Anybody have their auto tranny's go out?

[Lancer]

I guess that the transmission upgrades couldn't wait for my tax return. I'm pretty sure that it's really going out this time. Before I found out it was just a bad connection with my Unichip and ECU that was giving me trouble.Now, especially after the car has been running for a little bit, (NOT racing! ), When I leave from a light You can hear and see the rpms going up, but you feel the car not going. Then it seems to catch and drives mostly normal. Also when I go to pass or just give it a little like on an on ramp to the highway, shifting is a lot longer and not as crisp, and I'm not feeling the power as it was just a few weeks ago. I only owned one other car (Geo Storm GSi) and never had any tranny problems until now. What would be the main cause for this? Torque converter, valve body, other?

[ColonelPanic]

Anybody have their auto tranny go out? Yeah, me. "Bulletproof Toyota powertrain" *barf!* There was somebody else too, can't recall who.Mine started shifting HARD during the 1-2 shift. Eventually, it started shifting sluggish for that 1-2. And before I knew it, I was hitting the rev limiter because the stupid thing wouldn't shift out of first. Also it wasn't even wanting to engage in first when coming out of park, I could sit with it in D and nail the gas, nothing ever happened. The transmission pump was putting out 1/3 the normal pressure at best.It could be something like a shift solenoid or the like. I would get a code reader on that sucker ASAP, even if you don't have a check engine light you still can have codes. I had several tranny codes in mine but never saw the light. Gee, maybe you can be lucky like me and have the transmission pump suck up shrapnel and fling it all over the innards of that piece of crap. It was good times man, there wasn't a single part inside that casing that could be salvaged. Over $4,000 to replace in parts alone. But extended warranty covered that. And rightfully so, 63,000 miles to kill a transmission is pretty pathetic when these are Toyotas after all, and golly gee, I should have gone a trillion miles before having it die from what everybody says! (removed)! I do have to admit though, seeing how average driving killed my tranny, that I'm especially concerned about yours. They're weak, weak weak! Adding stress to the unit with superchargers and hard driving probably hasn't been kind to yours. Were you still on the original fluid? Check it to see if it smells burnt...For your sake, I hope it is easy and not too terribly costly to repair. It may be worth it to you to stop driving it if you can until you can get it checked out...

[kostby]

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[ColonelPanic]

That's great. If I didn't have to keep spending one day a week in the shop, I'd have better things to say. lol!

[Lancer]

had the system flushed in Nov. last year. From the dipstick, it looks good and is at the correct level. No burnt smell, either.I too hope its something simple like a "sillynoid."Man, I even had the performance upgrade kit picked out (Level 10, stage II). Just needed the money from the tax return. Damn Gov., give me my money! Banks charge interst , why can't I!

[ColonelPanic]

Yeah, sounds like it could be a solenoid, go get that thing scanned and see what the deal is. Hopefully there's something there...

[Petrucci914]

Mine kinda does that too. I cleaned the MAF sensor and just had the tranny flushed with Amsoil (pricey indeed). What is this solenoid stuff and how do you fix it? I've never had a CEL, though.

[northvibe]

yea lancer i was going to say sounds like something is dirty or not working, im not all that great with tranny issues but it could be a solenoid. have you cleaned your MAF sensor?

[Petrucci914]

I'm thinking about buying one of those ODB Diagnostic boxes for like 55$ that gives you the code readouts. If I do I'll drive on down and let you use it, bud.

[ToolGuy]

I am thinking your SC killed it. Usually the trans needs to be beefed up when adding nitrous, turbo or a SC.

[northvibe]

lancer do you have a tranny cooler?

[Mrizzle05]

last time i talked to him he was still looking into putting one on, im not sure hes got one yet.

[VibeoFive]

Just turned 12,000 miles and only 1 trans. complaint (since day 1): while cruise is engaged going uphill, trans. will downshift and engine will rev like it's supposed to untill speed selected is attained. Then, as if it over shot it's mark, it "hangs" in it's still downshifted gear (with engine still revving) for about 2 tenths of a mile (forever!) , then it finally slips back into 4th and rpm returns to normal. It's quite the noisey "lurch back" and scary as hell. If I drive with cruise OFF, and mash down on the accelerator to pass, passing gear disengages normally, so Im guessing it a programming glitch in the pcm. Anyone else have a tenuous relationship with AWD trans. in cruise?

