mckellyb

A few weeks back, my wife's RX wouldn't engage reverse. It seemed to slam into gear when it finally did.

Odd. Didn't do it again, though.

Transmission fluid level is fine, I change it every 20K with Castrol Multi-Import synthetic (used to do Toyota's synthetic, but this is easier/less expensive to purchase, and it's 100% compatible).

Last Tuesday, my wife calls and says Princess will not go into reverse. Eventually it does, but she said it took like 20 minutes.

Later in the week, we were out-and-about, and whadda know, she's suddenly shifting strangely. Not smooth, kinda 'jumpy'. Reverse, again, took a long time to engage.

Parked Princess...wife went about a mile to go get some fast food later that day. She said she didn't think Princess was going to make it back, it was like the brakes kept being applied at random.

This isn't good...sounds like a $2,500 trans rebuild is in my immediate future.

First, though, it's been about 60K miles since I changed the filter. Let's see what it, and the pan magnets, look like.

Oh.

The magnets are a solid 50% larger from clutch particulate, and the filter/pan all have a very light metallic sheen to them.

Put in a new filter, five quarts of fluid, and took her out. All better!!!!

I know ours is low mileage, with only 132K on it, but still, if you suddenly have transmission problems, try changing the filter.

Of the at least 10 automagic transmission vehicles I've owned (not including the other three my wife has since I've known her), this is the first one in which a clogged transmission filter has not only happened, but caused this kind of transmission behavior weirdness.

So instead of $2,500, it was $23 for a filter, and I have a few boxes of trans fluid in stock for changing it regularly...figure another $30 for it. Less than $60, and she's just fine...at least for now.

hypervish

Time to start pricing out rebuilds, like you said "she's just fine....at least for now".