My 2001 XJ wouldnt start in park, but would when I shifted to neutral. After investigating on this fine site, it appears the NSS is most likely the culprit so It wouldnt hurt to have a look. The XJ has 98k miles on it and no off road time so it was relatively easy to take out and slide off the shaft using the screwdriver prying method. The connector was a bear, standing on my head and belly firmly anchored to the top of the battery, so I had an incentive to work fast. After much juvenile language, I won the battle with a small screwdriver and 2 broke fingernails. I saw the tie wraps were removable but try and do that with one hand. Finally cutting them, tying a string to the connect to aid in the connectors accent, later on, the NSS fell to the garage floor with a satisfying bounce.

The easy part was taking it apart, cleaning, adding the conductive grease and reassembling. Nice and shiny now. If you havent done maintenance on this 'selector', its a great comfort to know you have, so you wont get marooned somewhere.

Putting back in was a breeze, the string is the way to go and tie wrapping the cable to the AT dipstick tube worked fine. I imaging it was tied off to the other cables during the manufacturing process so they are out of the way when the engine/tranny are put in. Not necessary now.

I would offer that before removing the 12mm lock bolt, take a stack of feeler gauges and gap the distance between the bottom of the NSS and the top of the tip of the AT pan bolt thats right under it, so when you assemble, you can use the stack to gauge the correct position and lock down the bolt. Almost like the bolt was placed there for that. Kinda like gaping a spark plug. The switch is in correct position and all functions restored.

Finish up with a Guinness and an ice pack. And yes thats me in my Avatar at 2yo. My first jeep was a Nellybelle. Someone just sold a copy for $12k on ebay

 

Glad to hear it went so smoothly.

 

Yet another reason why I keep putting it off and just jiggle the shifter as needed. One day soon I will get it done. Glad to see people actually cleaning and repairing it instead of buying a new one.