Saturn Tansmission Problems

May 25, 2004 3 Replies

The Customer who's Saturn I just did a engine swap on called me yesterday. The Engine runs fine, but now the transmission is having an issue.



The customer purchased this car with a bad engine. Every thing other then the engine was supposed to be alright. When I swaped engines I did not take the torque converter out, nor did I need to pull the radiator (enough room with it in), so I did not need to disconnect the transmission cooler lines.



Once running, I checked the transmission fluid after cycling the shifter thru the gear ranges. Then I let the car idle for 45 minutes (15 with the A/C on to test for over heating), then checked the transmission fluid level again.



When the customer came to pick the car up, I had not had a chance to road test, and informed them of that. Yet when I moved the car around my shop revserse and drive gears engaged correctly. Although I did not move faster then idle (as not to kick stones up on the car).



When the customer called me, they told me the transmission is: Reving up, clunking, then engauging Reverse. I checked with a transmission tech I know who was a bit stumped. He suggested trying to drive it, and recheck transmission fluid levels, and to change the fluid and externial filter.



I kind of feel bad for the customer as they just spent $755 parts & labor on this engine swap. I would hope I could adviod the extra charges for them of me having to swapout transmissions.



Specs: 1993 SL2 1.9 Twin Cam, automatic with perfromance mode (shift selector only goes to 2nd like on 94 to 97 F-bodies)



Any Ideas? Charles


The customer purchased the vehical totally in-operable. The previous owner said everything was good. Yet we all know how that goes. The car probably sat non running for a year to a year and a half.

The Customer was/is pleased with my service, Ialready have 4 other vehicals from him waiting to come in for service 1 transmission job, one engine, one rear end, and one mystery front end problem.

I don't do many Saturns (although I may start to do more, since they are more commen around here now). That said I am not an automatic transmission specialist by any means. Basic automatic transmission services I can do. My business partner does more of that (TH350, TH400 & TH200R4 rebuilds). Yet like me he is new to the saturn heavy service thing.

Is there a PCM for the transmission? If so, where is it located at? will it give a reading thru the ALDL? Ifso I can pick up a catridge for my pathfinder scan tool. If it's a problem between the PCM and transmission it would probably be something simple like crushed wire, or a bad connection. I hope. Charles excuse the worse then normial typing. I really did a number on my left hand driving a post-roll over S-10.

transmission

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