Long story shortened- My daughters 94 Maxima had the transmission fail recently. It was like it was in neutral in every gear except reverse, which worked fine. I drove it home in reverse. I removed and disassembled the transmission and found the high clutch pack was metal to metal. There was no fibre at all on the discs. I purchased a rebuild kit with all three clutch packs, o-rings, seals and gaskets and installed them. I also replaced the planetary assembly because a couple of the shims were disintegrated and throughout the transmission. Once it was reassembled, I would have to tap the accelerator pedal to get it to engage the clutch, but even then it still slipped in all gears (slightly). I thought it was a fluid pressure problem so I removed the transmission and disassembled it again to inspect the pump. I found no problem with the pump or anything else inside of the transmission. I inspected the valve body and everything there seems to be in working order, i.e. all valves that are spring loaded snap back into place and the ones that aren't spring loaded move freely in their cylinder. The shift solenoid resistances are all in the middle of their tollerance range. I feel comfortable about the condition/assembly of the interior of the transmission but am wondering about the shift solenoids. Do they have a history of leaking by, or not seating off properly and allowing a low fluid pressure condition that would cause the transmission to slip? Upon assembly the second time, the results were similar to the first, except I didn't notice slipping in gears "1" or "2". Drive and reverse have a very noticable slip and still require a tap on the accelerator to engage the clutches. My next move is to try to find a solenoid assembly in the junk yard, and hope they are good, to see if they make any difference. Any thoughts and/or suggestions would be greatly appreciated .
- posted
18 years ago