Long story short.. my transmission has been acting up lately. The CEL used to come and go but the last two weeks it has been staying on.

The car used to get stuck in 3rd gear on and off but lately it has not been shifting passed 3rd gear at all.

I took the car to a few shops to get it looked at and these codes popped up:











So this morning i resetted the ECU by unplugging the battery and plugging it back in, seemed to temporarily fix the problem however I know its not a permanent fix.

My question, with all these codes is if it is worth it to spend $200+ for the dealer to flush the transmission fluid? I am not sure if flushing the fluid at this point will be any help. I was quoted $1700 to rebuild the transmission or another shop has a used transmission with 50k miles on it and is asking $2100 to do the swap. One shop (very reputable here on CL) who is familiar with this problem has said that replacing the shift solenoid will fix it but not for long, since he has run into problems not too long after replacing the solenoid.



What do you guys think??

Car is 2006 with almost 120k miles. The previous owner who worked at Lexus said he flushed the transmission fluid prior to me purchasing it at 94k miles.

 

The problem is with the Selonoid so changing the tranny fluid wont do anything for you. Since the replacement tranny only have 50k miles.l,Maybe replacing is a better option.

 

That was my thinking..

Anyone else have any experience with this that can chime in? Any success stories from changing the solenoid?

 

I had exactly the same solenoid error code over a year ago. If i cleared the codes it will eventually come back and I used to get random power lag, and from time to time i got the same pending code regarding torque convertor. Dealer tested all solenoids and one was faulty and replaced it. Its been fine since, but tranny has never felt the same since.

 

replacing the solenoid (~$700) is probably better than rebuilding the whole thing...

 

Can't you find one online for cheaper then $700

 

Aren't the solenoids fairly easy to replace? Don't you just have to drain the transmission, drop the pan and remove the valve body (or not depending), pull and replace the solenoid then reassemble? A solenoid should only cost around $200 plus $20 for new filter/gasket and maybe $30 in oil. I have never done this but I imagine it wouldn't take more than 3 hours.

 

well... next question. Anyone in socal know a good place that is familiar with these transmissions?