Picture an American truck in your head. You probably just imagined a Ford F-series. In particular, it was probably a Ford F-150. These are great trucks. Great trucks with a lot of transmission problems.
What are the problems you can expect with a Ford F-150‘s transmission?
Here are the big ones:
- Truck may not accelerate
- Harsh and delayed shifting
- Truck runs rough and makes noise
Here’s what you need to know about the F-150’s transmission troubles.
A Look at the F-150’s Transmission
The F-150’s biggest transmission problems are in the 2017-2019 models with 10 speed 10R80 automatic transmission.
Among other problems, these transmissions are known for riding rough with loud clunky, banging noises coming from under the hood at under 10,000 miles, and gears being slow to shift.
The truck’s adaptive transmission shift explains a lot of these issues. The truck uses a module to adjust to the operator’s driving style.
Great idea, but this means that a truck with multiple drivers is going to have a lot of trouble adjusting between drivers.
3 Major Problems with Ford F150 Transmission
Truck May Not Accelerate
A number of F-150s have a tendency to not accelerate when you press the pedal. This has to do with the transmission shift linkage disconnecting. This can also result in the truck slipping into neutral when in motion or parked.
Thankfully, this probably usually won’t involve replacing the entire transmission, and there’s probably a recall in place to replace the shift linkage components. Just look up your VIN at NHTSA and find out.
Harsh and Delayed Shifting
Multiple drivers have reported that the truck may have a hard time shifting while accelerating or decelerating. This is bad enough, but it can be incredibly dangerous when merging or trying to avoid an accident.
In many instances, these issues can be fixed all at once by updating the adaptive learning software or having the module’s memory cleared by going into the scan tool and, well, this video can explain it a lot better than we can. You don’t even need to get your hands greasy.
Truck Runs Rough and Makes Noise
In many of the complaints regarding the F-150’s transmission, the concerns are less specific and more “The truck runs rough and makes a lot of clanking and banging noises.” This is, again, usually to do with the adaptive learning module.
This is another fix that can be handled by clearing or updating the software. Unfortunately, it can be hard to tell if this is a simple fix or a more serious problem, so you’ll want to try the software fix, and then see if you still have a noisy engine.