[ColonelPanic]

IMHO, the cruise kinda sucks on this car... A lot! I'm always cancelling mine when going down hills because I know as soon as I start to go up the next, it will slam itself down a gear and rev far up there when it REALLY doesn't need to. I don't have a problem with losing a couple miles per hour going up the hill, but apparently the cruise does so it has to floor it. All in all, I find a LOT of "glitchiness" with this tranny, I'm really not a fan of it. Even my brand new one won't upshift sometimes, it doesn't go out of first unless I stop the car, turn the ignition off, then start it back up. THEN it leaves first. A couple times, it has refused to engage OD, despite going at a speed that OD should have been working. Toggling the switch did nothing. Had to pull off the road again, reboot, and OD worked. Seeing that, I don't think it is mechanical but definitely electronic. Reminds me of those early 90's Chryslers that had to be rebooted to shift out of second... (removed)! I'm convinced this car runs Windows... heheheThe crappy part is, it isn't throwing codes AND it leaves me alone for long enough for me to forget about, then suddenly acts up again just to tick me off. So, the dealer will NEVER be able to correct these problems, I can't even duplicate them myself. This is just a really weird gearbox...

[ColonelPanic]

I know I should take it back. But I won't take it back because it would be pointless because the dealer I normally go to would look at it and find nothing although they'd look into it for free. I could try another dealer, but I'm basically guaranteed to be forced to pay a diagnostic fee for them to tell me nothing is wrong, I don't really have a hundred bucks layin' around right now. Perhaps I just see so much freaky stuff every day in my line of work, I always have people who have problems with their software and I sometimes simply can't find the problem or make it occur. So, I know how hard it is for anybody to diagnose something so erratic. And once it shows up, it's gone quiuckly. I'm talking once every couple thousand miles sort of thing, I've only had a few bizarre episodes in the 10,000 miles I've had this transmission, still more than it probably should have, mind you. FWIW, I don't mess with the OD unless I seriously need engine braking which is rare. Other than that, it always stays on for better mileage and less of a racket. The example I posted were about the incidents where I stopped at a light, took off, got up to speed in the 55 MPH zone and waited, waited, waited - it never went into OD even though at the light before, under the same conditions, it was in OD by the time I was at this point. (but I don't recall how far I drove from where I started to where I stopped but it had plenty of time to shift up and the conditions were perfect for it to do so.) So, I then toggled the switch a couple times simply to see if it would move from 3rd to 4th and nothing happened except the O/D OFF light came on. It kept winding the engine up and wouldn't shift up. Once I pulled off the road and restarted, it was fine - even though I was driving just like I was earlier where it wouldn't upshift. This was almost like you turn off the OD using the button, but I had not and the light certainly wasn't on when it does this. tis just weird, man...But anyway, back to Lancer's tranny, he needs more help now than I do, sorry for the rant in the wrong place...

[kostby]

Quote, originally posted by VibeoFive »Just turned 12,000 miles and only 1 trans. complaint (since day 1): while cruise is engaged going uphill, trans. will downshift and engine will rev like it's supposed to untill speed selected is attained. Then, as if it over shot it's mark, it "hangs" in it's still downshifted gear (with engine still revving) for about 2 tenths of a mile (forever!) , then it finally slips back into 4th and rpm returns to normal. It's quite the noisey "lurch back" and scary as hell. If I drive with cruise OFF, and mash down on the accelerator to pass, passing gear disengages normally, so Im guessing it a programming glitch in the pcm. Anyone else have a tenuous relationship with AWD trans. in cruise?The 'glitch' is probably normal! I suspect it's related to the ECU and the way it tries to juggle engine performance parameters to achieve lower tailpipe emissions at a certain road speed, engine RPM, throttle position, engine temperature, and ambient air temperature.Circa 1974, in the infancy of electronic engine management I had a manual transmission AUDI that would hold the throttle open for a moment (though it seemed like minutes, sometimes) after you let off the gas to make sure the engine wasn't going to produce too much NOx or whatever was being regulated at the time, so the car would pass the emissions standards of the day.

[VibeoFive]

Whether lurching back & forth in cruise is "normal" to correct for rich emissions or as a failsafe measure that protects some component in the trans., some engineer made a mistake! Computers in todays cars react and correct so fast that nothing like this should be happening at all. Its particularly embarassing with passengers in the car with you saying "what the hell was that?" while it searches for the correct gear to drop into next. I agree that a dealer would be a waste of time with this one. An AC Delco or Toyota engineer will need to study it and develop a TSB for anything positive to happen at the dealer. Until then, something bad may come of this eventually (hopefully within 3/36!)

