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Worst Automatic Transmissions Ever Built?
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Most "rebuilds" aren't.
Earl Schieb paint job and a set of seat covers!
The advertised price at that time was 29.95.
The trick was to remove as many emblems, mouldinge, etc as you could before bringing your car in. Otherwise they would be painted over.
The other trick was to find the painter who would do your car and slip him 10.00.
Still, you got what you paid for. Many a nice car was ruined by those 29.95 paint jobs.
Not to cost. The factory put a brand new transmission in my 2000 Intrepid that had only 3,000 miles. The technician told me the cost of the job, which was picked up by Chrysler, would have been about $3,200 if I had to pay for it. They think the casing had a bad casting and would not hold the transmission pump in place, so they just took it out and shipped a new unit down and installed it.
The tech told me the newer trannies from 98 model year on have been better, they all have coolers installed, and different fluids now.
Yours only went 3000 miles?
Good Luck!
Anyway, I have a co-worker with a 2000 Lincoln LS that was ready for its second tranny after about 6000 miles. And the tranny is about to go on my mom & stepdad's 99 Altima, which has about 25,000 miles on it. And these cars see much lighter duty than mine, being used mainly for 40-50 mile commutes to work in mostly highway driving. My mom's previous car, a '91 Stanza, at least went about 120,000 miles before its transmission started to go.
Jsylvester, good luck w/ your Intrepid! $3200 is a heckuva lot of money in my opinion, although I knew one guy, another delivery driver, who had to replace a tranny in a Subaru Impreza wagon...I think it was over $4000 (can't remember the exact figure...I mentioned it in one of these forums awhile back but can't find it now). I have an extended warranty on my Intrepid, so if the tranny goes within the first 100K miles, I should only have to pay the $200 deductible. If it goes at 101K miles, time to junk the car, 'cause I'm sure it's not going to be worth $3200 by that time!!
-Andre
Just wanted to get the facts (more or less) straight!
-Andre
2.The longest lasting automatics for me have best the GM TH400 in Chev and the one in my Volvo 240 (oringinal over 200k mi.)
3. I am now looking at buying a 1996-1993 pickup but don't want to get one of the "lemon" years of the Ford ( AOD ) or GM ( 700R4 / 4L60 ) automatics. Could one of you transmission experts here on the Town Hall BBS please discuss these and post some links.
Thanks
#2. '75 Olds Starfire, 231 V6, cast iron 4spd standard. One new years eve (yeah, you can figure out the details on that one) I missed a speed shift from second to third at about 65 and went into first. Cool part was that the syncs were good enough to do it, second cool part was that after recovering from taking that old piece of "stagger-fire" iron to over 6000rpm, the tranny and engine went another 50Kmiles without problem.
#3. '79 Olds Cutlass Calais. This was the good one, rear wheel drive, touring suspension, sharp looker. Had the Chevy 305 w/4bbl from the factory. Also the 3spd TH200 that was falling out of cars all over the country. Mine had a very soft whine when accelerating hard through second gear. Took it in to have it looked at and was given a "yeah, it's noisey, but everything looks okay" Sold the car five years and 70K miles later. Tranny still made the same noise but never gave one minute of trouble.
Jim
I would like to argue with Isellhondas about the Mazda MPV transmission. It smooths out as the car is broken in, and runs fine for us right now. In terms of hunting for gears, it doesn't do that in hilly country if you turn off the Cruise control. The owners of 10 and 12 year old MPV's I talked to loved their vans, and many are still going strong. This van is head and shoulders above the Ford products, and may be more reliable than the Odyssey. time will tell. It certainly is easy to drive and park in the big city, and is big enough for our needs.
Diana
Ask any transmission rebuilder.
But then you never know...you may drive 200,000 miles and neve have a problem.
Actually, I thought that Ford had solved, for the most part, the Taurus/Sable transmission woes by 1994? Perhaps not.
By the same token, I once took in a 1988 Taurus with the 3.8 engine. 165,000 miles and neve a transmission problem.
Go figure!
Jaguar XJ6 in the 1970s.
Saab automatics up to recently.
The first time I drove one, in a '62 Grand Prix, I was sure the transmission was shot. Then I found out they all perform like that. The only car I ever owned or drove that was comfortable with that huge gap between first and second was a '64 GP with the 421. Apparently the engine had enough torque to pull it without falling on its face.
GM came out with a number of engineering "innovations" during that time, and most of them would have put a smaller company out of business.
The car was a pretty good performer, but just felt strange with only 2 gears!
-Andre
had to get loan from credit union for repairs. Out of warrantly. Love those German built automatic LOVE BUGS...
SHUCKS!!
