Transmission Problems

[Duner]

On my '04 W22, I've had the "gear icon" (Transmission Trouble) come on when I was having problems with the Allison 1000 AND the Actia cluster acting up. The tranny had many different intermittent trouble symptoms, some of which would turn on the "gear icon". It was very inconsistent over a period of 9 months/7000 miles. I was expecting it to get worse so the service guys could witness the problem in a test drive. Instead it cleared up entirely about 4 months/3000 miles ago.

This is from my notes I was taking at the time things were going bonkers:
1) Sometimes it would suddenly downshift on perfectly flat highway and the gear light would come on, then everything goes normal. A year ago this would happen maybe once, maybe not at all on a 300 mile trip. Then it got worse and do it very frequently, maybe 5 times in a 2 hour trip. At the time was a long distance from a Allison service center.
2) Sometimes when we hit a bump it suddenly would down shift and the gear light on, then everything went normal.
3) Sometimes it downshifted from 5th to 4th to 3rd when pulling a mild hill at approx 58-60 mph. Sometimes it would happen on flat road cruising at 60 mph.
4) Once when I left the cruise control on a mild hill we had slowed down to 55 mph it downshifted from 5th to 2nd the gear light and the Check Engine light came on and stayed on. It seemed to go into Limp Mode and engine had little power. Stopped, turned off and everything seemed normal again driving, except Check Engine light stayed on for a while.
5) Once it suddenly dropped out of gear (found a neutral?) & the engine rev'd way up but the tach & speedo went to zero & the IP reset Bells sounding, lights flashing, all gages dropped temporarily. I let off the gas pedal & everything was back to normal.
6) A few times it downshifted for no apparent reason and at the same time the tach dropped to zero rpm.
7) Once I got off the freeway, stopped on the off-ramp, light turned green, stepped on throttle, got a loud clunk, the engine rev'd up (as if was in neutral) and we didn't move. I let off the gas peddle, put tranny in Neutral and back in Drive. We took off and this never happened again.
8) A few times it would not lock up in OD and I noticed that if I gave it gas the engine rpms would go up, but the speed wouldn't change. The speed & tach indicated is was in 5th gear but the torque converter was not locked up. After putting it in different gears and 5-10 min, I realized that clutch plates could be slipping and that it could be doing real damage. I pulled over & checked the tranny fluid level it was ok, color good and no burnt smell. Turned engine off and checked for leaks and burnt smell. Nothing seemed wrong. When this happened again, I found all I had to do was flip the OD switch off and back on again and it would drop into 4th gear and then back to 5th locked up.

Just before the 3 yr warranty was up (that was 2 yrs ago) I had Allison replace the rear main seal which had a slight leak. When I drove to my destination up the 15 mile Cajon Pass, there was a mist of tranny fluid all over my toad and the rear of the mh. The tranny had pushed out excess fluid out the breather on top/rear and everything was soaked with fluid. I checked the level, which was not too high or low. After cleaning up the wet tranny, I've never seen any fluid out the breather again.

The only thing I did that may have fixed the problem is pull all the connectors to the tranny, re-seat them, and cleaned one. I did this about 6 months ago. The connector near the shifting linkage was saturated in tranny fluid on the outside, but seemed pretty clean on the inside. I sprayed this connector with contact cleaner, inside and out. The problems continued but approx. two months later all problems disappeared.

Your experiences and comments are welcome.

[Duner]

On my '04 W22, I've had the "gear icon" (Transmission Trouble) come on when I was having problems with the Allison 1000 AND the Actia cluster acting up. The tranny had many different intermittent trouble symptoms, some of which would turn on the "gear icon". It was very inconsistent over a period of 9 months/7000 miles. I was expecting it to get worse so the service guys could witness the problem in a test drive. Instead it cleared up entirely about 4 months/3000 miles ago.

This is from my notes I was taking at the time things were going bonkers:
1) Sometimes it would suddenly downshift on perfectly flat highway and the gear light would come on, then everything goes normal. A year ago this would happen maybe once, maybe not at all on a 300 mile trip. Then it got worse and do it very frequently, maybe 5 times in a 2 hour trip. At the time was a long distance from a Allison service center.
2) Sometimes when we hit a bump it suddenly would down shift and the gear light on, then everything went normal.
3) Sometimes it downshifted from 5th to 4th to 3rd when pulling a mild hill at approx 58-60 mph. Sometimes it would happen on flat road cruising at 60 mph.
4) Once when I left the cruise control on a mild hill we had slowed down to 55 mph it downshifted from 5th to 2nd the gear light and the Check Engine light came on and stayed on. It seemed to go into Limp Mode and engine had little power. Stopped, turned off and everything seemed normal again driving, except Check Engine light stayed on for a while.
5) Once it suddenly dropped out of gear (found a neutral?) & the engine rev'd way up but the tach & speedo went to zero & the IP reset Bells sounding, lights flashing, all gages dropped temporarily. I let off the gas pedal & everything was back to normal.
6) A few times it downshifted for no apparent reason and at the same time the tach dropped to zero rpm.
7) Once I got off the freeway, stopped on the off-ramp, light turned green, stepped on throttle, got a loud clunk, the engine rev'd up (as if was in neutral) and we didn't move. I let off the gas peddle, put tranny in Neutral and back in Drive. We took off and this never happened again.
8) A few times it would not lock up in OD and I noticed that if I gave it gas the engine rpms would go up, but the speed wouldn't change. The speed & tach indicated is was in 5th gear but the torque converter was not locked up. After putting it in different gears and 5-10 min, I realized that clutch plates could be slipping and that it could be doing real damage. I pulled over & checked the tranny fluid level it was ok, color good and no burnt smell. Turned engine off and checked for leaks and burnt smell. Nothing seemed wrong. When this happened again, I found all I had to do was flip the OD switch off and back on again and it would drop into 4th gear and then back to 5th locked up.

