Automatic transmission problems

[clive_homewood]

I have a saab 93 arc 2002 automatic. Bit old but worked great other than the car jumping a bit from cold when you first put it into drive. A saab mechanic told me to have the auto gearbox oil change. however I did not do it straight away I thought i would wait for the service to get it done. However saab in our area has now closed and I took it to a normal garage. They changed the gearbox oil and brought it back.

Now it only has 1st and 2nd gears. If you put it in third gear using manual selection there is no drive at all.

the garage said it is not their problem. i checked the auto oil and it was just under its minimun level. so i topped it up.

this has done nothing. does this mean the gearbox is now duff and what could the garage have done to cause this. i previously drove the car 60miles a day no problem.

any ideas anyone

thanks clive

[93-conv]

hi,
did you solve this problem!!



ray

[clive_homewood]

no not yet. I took it to saab at 25mph with only two gears. i.e 1st and 2nd. Saab said the oil used was the wrong type and they had damaged the gear box. The garage that did it said it is just one of those things and it must have been on its way out and saab are only trying to get work out of me. so can not yet find out what they did as saab said they would need to take it out and find out what the problem was and do a report on it. They want around £1000 to do this. So have now given the garage 7 days to pay for value of the car and money spent so far. They have told me they will not pay. The garage is called unique services ltd at milton keynes. UK. they are very unique. So starting court proceedings on friday. Saab were very good lent me a car for a week for £20. Fun days a head.

clive

[93-conv]

Hi Clive,

What a bummer! Only reason I asked was I had a problem with my auto box and it turned out despite the transmission light coming on the dashboard and staying in a low gear all it was the oil was low, I filled it up and touch wood 300 miles later smooth changes etc.
While not suggesting you did it incorrectly, but did you check the oil when car was running, this was my mistake, also you don’t mention if the trans light is on, if you have any fault with gearbox i would be surprised if it did not light up, and a cheap code reader will inform you of what the fault is!
as for saab wanting £1000 to ?????

Let me know I can go into more detail

Cheers

ray

[clive_homewood]

the garage did not know there was a dip stik on the box. but i checked it and it was at the right level. there was no warning on the dash. saab flushed it out with 10 ltrs of the correct fluid. this did not solve anything. saab said the fluid put in by the garage was to thin and the wrong fluid etc.

regards clive

[Burnsside42]

I wonder what that "wrong type" of fluid was? Saab uses normal ATF in most of their cars. But yes - IF they did indeed use the WRONG fluid type then THEY are the ones who owe you a transmission or at least a refund for w/e repairs it requires to be right again. I would not have them fix it since they made it fail in the first place. Get all your documents in order and have a lawyer give them a letter on his letter head addressing they make it right or you will go legal. That's my .02

[93-conv]

I wonder what that "wrong type" of fluid was? Saab uses normal ATF in most of their cars. But yes - IF they did indeed use the WRONG fluid type then THEY are the ones who owe you a transmission or at least a refund for w/e repairs it requires to be right again. I would not have them fix it since they made it fail in the first place. Get all your documents in order and have a lawyer give them a letter on his letter head addressing they make it right or you will go legal. That's my .02

hi Clive,

totally agree re above,
threaten them with the media, watchdog etc, check their site always looking for "rogue dealers"
surprised that the Saab dealer with all their Wizardry ( tech2 etc ) can not give you at least a clue as to what the fault might be!

Best of luck

Ray

[clive_homewood]

Ended up taking them to court. The judge being a jeep nutter, new the importance of putting the correct fluid in the gearbox and took the garage apart. I got awarded damages. i.e the money back I had paid out. However although it made me fill better, it has not helped. The car is only worth about £1400 and is in good condition, but the gearbox is going to cost around £500 + vat as it was only used during 2002-2003 so there are not many of them around + fitting. Etc.
The gearbox part number is FA57201 12785050. Which is quite rare. So I still have the problem of if he is going to pay or not and if he does do I fix or scrap the car. Scrap value I will only get around £200 if lucky. So more problems now