ATF+4 thicken while cold?

Manual or Automatic? How many miles do you have on the fluid? Have you recently been through any deep water holes?

Guessing 50k on fluid. Its an auto but this is regarding the tcase. I changed the tranny fluid a few months back. I have wheeled some sloppy holes in the past (Gigidy) so I was also thinking of contamination. I will swap the fluid in an hour or so to see it it helps

i would say def swap the fluid out and u should be fine. it should just be some moisture in the fluid if u have done some water holes.

here is a fact: Fisher snow plows use two types of fluid, originally it was an ATF, which they still use. Then the company wanted to start making there own instead of sending out a plow with a valvoline or mobil atf bottle etc. so they had there own produced which in reality is the same as ATF WITHOUT the added red color to it. So i would have to say seeing snow plows all over the US from top to bottom, (way up in canada where it reaches extremely cold temps) and the plows... not having the ability to warm up like a vehicle, still run without issues. Your traditional ATF should be absolutley fine in your climate area.

that is why i am leaning towards it being something such as water/moisture in the fluid or even a mechanical issue. (maybe even moisture on the linkage causing it to give you an issue.

Just swapped fluid, after trying to figgure out why only half of the fluid would go in, and tearing a slab of flesh from my arm while removing a stuck fill plug, I realolized I was trying to put 4.2 qts in instead of 4.2 Pts. yep, going to be a long day.