The slim jim...always felt like they were slipping until they finally wouldn't move.
But I still think Buick's miserable Dual Path used in Buick Specials from 61-63 were probably the worst. The trans pan was help in place by ONE bolt through the middle.
VW Auto Sticks were a riot. If you rested your hand on the shifter they went into neutral. I saw a guy do this while revving the engine in first gear. When he yanked his hand off the shifter the VW almost pulled a wheelie! It was hilarous. Bet that transmission didn't last long!
has anyone else here ever had the priveledge of re building one of these things? I did at 18 years old with a factory shop manual in hand. what a job!! overhaul kit was cheap though....
the mechanic I borrowed the shop manual from said the most common complaint other than no shift at all from 1st, was the selector would not go into reverse from park while the engine was running.(my symptom) the problem wound up being that the govenor had reduced itself to a mass of twisted metal in the tailshaft....
i agree with the other posters comments, thinking something was wrong as soon as they took their new car for a test drive!!
how about those 1st to 2nd shifts??
it felt to me like the car was being towed with a huge rubber band,, as soon as the car hit second gear you felt like you were being thrust forward quickly.. a wierd sensation.
my brother had a 1965 olds. that transmission was a huge improvement. it never did fail, well over 100k on that car..
Whenever we appraise a Taurus/Sable we ask the customer if they have replaced the transmission.
If the answer is no, we REALLY drive it carefully to make sure it's not messing up. After that we will wholesale the car. Not worth taking a chance.
Aaron
After checking it the service writer told me "they all do that". I was calmly (I thought) pointing out that a) I doubted that and b) it had just started doing it after almost three years and c) offering to seat test the other Mystiques on the lot when a tech casually walked over and stood next to the writer, both of them looking like they were ready to call security.
Maybe that's what you should do. It didn't get me anywhere of course but I felt better.
Happy Motoring,
Aaron
Bring back the 727!
You have a P6 or SD1???
Neat!
Bill with the PA Vauxhall in FL
Actully, those weren't that bad. They were really pretty rugged.
It wasn't until 1953 that they would start in low and shift to second if they were in "drive".
As a result they were pretty sluggish fron a start. Uh...make that VERY sluggish unless you manually shifted them.
The bonus was the powerglide models came with the 235 engine instead of the 216. The 235's had full pressure lubrication and were bullitproof.
Let's get this right, O.K.?
A few late 99 early 2000 V-6 Accords and Odysseys were affected. A vendor changed some part without telling Honda about it. This would cause a "clunk" while backing up. Honda was blindsided by this. Personally I never heard the "clunk" in any of the hundreds I've driven.
The problem did exist, however, on some of the production. These were fixed under warranty.
Hardly "quite alarming".
And..Anselmo...this is a "classics" forum.
You have posted the same message elsewhere.
Anyway, I have a friend with a 1998 Tracker, and the shop just told him he needs a new transmission. They said they could put in a used one for $1700, which sounds awfully steep to me. In contrast, the place I bought my Gran Fury from said that if its tranny ever went out, they'd throw in another used one for $300.00!
Here's a little history on his Tracker...around 28,000 miles, it started acting up. I forget what, exactly, but the dealership fixed it under warranty. Then, around the 50K mark or so, it had to go back, again fixed under warranty. This time they did what they called an "overhaul" which would have run about $750 if it had been out-of-pocket.
Now, it's got around 77K or so miles on it. It was All-Tune and Lube, who told him he needs a new tranny. I'm going to have my mechanic give it a second opinion though. Are these things that unreliable though, that they have to go in for repairs every 25K miles or so?
As for symptoms, he said that it's holding the gears too long before it shifts, and really over-revving before it changes gears. My '82 Cutlass Supreme did the same thing, and needed to be rebuilt. Actually, I forget what was wrong with it, but they said it was $150 to fix it, but it might have the same problem again in a year, or $675 to rebuild. I thought I'd keep that car forever (kept it just over a year, it turned out), so I splurged for the rebuild.
His warranty was up at 60K miles, and I'm also wondering if they just tried to nurse the tranny along so that it would get him through the warranty period. Since he's had problems since it was under warranty, and it was never really fixed (getting it to last another 25K miles before breaking again doesn't constitute "fixing" to me!), would he have any recourse with Chevrolet?
Last time I had to have a tranny rebuilt, it was a '79 Newport, and it was only $650! While that's nothing to reference against, how much more complicated could a Tracker tranny be? It's still a 3-speed automatic, and still RWD.
Thanks for any info
-Andre
PS: Can this qualify for one of the worst automatics ever built? ;-) Maybe we could shoehorn in a Chrysler 4-speed automatic from an '89 Dynasty for improved reliability ;-)