Hi there. Your car has a safety switch on the transmission that will only allow the vehicle to start in park gear with an automatic transmission. If you’re having problems with the shifter, it’s quite possible that either the shifting lever is dirty, or clogged with debris and needs to be cleaned or there is a bracket under the shifter that is damaged. In either case, having a professional mobile mechanic come to your location and complete a car is hard to shift inspection is the best way to resolve this problem.
How to Identify and Fix Common car Problems ?
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Common reasons for this to happen:
Transmission cables usually break due to stretching, which happens over time or can result due to speed shifting or jamming the car into gear. Stretched Transmission Cable: Prior to breaking, a transmission cable will stretch. When this happens the car may be hard to put in park.
When a shifter becomes hard to move, it is usually the interlock cable. AKA, shift cable. This cable slides in a housing and connects directly to the transmission. When this cables becomes worn, it gets hard to move inside the housing.
You most likely have a faulty brake light switch. While it seems like your transmission and brake lights aren`t related, they are; there`s a switch attached to the brake pedal which activates your lights when depressed, and the same switch activates a solenoid on your shifter to allow you to shift out of park.
If your vehicle refuses or struggles to change gears, you are more than likely facing a problem with your transmission system. Low or incorrect types of transmission fluid could be the reason why your vehicle is refusing to switch gears.
Bad habits such as parking without the handbrake, changing gears incorrectly, and shifting an automatic transmission before the car comes to a complete stop can cause your transmission to wear out prematurely.
Transmission won`t engage or stay in gear
If when you put your vehicle into gear and it won`t move, this may be a problem with low transmission fluid due to a leak, the shifter, shifter cable, or it could even be a problem in the valve body of your automatic transmission.
Not Enough Gear Oil If your transmission is leaking oil or you do not change it periodically, you will have less oil in the gear. Once this happens, there will be damage to your transmission and it will eventually become hard to shift it. There may even be strange noises or poor vehicle performance symptoms too.”
Let`s put your mind to rest. In most cases, having a transmission that shifts hard (or one that slips gears) is not the end of the world—or even the end of the transmission. It`s not necessarily a hard thing to fix, as long as you do take action and don`t let the problem become worse.
You experience delayed gear shifting and a sense of pulling or slipping when trying to shift between gears. The vehicle will not downshift as you slow down. An inability for the solenoid valve to operate may prevent your car from downshifting, and the engine will continue to rev as you attempt to brake.
If the sound resembles humming, buzzing, or clunking, you may be experiencing transmission failure. Bad automatic transmissions may emit humming, buzzing, or whining noises while manual transmissions have harsher “clunking” sounds.
1. At the top of all auto repair experts lists for causes of problematic transmissions is low transmission fluid. Usually caused by a leak somewhere in the system, low or contaminated fluid makes it nearly impossible for the transmission to automatically shift gears and run smoothly.
The main reason the car won`t go into gear is that the level of transmission fluid in the vehicle is lower than required. If the level is low despite regular maintenance, there may be a leak. Transmission fluid, therefore, is important to ensure that the car`s moving parts are properly lubricated for functioning.
But a blown fuse No. 38 becomes a likely candidate causing a loss of power to the transmission solenoids.
Your automatic transmission has a device known as a parking pawl. This device locks the transmissions output shaft, preventing it from moving when your shifter is in Park. This device resembles a pin, that functions by engaging a notched ring attached to the transmission`s output shaft when in `P” Park position.
A damaged fin or bearing in the torque converter can cause hesitation in the transmission shifting, or the transmission to slip out of gear entirely. This is because the engine torque is not being efficiently converted into the hydraulic pressure needed to shift gears within the transmission.
In most cases, this issue is caused by a damaged shift solenoid or perhaps an obstruction of debris inside the transmission hydraulic lines. It could also be caused by damaged inside the transmission…
Blocked shifter Most of the time, it is found that the shifter is clogged due to the entry of any foreign particles in it. This will also lead to the situation in which the Mercedes will not be able to shift into park or for that matter any other gears depending upon the location of the blockage.