my tranny shifts hard from 1-2...and someone posted one time that it can be bad struts.yesterday for some reason with my father,uncle and cousin in the car it shifted as smooth as possible.has this ever happened to anyone??can my shifts be suspension related??

 

seems unlikely... you prolly just drove easier (consciously or not) cause you had your family in the car and didn't want to jerk them around.

 

i had that when my drop resistor or whatever came unpluged. it wasnt clikced in all the way so somtimes it would just shift hard.

 

Could be a ton of things. Trans mount, transmission itself, torque converter, suspension related.

 

the tranny was just installed about a month ago..its a 98 with 42k.should i bring it to a couple tranny shops and see what they say.some say suspension but can it be tires b/c i need new tires very badly??any input cuz i have no clue.

 

 

Do you have high idle problems? I do and my tranny shifts pretty harsh.

 

no high idle problems...sometimes the tranny shifts fine and sometimes not.i have no clue and dont want to spend alot of money on things that arent really the problem.i do think it is suspension though im gonna get it checked out.

 

Someone needs to let me know how your suspension will make your transmission shift hard. You can have loose components in the suspension that give you the sensation of hard shifting just like bad mounts can do. Have you checked the fluid level again?

 

yep...exactly what you said.I have the sensations of hard shifts.my fluid level is fine.it only shifts hard at certain rpm's and not all the time thats why I dont think its the tranny.

 

Mine has shifted hard sometimes and smooth as silk others.. Been doing this for years now with no problems.. Seems to be more common than you think

 

I found in many cases that the front motor mount is what causes that 'hard shift' feel. You can check the mounts many ways without putting the car in the air. First way to check, as long as someone else is around to help, is to have someone powerbrake the car a little in both Drive and then in Reverse. You can see if the engine moves more at one mount than the other. The other way is to just rock the car back and forth while in park. Thats how I normally check them in the shop on most cars.

 

thanks...ill try it tomorrow.

 

Check the drop resistor

Only shifts hard when you quickly accelerate right? I had the same problem.

 

I think I realized what it could be after a couple people said engine or tranny mounts.when I got the tranny swap the part that the crossmember(the bar that supports the engine and tranny) bolts to was rusted.i need to get a new piece welded there.Im gonna get it done for free by my mechanic so ill see if that fixes it.if not ill talk to him andhave hime check it out.

 

Where is this said resistor located? And where can i buy a replacement?

I'm having the exact same problem.

 

Check (or have someone check) the valve springs. Same thing happened to me with my first Nissan, an automatic Sentra. That 1-2 shift went to crap, it was about $440 to fix.

 

mine shifts much smoother after the car has been running for like 10 mins

 

is the tranny fluid old? try changing it.

 

I don't understand how the valve springs would make your tranny shift like ****?

 

Valve body springs.

 

The dropping resistor is located on the driver's side on the side of the top strut tower (i.e., where the top of the strut is bolted) near the air filter box. It is just a small (about 3 inches by 1 inch) rectangular piece of white ceramic material with a metal bracket around it and a plug at one end. It takes literally about 1 minute to replace. I got mine from the dealership but can't remember what I paid (was less than $100 I think).

I was having the same hard 1-2 shift, read a bunch of posts here, changed out the resistor and still have hard 1-2 shifts.