Just before the 3 yr warranty was up (that was 2 yrs ago) I had Allison replace the rear main seal which had a slight leak. When I drove to my destination up the 15 mile Cajon Pass, there was a mist of tranny fluid all over my toad and the rear of the mh. The tranny had pushed out excess fluid out the breather on top/rear and everything was soaked with fluid. I checked the level, which was not too high or low. After cleaning up the wet tranny, I've never seen any fluid out the breather again.

The only thing I did that may have fixed the problem is pull all the connectors to the tranny, re-seat them, and cleaned one. I did this about 6 months ago. The connector near the shifting linkage was saturated in tranny fluid on the outside, but seemed pretty clean on the inside. I sprayed this connector with contact cleaner, inside and out. The problems continued but approx. two months later all problems disappeared.

Your experiences and comments are welcome.

[DriVer]

Allison uses a laptop to connect into the TCM and they can see and diagnose things that are unseen by a Tech II.

All the anomalies that you are writing about appear to me to be electrical connectivity issues. Too weird!

[knebrdr]

Duner,
This is one of those problems that can only be fixed by someone who has seen a similar list of complaints and stumbled across the cure. But since the percentage of failures of this type are most likely low and the total number of vehicles that may experience these symptoms is also low the cure may never be found. However, you do state that there were Actia symptoms also. Have you had the cluster replaced? Did this occur before, during, or after the trans problems went away? From what you are saying I would be leaning towards the cluster either "stealing" the road speed signal or manufacturing one and sending it to the ECM and TCM (if separate units). If you are wondering were my expertise at intuitive repairs comes from, I was with BMW from the days of carburetors to 100% electronically controlled engine and interior management and the problem cars always ended up in my stall. My stories of last chance before the Lemon Law kicked in to just plain running/shifting problems with no Ck lights would entertain you for hours.
Randy

[max49]

Duner, were you driving thru the 'Bermuda Triangle?"

Sorry, I just could'nt resist, but all that does sound pretty strange.
When mine was newer, I had lots of weird electrical problems but it's gotten better with age.
Hope you get get yours figured out.

[Duner]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by max49:
Duner, were you driving thru the 'Bermuda Triangle?" </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
max49,
No ... unless the triangle has been stretched from Vancouver, Canada to Yuma AZ to Richmond, VA. That's a pretty big triangle,... we'd all be in big trouble.

Randy,
I know exactly where you're coming from and how these crazy problems work their way up the chain of experts. Intermittent problems relate to several of the corollary's of Murphy's Law. Like what starts out as one problem when worked on becomes two, then three, etc, new and different and unique problems not related to the original problem depending on how long and how many people work on the original problem.

Back in my youth, while going thru college, I worked night shift testing & aligning Conrac tv monitors. I got very good at troubleshooting and soon that's all I did. The day shift would test and have 2-3 min to fix, otherwise put it on the pallet of rejects. I'd come in the late afternoon to 50-75 reject monitors that 10 guys on the day shift couldn't fix. My challenge was to have those pallets empty before I went home at midnight. The design engineers would come out to have me test the newest prototypes.
When I got my BSEE degree, I worked 35 years in R&D in telecommunications. On the the really tough problems, the buck stopped with me.

If I thought I was damaging the tranny, I would have taken it in asap. If I thought it was going to leave me stranded, I would have taken it in asap. If I wasn't living in the coach full time and didn't have to pay for repairs, I would have taken it in for at least a "code" check. If I was anywhere close to Brazel's or Redlands Truck and RV, I would have taken it in. Keep in mind I'm living off my 401K's and if they went up 40% this year instead of down 40%, I would have spent the bucks to have it looked at.

The original Actia I/P worked fine for me for the 1st 2.5 years. Then there was the I/P re-call and mine was replaced Feb 2006. After that I started getting the infamous erratic I/P going bonkers and an automatic reset back to normal. But never any tranny issues. Then in Oct 2006 I had the tranny rear seal replaced and the fluid all over the back half of the tranny. The intermittent tranny problems started July of 2007. There have been several episodes of I/P acting up simultaneously with the tranny acting up too.

I forgot to add symptom #9) I hit a good bump in the concrete interstate and the I/P tach dropped to zero rpm's while cruising at 63 mph and no tranny issues. I let off on the gas, put in Neutral, then back in Drive, then the tach jumped up to the normal rpm. That only happened once.

Since we've discuss this, I have decided to stop by and see Kieth Shomaker at Redlands RV and have him put his laptop on the TCM and read the stored codes. I'll be passing by his shop in Dec on the way to the sand dunes at Christmas time. I'm trying to get Keith with his sandrail to join us down at Glamis for Xmas before his busy show season starts.

Thanks for all the feedback,

[Max Tunnell]

I had your complaints # 5 and #7 when my coach was about 8 or 9 months old. #7 made the coach undrivable since it was happening whenever the coach was in 1st gear.

It turned out to be a direct short to ground on one of the wires leading from the "ECM" (the computer) to the transmission. When the engine moved on the motor mounts accelerating in 1st gear, it moved the wire and made contact with ground.

They actually found the short, corrected it and there was never another problem.

I had some Actia problems also and eventually had it replaced. That was a completely seperate event, but it was happening when the short occurred and it made things a bit confusing.

[DriVer]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Duner:
Since we've discuss this, I have decided to stop by and see Kieth Shomaker at Redlands RV and have him put his laptop on the TCM and read the stored codes. </div></BLOCKQUOTE> Now that's the best move I've heard all day!