[Lancer]

Ok, it's been a buisy week, but here's the scoop.I was tinkering with the car Monday and Tuesday and saw the air/fuel gauge acting wierd and staying on lean even at idle. Found out that it would rev the same way while in park as it did when driving off from a stop. So I started to wonder if it really was the tranny. I only know the basics about auto trannys. I decided to take Northvibes advice and check out the MAF sensor. It was carbon black! (North, you win a cookie!) So, cleaned it up along with the air filter and put some injector cleaner in the gas tank. Took it for a short spin around the block and it was a lot better, but still acted up once the engine warmed up. Wednsday I took it into the local dealership for a checkup. They drove it for awhile and came back saying that they didn't notice anything wrong. (of course, None of them have driven a s/c'ed Vibe before!! ) I asked about checking it for any codes, "Oh you want me to do that too?" No **** Sherlock! That ended up being my normal inefficiant O2 sensor reading (no cat up front, idiot put it in the back). Needles to say I got a clean bill of health for the Vibe. Until I need a tow, that is. But driving it the rest of this week, it has been improving a lot. So for the second time I dropped the ball and blammed the tranny when it was something else.

[damronjr]

Well, good to hear the tranny's good! From what I've heard they're pretty reliable. I can't afford to replace that!

[ColonelPanic]

Are there any parts available for these transmissions to beef 'em up a little? I'm not too sure that the transmission is going to be able to withstand the additional load of the supercharger and frequent flogging... If there are any components available, those would be quite a bit cheaper than a new transmission when it ultimately dies...

[damronjr]

There are ways of beefing the trans, but it's not cheap and you have to disassemble and send them the parts to be modified.http://www.levelten.com/store/...a.htm

[BlueCrush]

Yeah, LevelTen and C2Power are the only two places that have tranny upgrades for us.http://www.c2power.com/product...gines(yes, Jason, I'm stalking you today, haha)

[damronjr]

Quote, originally posted by BlueCrush »Yeah, LevelTen and C2Power are the only two places that have tranny upgrades for us.http://www.c2power.com/product...ginesI didn't know that C2Power had tranny upgrades! T&A told me about LevelTen.

[BlueCrush]

Either way their both spendy! And C2 is in Europe.

[Lancer]

Finally, an answer! I'm finally getting my tranny fixed after the GM dealership told me everything is working fine. (it's funny how the GM dealership says thay can't do anything cause it's a toyota and the toyota dealership says that can't do anything cause it's 'got GM parts in it and they can't hook up thier scanners to it.' Went to a tranny specialist that said yeah it's a little messed up. Said that the clutch is slipping pretty bad and as it slips it gets HOT and glazed. Then slips even more. Then gave me the lecture on 'balancing out the engine mods with tranny upgrades. Getting a shift kit/performance rebuild kit done to it. When he has it apart we'll see if I need to do any work to the torque converter. But for the shift kit/ rebuild kit is only $350's. Was excpecting more like $500. Should also take about .5 seconds off my ET's. I also told him how the Unichip shifts a lot smoother than the TRD ECU. He said for now I should put the TRD back in because smoother shifting means that the clutch is slipping a little (for driver comfort) and there's too long of an overlap in between shifting, which is also for comfort, but is causing the clutch to wear faster. So now the Unichip has to go back AGAIN for like the 6th time in a year! Oh, one more thing http://www.importperformancetrans.com is just like Level Ten, only $100 cheaper.

[ColonelPanic]

Good deal. Get that thing built up a bit! It will help you in the long run for reliability, and get some more performance to boot.

[Petrucci914]

I'll have to have you drive my car, Lancer, and see if it does the same as yours. That's pretty cheap to get that bulked up. The thing is I just flushed mine with friggin Amsoil. Not exactly cheap.

[Lancer]

Sure, anytime. I'm mostly free this weekend and I was hoping to install my tranny cooler and new brake pads.I think I figured out why everything is breaking down. I only have 1 (ONE) payment left on the car!!! Cause it couldn't be from my driving and moding!

[Petrucci914]

So what are they actually doing for 350$? Do they put in a performance clutch or something? What does the shift kit do? And BTW, my headers are on the friggin backorder.

[Lancer]

$350 is for the shift kit, that also includes a rebuild kit I guess cause you have to replace all the gaskets and o-rings once you open the valve body up. And the ones I saw also came with new clutches.The shift kit recalibrates the valve body componets to make the clutch ingage faster and with less overlap shifting between gears. It should be shifting harder so there's less slippage and less heat build up (the number one killer of clutches).The only thing I'm not sure of yet is the labor cost's. The shift kit alone shouldn't be to bad.