Overdrive Light Started Blinking, Then One Second

trafukin · November 18, 2004

hi, i thank you in advance for any input you can give me.

I was driving my car to orlando, about 200 miles from here, halfway trough the trip i stop for about an hour to eat something. when i get back in the car everything is fine, until about five minutes later when overdrive light starts blinking, for about 2 seconds. then it stopped doing it. at about the same time the check engine light came back on. the car continued working fine.

It was late and i was in the middle of nowhere, so i continued to orlando. the only thing i have noticed is that the car makes a squeaky noise every 30 seconds, at the same time that i hear that noise, it feels as if the engine lets go, but i see no change on the speed or the rpms. other than that the car runs as usual.

its a 94 es300 with 150k miles. any help will be appreciated.

supreme300 · November 18, 2004

sounds like the tranny, are u the 1st owner? also do u have all the service records for the car?

SKperformance · November 19, 2004

could be anything but if you are doing a long trip get you tranny flushed immediatly and you might save some headache.

Make sure the filter is removed and cleaned as well.

Lex3486 · November 21, 2004

Ya know, I had a cousin who worked at a lube shop and he said that he wouldn't recommend flushing the transmission on just any car b/c the pressure is so high that he's seen it cause further transmission problems from forcing such high pressure through the components. As a person who has had to deal with A LOT of *BLEEP* transmission-wise in an ES300, I really wonder if it's a good idea to suggest it to people who are obviously about to face some major problems? It seems to me like a purely temporary fix, b/c I know from experience that the VERY first time that my transmission quit, I replaced the fluid and filter and it drove again for maybe a few hundred miles before giving up again...

SKperformance · November 21, 2004

lmao

sorry man but your cousin has no clue what he is talking about.

The machine doesn;t even have any pressure that is used to do a tranny flush.

Trannies have about 20-30 psi of pressure the machine has none it uses the tranny to ciculate the fluid through it.

All it does is connect to the trannny cooler lines and reroute it to the machine to keep it circulating through the machine until the operator flips a switch to stop ciculation and purge the system by releasing the old fluid into a resevouir for disposal while sucking the new clean fluid back into the tranny.

their is a reason your cousin works in a lube shop, sorry but it is idiots who fill people with bad information because they don;t know better and try to sound like they know somethign when they really don't have a clue.

This is a fact of how it works ,no guessing needed.

steviej · November 21, 2004

their is a reason your cousin works in a lube shop, sorry but it is idiots who fill people with bad information because they don;t know better and try to sound like they know somethign when they really don't have a clue.

←

I think it would be better to say, "it is misinformed people who fill other people with bad information".

steviej

Lex3486 · November 21, 2004

You are talkin about family here man...he worked there, so I figure he MIGHT know what he's talkin about. All that aside, I didn't see any long-term benefits of it myself; in fact, I'm pretty sure that I've never known of anyone who it actually fixed anything for them, but whatever. If his O/D light came on, that means there was an electrical failure of some sort, which he can check the diagnostic code for and find what went wrong. It's been my experience though that if the light quits coming on and you go to try and check the code, it reads normal if the light is no longer on...that's what mine did anyway. Those *BLEEP*s that have my car don't know that though, so they're replacing God knows what when in fact, it's probably just a solenoid that went bad. It's not so far outta the question in my opinion that a solenoid failed, seeing how it IS a used part that they put in there to begin with...I hate that shop, I wanna blow it and everyone in it up. Any takers on that?

ArmyofOne · November 21, 2004

lmao
sorry man but your cousin has no clue what he is talking about.

The machine doesn;t even have any pressure that is used to do a tranny flush.

Trannies have about 20-30 psi of pressure the machine has none it uses the tranny to ciculate the fluid through it.

All it does is connect to the trannny cooler lines and reroute it to the machine to keep it circulating through the machine until the operator flips a switch to stop ciculation and purge the system by releasing the old fluid into a resevouir for disposal while sucking the new clean fluid back into the tranny.

their is a reason your cousin works in a lube shop, sorry but it is idiots who fill people with bad information because they don;t know better and try to sound like they know somethign when they really don't have a clue.

This is a fact of how it works ,no guessing needed.

