Spend the $2000 for a rebuilt.
It’s more expensive than buying another car
If you like the van enough to drive if for some more years, I’d fix it. You may be able to find another vehicle for what it will cost you to fix this one, but you will be inheriting someone else’s unknown problems, treatment, and maintenance history. At least the van you have is the ‘devil you know.’ If, however, you’ve neglected this thing, it might be worth dumping it and getting something else.
I have the oddest feeling that the OP is not going to return. I suspect this was a frustration post rather than a question post. Then, upon not finding a chrysler transmission-bashing party, interest in this was lost. In other words, yet another post by someone who already knew what they wanted to hear and wasn’t going to go with anything else.
For $1500 installed?? That sounds like a used salvage yard transmission. You are correct that the transmission in your vehicle keeps thousands of transmission shops in business…Price-shopping transmissions and choosing the lowest price is usually false economy…
“A new transmission is $3600.00, a rebuilt transmission is $2200.00. Mopar remanufactured transmissions (from the dealer) come with a 3 year/100,000 mile warranty.”
While not the cheapest, it will add the most value to your vehicle…
There were countless improvements made to the 42TE transmission during the 1990’s and to see only 9 complaints on carcompaints.com may suggest that the 2002 model is much more durable than the former years. Note that 6 of the 14 complaints were posted by the same person. There are 145 complaints posted for transmission problems on the 2002 Honda Odyssey. Perhaps Chrysler owners don’t post there because they don’t know about the site?
I can’t help but wonder if the OP’s use of the vehicle contributed to the slightly early demise of this transmission. For example: regularly carrying excessive loads or pulling a trailer, maybe overheating incidents on steep mountain roads (eg: Pikes Peak or Mt Washington…) or maybe a lead foot routinely accelerating hard, even a long and very steep driveway? Just a thought.