Hi, I'm new to this forum and have a question. I have a 1999 e300 turbo diesel with auto transmission and 82000 miles on it. When the car is cold and I put it in reverse it shudders almost violently ,put it in drive its fine but shifting seems hesitant to 2nd. Once the tranny warms up reverse is fine.I tried the search and found out the sealed tranny needs to be changed, could this be the problem? I'm planning on changing the trans fluid anyway.

Thanks, Anton

The shifting to 2nd being slow may be normal operation when cold.

I say this because I owned a Bmw 525tds e34 1994 model,this was all edc fly by wire engine and auto box management and when cold it would do the same until engine temperature was up a bit,leaving it ticking over to warm up and then driving would see this not occur.

With a good frost the Bmw would hang to around 2k revs in 1st gear before reluctantly slurring into 2nd,once the temperature gauge was halfway through the blue mark then normal operation was resumed.

On a lot of the UK and Euro forums the consensus is that this is inbuilt into the ecu to protect the gearbox and let it warm up quicker by most and others insist it is the need for a fluid change.

The sealed for life boxes can have trouble at high mileage with a fluid change and this can cause them to slip,you only have low miles so there should be no such problem.

At high miles the fluid contains a lot of clutch fibers and replacing the oil takes these out,so keep what comes out and if there is trouble then it can be put back in to make the box functional until a rebuild.

Change the tranny fluid as a matter of course but go over engine and tranny mounts as there may be a something worn or not at its best.

Thanks Murkybenz ,even when warm it still hesitates into 2nd but reverse works fine.Only when it cold reverse has that problem. If I change the tranny fluid it could cause more problems? I will check my mounts even though I don't think thats the problem because it goes away when warm. I hope I don't need a new tranny!!!

Thanks Murky you da man, It was an engine mount the hydraulic fluid leaked out and was causing the problem(now fixed). I changed the tranny fluid also it runs great now.
Thanks again for your knowledge,
Anton