutes, I was on my way. I backed out of my driveway like normal, but then when I went to shift from reverse to second gear, NOTHING!! . The shifter froze up and wouldn't go into any gear forward or reverse. The truck kept running as long as I kept the clutch pedal floored. When I let out the clutch it died right away. The wheels were locked up until I put the transfer case into neutral, then I towed the Pinz up my driveway with my Avalanche. What has me puzzled is that when I got home from work tonight, I shifted the pinz right into gear and drove the rest of the way up the driveway! I didn't want to take it on a longer test drive in fear of another break down. Any ideas on what happened here :?: Whats the fix??? Thanks for the help, you old pros are great!!

[Hawkeye Pinz]

Just an update on this issue. I took off the witches hat and checked everything out and things didn't look out of the ordinary. Checked oil level in tranny and that was OK too. So I took my 710 out for a short drive and it drove fine! I guess this one has everybody here stumped too!

[trscott]

Just speculating...

Could something have been frozen solid that subsequently had thawed just enough to work better?

That's the only thing that comes to mind to explain the sequence of events you described...

[purplePinzer]

mine did that too, i was playing around in some water and the next day it was 17 degrees. i couldent move out of my parking spot untill i put it in low range and popped the clutch in reverse. i heard a big SNAP and after looking around a bit i saw a bunch of busted ice right below the pinz... a few days later it was about 50 degrees and it never happend again...were u playing around in water before that?

[Jimm391730]

Sounds like somehow the transmission had two gears engaged at the same time; this is never supposed to happen, but if it did it would lock the tranny solid. With the shifter stuck, the engine dies as soon as the clutch is released, and wheels locked up, it all points to multiple gears engaged. I've heard that the shifter fork pins can break, perhaps you have this problem that allows this possiblility. Jim L. has discussed fixing the shift fork pins in previous threads.

Jim M.
712W and 710M

[Hawkeye Pinz]

Thanks for the input on my problem guys! As a matter of fact the weekend before my Pinz locked up I took it to a car wash and cleaned all of the road salt off of it. The truck then sat for a few days when the weather was in the single digits. So maybe something just froze up. I've had my truck out on about three or four short trips since the incident, and everything seemed fine. I would think that if a shifter fork broke it wouldn't shift like normal. Correct me please if I'm wrong!! Just to be on the safe side I think I'm going to take her to a local shop that works on older European vehicles. Thanks again, Dave.