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2009 Won’t Drive Until Engine Warmed Up….

5K views 24 replies 13 participants last post by  Randall 
#1 ·
Car Automotive parking light Wheel Land vehicle Tire

This is my sixth xB….and it’s giving me an issue I’ve not experienced before.

This is an automatic. It will not engage into Drive until the car is completely warmed up. Once the car is warmed up there are no shifting or transmission issues. I sit in front of my house with the car in D and it won’t move forward until it’s fully warmed up and it decides to go. At that point it drives smoothly….no
lurching or hard shifting.

Transmission fluid is full and a good color. It does not pull any codes when hooked up to a scanner.

Has 195k original miles but engine was rebuilt 70k ago.

Has anyone encountered this? And how did you fix it?
 
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#6 ·
View attachment 80399
This is my sixth xB….and it’s giving me an issue I’ve not experienced before.

This is an automatic. It will not engage into Drive until the car is completely warmed up. Once the car is warmed up there are no shifting or transmission issues. I sit in front of my house with the car in D and it won’t move forward until it’s fully warmed up and it decides to go. At that point it drives smoothly….no
lurching or hard shifting.

Transmission fluid is full and a good color. It does not pull any codes when hooked up to a scanner.

Has 195k original miles but engine was rebuilt 70k ago.

Has anyone encountered this? And how did you fix it?
The XB knows there is a cat there and does not want to run over it. LOL, jk
 
#7 ·
View attachment 80399
This is my sixth xB….and it’s giving me an issue I’ve not experienced before.

This is an automatic. It will not engage into Drive until the car is completely warmed up. Once the car is warmed up there are no shifting or transmission issues. I sit in front of my house with the car in D and it won’t move forward until it’s fully warmed up and it decides to go. At that point it drives smoothly….no
lurching or hard shifting.

Transmission fluid is full and a good color. It does not pull any codes when hooked up to a scanner.

Has 195k original miles but engine was rebuilt 70k ago.

Has anyone encountered this? And how did you fix it?
When was the last time the Transmission Fluid/Filter (if it has one) were changed out ?
 
#10 · (Edited)
This could be an electronic issue.

Cold engine coolant temperatures will prevent the transmission from upshifting out of third gear....if the engine coolant temperature is super cold, this will prevent the transmission from upshifting out of second gear.

This hesitation to upshift is by design and it's done in an effort to help the engine rev higher, to produce heat sooner. Lots of things happening with many different temperature & pressure sensors.

That being said, the next time you park your car for the evening, set the parking brake, place the shift lever in neutral, turn off the engine and disconnect the battery......yes I know, doing this will cause the ignition key to be stuck in the ignition lock cylinder for the evening.

Next morning: Reconnect the battery, get in the car and start the car while leaving the gear selector in neutral. Once engine is started, place the shift lever into D and see if the car is drivable. Obviously, disengage the parking brake.

By NOT placing the shift lever in park when you turn off the engine, and disconnecting the battery, you cause the PCM to NOT initiate a "cold start" cycle the next morning when everything is actually cold.

Do this and then report back here with the results.

You don't need a new transmission if it shifts fine once warm. Chances are all that's needed is one of the following items:
Trans temp sensor.
Line pressure solenoid.
Line pressure sensor.
Shift engagement solenoid.
Shift engagement valve.
PCM reprogrammed.
Or worse case scenario, a rebuilt valve body.

If you eventually DON'T resolve this problem, take the car to an independent repair shop and pay the $200ish for a bi-directional scan/command diagnostic service.

Whatever you do, DO NOT take the car to a transmission specific "repair" shop for a diagnostic. Those types of repair shops have bad business practices. I mean, .....they always want to get you to spend more than what's necessary.

I worked at quite a few transmission shops before working for Toyota. I'll tell ya, every single one of those transmission shops operated the same. They refused to perform simple repairs and pushed customers towards buying a rebuilt transmission.

Think about it: If I'm working at a transmission shop and I replace three transmissions in one day and each customer is paying a Flat Rate Fee of $3,000 per transmission, that's a total of $9,000 income for the shop in a single day from the work I perform.

On the other hand, let's say I REPAIR three transmissions in one day....the customer now is not paying a Flat Rate Fee, the customer is now paying an Hourly Rate Fee of $120 per service hour. So, $120 X 3 service hours to repair the customers transmission is $360. ...so if three customers are each paying $360 for service hours to repair transmissions, the shop only gets $1,080 for the entire day.

