oh man... i have the worst luck with 540's man... i'm driving on the highway, let go of the gas to change lanes, hit the gas again to pass the car, and bam, a big jerk and the c ar goes into a transmission failed safe mode or some crap, i thought it was some fluke, so i took it to the dealership and they said the same thing, they just cleared the error code for me, and now i'm driving again and it does it again, it's a constant thing now, the transmission is not shifting smoothly at all, you can feel a jerk after each gear shift, anyone ever had a simliar problem or recommend something for me? if so please help, thanks.
oh man... i have the worst luck with 540's man... i'm driving on the highway, let go of the gas to change lanes, hit the gas again to pass the car, and bam, a big jerk and the c ar goes into a transmission failed safe mode or some crap, i thought it was some fluke, so i took it to the dealership and they said the same thing, they just cleared the error code for me, and now i'm driving again and it does it again, it's a constant thing now, the transmission is not shifting smoothly at all, you can feel a jerk after each gear shift, anyone ever had a simliar problem or recommend something for me? if so please help, thanks.
I had a similar event happen in my 530 and it turned out to be a bad alternator. The dealer replaced the battery and the alternator under warranty and it never happened again.
If you think you had back luck, this happened to me on the DAY I BOUGHT the CPO car. Fortunately, it was still under the regular warranty so everything was covered 100%.[/QUOTE
Happened to me a couple weeks ago ...battery light came on too though, so I knew immediately that my alternator was toast. Headed straight to the dealer, and car crapped out one mile away...AAA flat bed got me in the rest of the way. New alternator and all is well again.
OK - here is an update on my condition. Took my car to AutoZone to have the new battery checked and the alternator checked. Still planning on re-checking the tranny fluid level too but this was an easy place to start.
First the battery. It was very low despite being charged all night. It read "charge and retest". It did fine under load.
Then the alternator. Got in and held 2000 RPMs. I was 100% prepared for it to be bad. Guess what - it tested OK. I don't know how long this thing will last but that was some good news. During the test the tech noticed as the revs fell to idle the voltage dropped too. He then suspected the battery was bad. We grabbed a new one and then retested and sure enough the voltage remained constant and didn't drop off with load. Kept the new battery and drove around. Didn't seem to be any problems with shifting. No mystery lights coming on.
Next day - fire up the car and drive off. It is wet from rain and a LOT warmer then usual but the car behaved 100% better. The car always seems to be perfect in manual shifting mode - it is just when in normal driving mode when I head out in the morning that it seems to loose power upshifting, hunt for the right gear (feels like slipping clutch) and then bangs into gear sending the car forward.
I will keep testing but maybe this was an electrical gremlin. I will still use the Bentley to recheck my fluid level on the rack this weekend as well.
Two things to consider...one is that the voltage regulators in alternators can fail when the get hot, then return to normal when cold. Was you car hot, and fully up to operating temp? So it can test fine when cold, or not fully warmed up, but fails at higher operating temp. Also, are you sure you don't have a drain on your battery somewhere? Perhaps the common "final stage resistor" that causes the a/c fan to cycle on an off a few minutes after shut down?
What caused your last battery to fail? Was it old?