This transmission has had a lot of warranty work, and it's becoming almost comic how it develops some new behavior seemingly every week. I normally drive in flat ground and not very hard, but spent the weekend in the mountains, so the car got used to a lot of hills, curves, and leadfooted acceleration (because it really does suck wind at high altitude). Anyway, the car sat for 2 days, where mornings were cool (low-60s) and dewy. I started it up yesterday, idle was rough, and when I drove off it had a harder-than-usual jerk into 2nd gear, AND into 3rd. I've never had it kick so hard in either gear during a cold-start, but it never at all kicks in any gear beyond 2nd. Seems to be ok otherwise.

History - since 65k, fluid and filter, trans computer, conductor plate, shifter assembly mechanism, shifter bushings.

Could it be the valve body? What are the symptoms of a failing valve body even if that's not what you think it is.

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former: 83 300D, 97 C230, 93 400E

current: 08 C300 Luxury , 92 500SL

Have you checked all the ignition components? With the rough idle I'd suspect the spark plug connectors,but check the coils themselves also. I've seen coils crack around where the connectors attatch and cause a cylinder to miss. If it's running bad enough, you may be getting on the throttle enough to fool the computer into thinking you're just driving fast. There shouldn't be many opportunities for a vacuum leak on your engine, but it might not hurt to check for that. Another possibility is the mass airflow sensor. When they go bad they can cause all sorts of driveability problems. As for the valve body, about the only thing that causes problems there is the conductor plate. I haven't seen too many bad shift solenoids. Usually if it's going bad it will go to the limp home mode and leave you driving in low gear. Hope I gave you enough ideas to get you started.

Thanks Mike. Plugs, resistor tips, and something else related were replaced under warranty about 10k ago. The MAS is original, with 95k on it.

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former: 83 300D, 97 C230, 93 400E

current: 08 C300 Luxury , 92 500SL

I forgot to mention the electrical connector. You may want to unplug it ( ignition off) and check to see if there's any trans fluid in it. They are bad about leaking. Good news is they are cheap to replace if that's where the problem is.

Original Air Mass Meter? I'll bet that it's on it's way out.

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John Shellenberg
1998 C230 "Black Betty" 240K

http://img31.exs.cx/img31/4050/tophat6.gif

Are you sure the AMM is original? That is pretty amaizing if true, I think. Did you do anything special to get it to last that long? If it is on the way out then that might explain the rough idle I suppose. But those transmissions do seem problematic. I am not sure if they ever got all the bugs worked out. Maybe by 1999 or 2000.

Mike

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1998 C230 330,000 miles (currently dead of second failed EIS, yours will fail too, turning you into the dealer's personal human cash machine)
1988 F150 144,000 miles (leaks all the colors of the rainbow)
Previous stars: 1981 Brava 210,000 miles, 1978 128 150,000 miles, 1977 B200 Van 175,000 miles, 1972 Vega (great, if rusty, car), 1972 Celica, 1986.5 Supra