Hmmm.......would a transmission shop rather earn $1,080 repairing transmissions or would they rather earn $9,000 replacing them?
 
#11 ·
This could be an electronic issue.

Cold engine coolant temperatures will prevent the transmission from upshifting out of third gear....if the engine coolant temperature is super cold, this will prevent the transmission from upshifting out of second gear.

This hesitation to upshift is by design and it's done in an effort to help the engine rev higher, to produce heat sooner. Lots of things happening with many different temperature & pressure sensors.

That being said, the next time you park your car for the evening, set the parking brake, place the shift lever in neutral, turn off the engine and disconnect the battery......yes I know, doing this will cause the ignition key to be stuck in the ignition lock cylinder for the evening.

Next morning: Reconnect the battery, get in the car and start the car while leaving the gear selector in neutral. Once engine is started, place the shift lever into D and see if the car is drivable. Obviously, disengage the parking brake.

By NOT placing the shift lever in park when you turn off the engine, and disconnecting the battery, you cause the PCM to NOT initiate a "cold start" cycle the next morning when everything is actually cold.

Do this and then report back here with the results.

You don't need a new transmission if it shifts fine once warm. Chances are all that's needed is one of the following items:
Trans temp sensor.
Line pressure solenoid.
Line pressure sensor.
Shift engagement solenoid.
Shift engagement valve.
PCM reprogrammed.
Or worse case scenario, a rebuilt valve body.

If you eventually DON'T resolve this problem, take the car to an independent repair shop and pay the $200ish for a bi-directional scan/command diagnostic service.

Whatever you do, DO NOT take the car to a transmission specific "repair" shop for a diagnostic. Those types of repair shops have bad business practices. I mean, .....they always want to get you to spend more than what's necessary.

I worked at quite a few transmission shops before working for Toyota. I'll tell ya, every single one of those transmission shops operated the same. They refused to perform simple repairs and pushed customers towards buying a rebuilt transmission.

Think about it: If I'm working at a transmission shop and I replace three transmissions in one day and each customer is paying a Flat Rate Fee of $3,000 per transmission, which is a total of $9,000 income for the shop in a single day.

On the other hand, let's say I REPAIR three transmissions in one day, and the customer is now paying an hourly rate of $120 per service hour. So, $120 X 3 service hours is $360. ...so if three customers are each paying $360 for service hours the shop only gets $1,080 for the entire day.

Hmmm.......would a transmission shop rather earn $1,080 repairing transmissions or would they rather earn $9,000 replacing them?
Thank you so much for sharing your expertise and knowledge. Very informative!
 
#19 ·
View attachment 80399
This is my sixth xB….and it’s giving me an issue I’ve not experienced before.

This is an automatic. It will not engage into Drive until the car is completely warmed up. Once the car is warmed up there are no shifting or transmission issues. I sit in front of my house with the car in D and it won’t move forward until it’s fully warmed up and it decides to go. At that point it drives smoothly….no
lurching or hard shifting.

Transmission fluid is full and a good color. It does not pull any codes when hooked up to a scanner.

Has 195k original miles but engine was rebuilt 70k ago.

Has anyone encountered this? And how did you fix it?
View attachment 80399
This is my sixth xB….and it’s giving me an issue I’ve not experienced before.

This is an automatic. It will not engage into Drive until the car is completely warmed up. Once the car is warmed up there are no shifting or transmission issues. I sit in front of my house with the car in D and it won’t move forward until it’s fully warmed up and it decides to go. At that point it drives smoothly….no
lurching or hard shifting.

Transmission fluid is full and a good color. It does not pull any codes when hooked up to a scanner.

Has 195k original miles but engine was rebuilt 70k ago.

Has anyone encountered this? And how did you fix it?
Did you ever resolve the problem?
 
#21 ·
View attachment 80399
This is my sixth xB….and it’s giving me an issue I’ve not experienced before.

This is an automatic. It will not engage into Drive until the car is completely warmed up. Once the car is warmed up there are no shifting or transmission issues. I sit in front of my house with the car in D and it won’t move forward until it’s fully warmed up and it decides to go. At that point it drives smoothly….no
lurching or hard shifting.

Transmission fluid is full and a good color. It does not pull any codes when hooked up to a scanner.

Has 195k original miles but engine was rebuilt 70k ago.

Has anyone encountered this? And how did you fix it?
My second scion it does the same thing. I flushed the trans three times and added Lucas Transmission Fluid (ATF) Conditioner all three times. It only does it every now and then. how long does it take to go into drive? mine took 2 minutes
 
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