I just got a great deal on this car, its an 04 automatic and it has its issues, but right now the one I want to finger out first is this weirdness going into drive. It doesn't always do it, which is just so awesome because intermittent behaviors are super, but sometimes when you put it in drive it will jerk forward and viewed from the outside it looks like the rear end takes a pretty good hit kind of like you'd see with a manual transmission with someone inexperienced on the clutch. Car doesn't die or anything when this happens and after the initial jerk it drives around just fine. If someone could tell me what transmission I actually have that would be super helpful too. If a rebuild is in order, thats usually something I find a book on and do myself and I just want to make sure I shop up parts for the right transmission when it comes to that. almost 160k miles on the car so its probably long overdue for some love.

 

At what rpm does it idle?
Does it also do this when put in reverse?

I wouldn't jump to rebuild just yet, might make more sense to just get another used 04-05 automatic. Usually the engines die before the trans, so there should be good supply.

 

It seems to idle at 3 rpm ranges. with 70 degree ambient temps the initial idle is about 1500, after a minute or so it drops to what I guess would be the 1250 mark and it stays there until the temperature gauge starts moving, once the temp gauge reaches about the second or third little mark the idle drops down to about 1000.

It does not do it in reverse, shifting to reverse you don't feel it at all but the car is perfectly happy to move the moment you start lifting off the brake.

 

Do you have an OBD reader? I would check your exact warm idle speed and airflow grams/second and report back. 1000 is high for warm idle, which could be causing the jump. It would do it in reverse as well in that case, but worth validating the engine is o
​​​​perating as expected before diving into the trans.

Is your trans fluid level OK?

 

It occurs to me that I should have checked the fluid sooner, and I may just be an idiot lol where even is the dipstick for the transmission? I can find the engine one easily enough but I can't find a thing for the transmission. Wow that picture is enormous - sorry about that - looks like given about 5 to 7 more minutes of idling the idle came down a little further and this is what my scanner gave me. Who knew screenshots on my phone got so big. At this rpm the weirdness is lessened but still very much noticeable, but only in drive. I also discovered with the scanner an intake valve control solenoid code - could that have an impact what this is doing? code is P0076. There are other codes too but not related to this issue.

 

Found it! Was tucked away under some vacuum lines everything just looked black lol. Fluid level is a touch low it looks like so I will remedy that before doing any other troubleshooting. Fluid looks good though, doesnt look or smell burnt, still a nice red color.

 

Hi Everyone,

Im having trouble with my 04 automatic. The car has recently been rebuilt, along with the torque converter being replaced. Some of the transmission fluid was lossed due to this component being swapped ( I think ).

The problem i'm having is the car sounds very electric, no idea why.

I've done some searching and maybe its transmission hum?
Which would make sense as there is less oil.

But what I cannot figure out, is two things:

How to read the automatic dipstick.

How to top up the transmisison oil.

Any help is appreciated.