Anyone have this problem before?

I have a 2005 Sprinter 3500 (for a Winnebago View). I had the transmission replaced at 120,000. Saw the post about dropping to 4th gear/slowing down when riding up hills to help keep engine temps down (I try to keep it below 215 degrees). When doing this for a while (such as climbing up/down multiple hills) and then driving on flat terrain, it seems the transmission is slow to go to higher gears. I can pull to the side, turn off the Sprinter and then turn it on again immediately and it seems to drive normally. First time it did this (while driving in Canada), I had the transmission fluid replaced at 134,000 and I was told the fluid was dirty and not burnt. Did another road trip and it seemed to happen again after climbing several hills and then driving downhill then flat terrain - almost seemed like it was staying in a lower gear and refused to go higher to allow me to go faster. Once again, I pulled to the side and turned off/on the Sprinter and it seemed to drive normally again. Any ideas?

Yes I have, in the sense that when your go down the hill after going up the hill in 4th it tends to want to stay in 4th until you tap Right the shifter to 5th and add accelerator. Going up in 4th the tranny has 'learned this is how you'd like to drive at this speed ' until you force it back to normal mode.

If it doesn't go back to normal mode after tap and acceleration it is something else, like a soft LHM.

Coming down a series of steep hills, my tranny doesn't want to upshift on the flats at the bottom until I'm at 3500rpm or so. It "learns". We must stop Skynet before it happens.

Somewhen in the dim and distant past i thought i read in one of the manuals that tapping the handle 3 times told the tranny to resume "normal" operation.

So when i've been down-and-up shifting for terrain/load, i finish off with that triple-tap when it flattens out.

I can't recall having a "slow" transmission after doing that.

--dick (if i can re-find the manual that said it, i'll provide the reference)

I've noticed sometimes I shift from 4 to D and on the display it reads D, but stays in 4. Another upshift seems to settle it into D.

At the moment, the only mention other than "just tap" is this item in the Owner's Manual:

Press and hold gear selector lever in the "+" direction:
The transmission will shift from the current gear range directly to gear range "D".

Click to expand...

So that's press-and-hold instead of "3 taps".

--dick
p.s. the manual also says that upshifting is "delayed" if the engine is cold ... but that should only affect gears 1, 2 and 3 ... they're trying to get the Cat Converter up to operating temperature.