Do the automatics run on oil psi like the Ford AOD does? If so, maybe a gauge to monitor it. Im not familiar with our automatics, but I am getting a ton of experience with my TBird trany, lol.

Do you feel the trany downshifting hard? On the AOD, manual says to check in Park and trany warmed up. Pull the dip stick and see if it mentions N or P, which probably is not a huge difference.