Hi, I'm new on here so I hope I am doing this correctly.
This what happened:
Was driving my wife's 98 Accord LX and pulled in to a parking spot, put it in "Park" on the floor selector lever and turned off the ignition and went to exit the car. As I was stepping out the car was rolling backwards so I immediately stepped on the brake and got back in the car properly. I could not believe I had not put it in park, but instead in neutral. I looked and saw it was in fact "In Park" on the selector lever. I turned on the ignition to see that the dash board indicator showed it was in "Neutral" though. So... the shift lever was in the "Park" position but the transmission was actually in Neutral.

I put the key back in the ignition and turned it on and attempted to take the shift lever out of park and into a gear to try and do this all over again and hopefully get it going. However, no matter what I tried I could not get the little little silver button on the shift lever to depress in order to move the lever into another position from Park. That meant I could not get the car to go into any gear other than neutral, so it was stuck.

Had it towed home, luckily only 3.8 miles away and it is in the drive. Shift lever stuck in park, transmission stuck in neutral. Anyone have any idea what happened? I heard no noise and felt nothing different when I placed it from Drive into Park that final fateful time. What could I check for or look at to try and work out what has happened here? All help and advice will be greatly appreciated and thanks in advance for taking the time to read this message.

 

First thing is the engine. 98 LX was available 4-cyl or V-6, and they're so completely different from each other that sometimes I wish they had made up a new name for the V6 car.

Much of the description sounds like a broken or disconnected shift cable. You can remove the plastic shrouds around the shift lever & have a look, or check for movement of the cable where it attaches to the transmission.

There's a slot where you can press a key or screwdriver, to release the shift lever when the interlock solenoid is stuck. Can you release the lever that way & describe how the lever feels to operate?

 

it's the 4 door four cylinder model LX, sorry I should have included that info. I will take a look at what you suggested this afternoon and get the info back here. I'm hoping it will be that simple. Thank you very much for your help.

 

On the console picture part #4 is a bezel you pull up to expose the slot where you release the shift lever lock.

The other picture shows the cable going forwards. It seems to be bolted to the bottom of the shift lever - maybe that came apart?

I'm not having any luck finding a better picture of the forward end of the cable where it attaches to the transmission. You see the lever in that one picture, but I don't know where that's located on the transmission.

 

Thanks for the diagrams, we had a look and there is no place to stick a key nor screw driver to release the lock, in this model. My 94 had such a thing but this model has nothing at all anywhere. With that said after looking under the car the cable looks like it has come away at the transmission but there seems to be a hole/door or orifice where the cable goes through and into the transmission. The cable was hanging down a bit, so basically not in tension and when wiggled a small plastic bit drop onto the floor from something that must have broken off. We stuffed the cable back up inside the transmission (not that the end was loose or unattached form inside the transmission or anything) to take up the slack. Just for fun I started the car and tried the shift lever and the silver button on the side pressed in and I was able to move it out of the park position and then I put it back into park and again it locked itself there. Still showing neutral on the dashboard light and still locked in park on the floor shift lever. Any idea how this unit happens to be attached at the transmission or if this is the type that needs to be split apart to get at the end to repair it? I m assuming a complete new cable is needed here.

 

On your 98 Accord AT, you have to lift off the shift lever outer frame to reveal the shift lock release slot. See pic.

 

Redbull, you got a good picture of where/how the cable attaches at the transmission? Sounds like something is broken up there.

 

Here's a link showing cable replacement.

how do i remove the shift control cable from a 1998 ... - JustAnswer

 

Redbull 1,

Greatly appreciate you posting the link with the explanation and drawings. Just one question regarding the question on that link which I will paste here now :
Customer Question

how do i remove the shift control cable from a 1998 honda accord lx 4-cyl manuel
_______________________________________


The question I have is this... from what the customer is asking there, at the end he/she write the word "manuel" is this supposed to be his name or is it that he does not know how to spell the word "Manual"? If it is the latter and he was asking about a manual transmission, were the instructions that followed for an Automatic or a manual transmission, because I have an automatic transmission? If this description was for a manual transmission is there something posted somewhere for an automatic tranny? Thanks again for your help on this.

 

That part of the original question is confusing, but the pictures and procedure are clearly for an automatic transmission. A manual transmission has 2 cables, not just 1; the shift lever is very different; and the cables attach to the transmission in a very different way.