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02 GT bangs into gear when cold

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skeelo58

New member
I've been searching around the forums for a bit now, trying to find a similar problem that I am having, but so far have come up empty. Hopefully you guys can help me out?

Basically what is happening is that if I start my car up, and don't let it warm up for 2-3 minutes, it will shift into D extremely hard. I'm talking like I'm thinking one of these days the transmission is gonna just fall off the car. However, if the car has warmed up, it will shift into D just fine. Reverse seems to be OK regardless of whether or not the car has warmed up or not.

What could be a possible problem here? The car has 131k miles. I've checked the tranny fluid level, and it is fine. Any help is appreciated.
 


mine bangs like that in reverse. hows the tranny fluid looking tho? might be a good time to do a pan drop.
 
Well, there's no other "slipping", but it started to do this thing like when I am driving between 30-60 mph, if I try to maintain a constant speed by pressing on the gas, it will hang at about 2k rpms, and then bang out of that gear kinda hard and drop to about 1500 rpm. It does this with cruise control too. For example, I can be cruising at 55 mph, and hit R/A a couple times to bump it up to 58. As soon as it is done accelerating to 58, it will bang out of that gear again.

But, I'm willing to try anything. 2 people have said to replace the mounts, so I might have to try that. Is is a job I can do by myself, or would I need to take it to a professional?
 
it's pretty simple there is a how-to on here. You might want to clean the maf and tb first and see if that makes a diff.
 


its not coming out of gear, thats your torque converter locking/unlocking. when its cold out the trans fluid is a little thicker and will take a little longer to warm up and thin out. could be that the fluid just hasnt built up pressure enough yet before you put it into drive.

if its dropping gear the rpms will shoot way up and the car will slow down right away. if you shift the car into 3rd at 55 on the highway youll see what im talking about.
 
So does that mean that I have a Torque Converter problem instead? I've heard that is a common problem on these cars anyways....
 
Many times faulty sensors will cause slam shifting like that........and not always showing "engine codes" on the dash, but logging "sub codes" that can only be discovered by using a PCM scanner.........not a reader.
Recently, on my 98 Chevy pickup, I was having similar problems but showing no code at all. A scan of the PCM using such a scanner showed that I had an input speed sensor that wasn't working properly. I changed it out and it shifted perfectly.

A TPS (throttle positioning sensor) will cause slam shifting also (and is very common) but it will usually show a code (check engine).
Taking a ride with someone who has such a scanner (usually $500-$1000) will diagnose the problem correctly, if it is in fact an underlying problem.....

Best of luck
 
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