←

jason, at JP Imports has told me something similar on old trannies. you cant flush them. he also said that (on my particular car) Lexus doesnt even reccomend a flush, at ANY point in the vehicles life.

on old transmissions, the bands that are in betwwen the gears deteriorate. when they do, they pick up particles from old, broken down trans fluid. when you flush the trans, the flush takes all fo the old particles out, and the tranny will slip as a result. thats the best way i can describe it, btu you have to have some working knowledge of an Auto trans before you can understand it. i dont even fully understand it myself, but thats the way i was told.

SKperformance · November 21, 2004

lol

i can understand the frustration of substandard mechanics.

Most dealers won't waste time ripping it apart but just order a new one but really they send it out to be rebuild by another shop they use so it costs tehm about 800 and they resell it for 2000 easy.

Sorry to sound so brutal about your cousin but bad info like that leads people to get short arm intakes, ground wires on new cars, thinking premium gas is a waste of money all are basic prinicpals of physics and an engine that all technitions and a good mechanic ( who understands performance)will know.

When someone guesses it turns into stone as time goes on when they have nothing to base the opnion on but a guess or a thought.

Liek the guy who said he smoked a wrx.Rondald MCdonald could have driving that thing with his 2 foot shoes and misshifted all the way and still ate the ES's food. Sorry anyone who has driven a wrx never mind an sti will know it isn;t highly aclaimed for nothing.

I wouldn't be suprised with the solenoid just needing cleaning. As that is all mine needed which was to have the valve body cleaned but rather than rip the guts out i decied to baby the car even more for about 2000km as to slowly let the filter i added clean the fluid from debris.

It went from shifting in first at about 5000 rpm or not at all when cold,

never being able to use the kickdown as once i pressed the gas pedal it would just slip and rpms would shoot up like i was in neutral

harsh engagment of 1-2 2-3

when codl it was the worst as it sometimes would not even get into gear for a few minutes.

As well as short stop and go driving if i drove for 10 minutes before it warmed up i might not be able to move again ,which happened a few times where i had to get the car in the air drop the pan and filter to clean the mesh an i would be ok again for a few months.

Afer a while of troubleshooting with my cousin who runs a tranny shop i got a fitler, he told me it would never work that my TQ fibers were destroyed and causing it to block even more.

I was optomistic as well as cheap as i have had the problem for 2 years.

Well it is almost perfect now and i still have to change the filter and put a new one in to finish the cleaning process as i am sure my external filter has been clogged with fibers.

By replacing it i will gain my pressure from the fibers being gone which in turn willl cause my clutches and bands to actuate when needed properly .

Well worth $40 any day for a future of investment since most 1mz-fe trannies have issues.

To think all of this beacuse i went to ERIN PARK LEXUS IN MISSISSAUGA to get a drive clean test. the next morning i could not get out of my garage as the jackassss tech shredded my clutches hen he was supposed to be warming up the cat and plugged it up.

But of couse their is no way i could prive it so here is my retribution.

Lex3486 · November 23, 2004

SK!! I wish I had known that you had all those problems!! Mine did the EXACT same thing, and we, as you, replaced the external filter and did a drain/fill with new fluid and got a few hundred miles outta it again. It was when the car refused to move at all from a dead stop that we decided to seek professional help. So anyway, it's interesting to hear that you had those problems and managed to work through them. Makes me wonder if I could have saved myself HOW MUCH time and trouble, and not to mention MONEY. And yes, I truly think that the most recent mishap was more than likely due to a malfunctioning solenoid; it had all the symptoms, and then the O/D light was the icing on the cake. I guess the timing, being that it was roughly 100 miles away from no-warranty, we decided it best to have them run through it and do whatever they thought good since we still have it under warranty. It's going on 3 weeks now, and still no word. We do know they've ordered parts, but the person who is currently working on it is new and didn't know exactly what they'd ordered. Oh goodie, can't wait to see what the noob will do for us...should be interesting. It's a sad thing though, because I'm 90% sure that my ES is being sold as soon as we get it back and I always loved that car so much...it's just been *BLEEP*ized now and I'm afraid of it.

SKperformance · November 23, 2004

actually i added an external filter

the oem internal lexus mesh screen is useless as it only catches large particles in its media which if you have anythign like that you are toast already