Pajero Owners Club of South Africa

I have a 2012 Pajerosport, 3.2 DiD A/T GLS. Bought the car just after it hit 190 000km. It has a full service history and I'm 85% sure it got it's transfer and gearbox oil changes at 180 000km, as required (unless I'm mistaken about when it should happen).

The vehicle did have a shifting issue prior, but turned out to be a cable or switch, which was easily and inexpensively resolved (I bought from a family member, so know the full history).

Anyway, car just went in for it's 200 000km service. So haven't done a lot of driving in the past year. But I've noticed, I think specifically, when warm, toward the latter part of a 2 hour drive, when I hit a certain stretch of slightly uphill road with loads of robots and stop/starts (so under very specific conditions) I have issues shifting from 2nd to 3rd. It shift over at around 60kph, but then delays 1-2 seconds before getting into 3rd and going on. If I keep accelerator depressed revs climb, as it would in a manual if you hit the clutch, but don't release the go-pedal. I'm not in the habit that when this issue pokes it's head out I release the accelerator when I feel the shift from 2 to 3, which is weird in an auto. It seems like the problem goes away if I switch off and start again. But I drive 80% in the city and rarely get to 60kph. As I said, very intermittent and I only notice the issue pop up under very specific conditions, but it's happened on other occasions as well.

I have my car at a bosch service center today. They couldn't get the issue to appear on their drive around, but a diagnostic showed a potential issue with a shifter solenoid, apparently inside the gearbox, which they would need to remove and disassemble and replace the solenoid (if possible) or recon the whole gearbox, or, god forbid, replace. They're talking about this costing R10k +, depending on the repair. And if it's a new gearbox, well, ouch.

Sorry, long story, hope it makes sense. Any advice? Anyone been through something similar? Do I ask them to go through the stripping process or anything else I can try first?

Update:

Got car back from service center. They test drove and felt the delay on shift from 2-3rd. Plugged in the diagnostic tool and got a fault code P1770 (shift solenoid stuck off) and U1102 (fuel & air monitoring / glow plugs) on the gear control section. The U1102 fault code is very strange - how is this related to the gear control? Anyone?

They apparently went through the trouble shoot in the w/s manual for that fault code, but found nothing. That's why they wanted to remove the gearbox, strip and check the solenoid - which is a hell of a job, and not cheap, so I didn't do it. I would rather do oils, flush, replace filter, etc. first.

Anyway, they cleared the faults, went for another drive and found no delay. So I picked up the car and haven't had an issue since. But I haven't been driving that hard, so the jury is still out.

Philip12 wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 10:51 am Update:

Got car back from service center. They test drove and felt the delay on shift from 2-3rd. Plugged in the diagnostic tool and got a fault code P1770 (shift solenoid stuck off) and U1102 (fuel & air monitoring / glow plugs) on the gear control section. The U1102 fault code is very strange - how is this related to the gear control? Anyone?

They apparently went through the trouble shoot in the w/s manual for that fault code, but found nothing. That's why they wanted to remove the gearbox, strip and check the solenoid - which is a hell of a job, and not cheap, so I didn't do it. I would rather do oils, flush, replace filter, etc. first.

Anyway, they cleared the faults, went for another drive and found no delay. So I picked up the car and haven't had an issue since. But I haven't been driving that hard, so the jury is still out.

Hi Phillip12 - do you have any more news on your issue?

No update. It's been fairly quiet. I've felt the delayed shift a handful of times since and it's 15000KM later, but very intermittent, less noticeable than before. I'm at 215 000 KM now, will probably do the gearbox, diff, transfer case oils at 240 000KM. Would love to do it now, but it's not cheap and doing it more often than required doesn't make it cheaper.

Reaching out to the forum again - this issue has popped up again, more frequently than before. May have been triggered by an overtake where the car shifted down to 3rd (in auto), and I kept the accelerator in to get past, causing the car to scream at me, let off the pedal slightly, it got in gear and got past the car. Now, the issue when shifting from 2-3 is back and quite frequent (for the past week or two).

To summarise again - shifting from 2-3 happens with a delay. Before getting in gear the revs climb, I need to lift off the accelerator, then it gets in 3rd. Or, if I'm just pulling away gently the revs don't climb as aggressively between 2-3 and after a second or so it gets into 3rd and I carry on my way. Funny thing, if I'm in the triptronic mode I don't seem to have that delay, although I do feel the gear change a little more pronounced than it is from 1-2 or 3-4 (which I don't notice unless thinking about it).

Hope someone out there has some wisdoms for me. My car is at bosch again today for its 230k service, asked them to check it out again.