Hello to all.
New to the forum, joined today. Thanks. I have a 05 V6 automatic. Recent purchase, private sale. All cars I've owned through my yrs, regardless of manufacturer, I've always been able to push automatic transmission conslole shifter into neutral from drive without engaging button on shifter. This includes other Ford vehicles. I took the car to local Ford dealer to have have them investigate the nature of the problem and dealer states" this is normal operation for this vehicle". Can anyone else with an automatic tranny let me know if this is true of their Mustang also. I can go from reverse to neutral w/o engaging button, so it seems to me i should be able to go from drive to neutral w/o engaging button.
Thanks for any advise in advance.
MCMAN

 

Can't speak to the mustang automatic, but in my experience, MANY auto transmissions work this way. It makes no sense to me either...

 

My 2010 auto has the same behavior. It's the first time I've experienced it in any car also.

I suppose it's a good thing if you are manually shifting at the track (or for the fun of it) and it prevents you from inadvertently putting in neutral.

 

You're fine. It makes sense to me. You don't want a passenger accidentally hitting the shifter handle and putting you in neutral while you're passing a semi on a two lane road!

 

Yep, it's just how these transmissions work, and as stated it's for general safety reasons. It can definitely happen that you knock the car into neutral accidentally, particularly while having a manual shift session in the car.

But yep, definitely a normal attribute of the mustang.

 

i've been driving automatic Mustangs since 2005 and honestly can't say, as it's just nt something I even have to think about much!
But then I don't really go from D to N very often!
will check the next time I take the car out... maybe in a week or so!

 

You should be doing this, unless you are parking on level ground all the time. D to N, set the emergency brake then to P...takes the weight of the car off the transmission linkage.
OP do yourself a favor and get a TCI shifter and replace that factory plastic piece of sh&t asap. Add's a little fun factor to the auto and looks sweet!

http://www.americanmuscle.com/tci-ra...er-0509gt.html

 

It's a safety crutch. You can't engage neutral "by accident". 1-D shifts without engagement. That is another reason why the stock shifter is super easy to skip a gear by accident.

 

Hi mcman,

My name is Deysha with Ford Customer Service. This indeed is a normal operating characteristic of your vehicle. It was designed like that to avoid accidentally knocking the gear shifter into neutral while driving and possibly causing an accident.

Deysha