While searching the internet for info I found your newsgroup and I'm hoping some of you can venture knowledgeable opinions on this failure.
Some background...We bought our 2000 Camry (4 cyl, A/T) in Sept, 2000 from our local dealer in Santa Rosa, CA. It was driven from another Northern Calif. dealership who had the right color, and we picked it up with 135 miles on the odometer. The car now has less than 21,000 miles on it, since my wife drives it mostly for local errands and its longest one-way journey has probably been 150 miles. I have always done my own minor auto maintenance and have watched fluid levels, etc. on this car. Car is always garaged at night & has never leaked a drop of fluid or motor oil on the floor. Fluid color and smell were as they should be. Fluid level has also always been right on. Because the Camry maintenance guide doesn't call for A/T fluid to be changed until at least 60,000 miles, the pan had never been off it since I owned it. We've had no problems of any sort with the car until a few weeks ago.
The problem...Just before Christmas, my wife found herself needing to rev the engine to 1500 RPM to get the car to move from a stop...very frustrating and a little scarey for her in downtown traffic. I did a test drive that night, suspected low fluid level, but that wasn't the problem. The next morning I couldn't even back it out of the garage and had it towed to a very reputable local transmission shop. They checked the easy stuff, then disassembled to where they could check the shift solenoids. Nothing showed up, so I OK'd removing the tranny and doing whatever was needed. Bottom line is that both the reverse and low gear clutch packs were burned up. The mechanic said that, typically, this would happen when fluid level got low. I told him it had never been low. He said then maybe when the fluid was changed. I said it never had been. He said well why did it have this cheap aftermarket cork gasket on it; factory pan installation uses a bead of silicone as a seal!
The puzzle...does anyone know for certain that the factory always used silicone seals on this vintage transmission? As an engineer I know that, statistically, if average transmission life is 200,000 mile, there will be a few that go 500,000 and a few that, because of unfortunate stackup of part tolerances, for example, might last only 20,000 miles. But in this case I think I smell a rat. The transmission had never behaved improperly until 24 hours before towing into the shop. Still unresolved is whether the torque converter contributed in any way. When the rebuilder cuts it open we'll find out whether anything had failed there.
I will appreciate any insights, suspicions or questions that might help me pursue solving this mystery. I doubt that I'll recover any of my $2900 loss, but I'm thinking someone was into that transmission before I ever got the "brand new" car.
Anyway, thanks for reading this lengthy post.
Cheers, Dave Burson