I found a Trooper I really want to buy, as a light duty offroad/camping vehicle for our family of 4. It has everything I want (well, no sunroof, but hey you can't have everything ) but it has a transmission issue. I looked here but could not find a thread with these particular symptoms
Here is a little background, 1999 Isuzu Trooper, current owner (who appears to be a very honest upfront guy) bought it about 3K miles ago. After putting a a couple thousand miles on it, the tranny started to give him problems. He had it replaced with a used transmission that worked fine and then started giving him the same problem right after the 1K mile/90 day warranty ran out. I did some research on the the Trooper/4L30e tranny and after reading this thread,
http://forum.planetisuzoo.com/viewtopic.php?t=1707
I was hoping it was the range mode switch (RMS) problem and I went to go see it today with a plan to hopefully fix it and buy it.
When I got there I took it out for a drive and here are the symptoms. It will go into reverse just fine and work, no issues there. When you put it in D, it will go just fine, but never shift out of first. I tried starting in D and shifting up and down through the gears, but it will never shift out of first. I also tried starting out in 1, 2 and 3 and again it always started in first and remained there. I did notice that when I revved it out a bit (30 MPH or so) and let off the gas (but not all the way), the tranny would seem to disengage and the RPMs would rise. When I let off the gas a little more, the RPMs would fall and the tranny would reengage. This was not buttery smooth, but I wouldn't describe it as harsh either. Somewhere in the middle of all this manual shifting the "Check Trans" light came on. The whole time, the gear indicator light always indicated the correct shifter position.
I got back and described what happened and he said that is exactly what he has experienced, though he had never had "check trans" light come on.
I then asked him if he had looked at the range mode switch. He said that the range mode switch and the harness from the transmission to the PCM had been switched out but that he thought they were used parts. At this point, given the symptoms (lights indicated correct shifter position) and that the RMS had been swapped out, I no longer thought the RMS was the culprit, but I asked him if he would let me take a look at it. To his credit he did, so I got my tools out crawled underneath and took it out. It definitely was a used part, as it must have been more than a 1k miles old. I opened it up and it didn't look particularly dirty, but I cleaned it anyway, put it back on and went for another test drive. Same identical issue as before. The only difference was this time the "Check Trans" light did not come on at any point.
He did not say who replaced the 1st transmission, but he did say that he has found another used transmission and that Aamco quoted him $450 to install it, so that makes me think he used Aamco to to install the 2nd transmission. Based on stories I've heard about Aamco, I'm not convinced his 1st transmission was bad. I'm thinking it's something electrical, because I have a hard time believing that a 2nd transmission went bad with the same symptoms 1K miles later.
Here are a couple of other things that may or may not be related, so I'm going to include this info as I have no experience with Isuzus and their quirks.
He has a 1 inch lift that enabled him to install oversized tires without rubbing (305/70/16). I do not know if the lift/tires were installed before the first transmission failure or in between the first and second failures, I need to ask him this.
The Trooper had a newish battery, but it was dead because it had been sitting so long, so we had to jump it. After jumping it and running it for a little while and test driving it (10 minutes total), the battery would not charge enough to restart the engine, but it would work the power door locks. In my experience, 10 minutes is generally enough time to charge a good battery to be able to turn the car off and restart it almost immediately when the charging system is working properly (unless it's a diesel).
I would REALLY like to buy this Trooper, so any help would be MUCH appreciated. Thanks!!!
Here is a little background, 1999 Isuzu Trooper, current owner (who appears to be a very honest upfront guy) bought it about 3K miles ago. After putting a a couple thousand miles on it, the tranny started to give him problems. He had it replaced with a used transmission that worked fine and then started giving him the same problem right after the 1K mile/90 day warranty ran out. I did some research on the the Trooper/4L30e tranny and after reading this thread,
http://forum.planetisuzoo.com/viewtopic.php?t=1707
I was hoping it was the range mode switch (RMS) problem and I went to go see it today with a plan to hopefully fix it and buy it.
When I got there I took it out for a drive and here are the symptoms. It will go into reverse just fine and work, no issues there. When you put it in D, it will go just fine, but never shift out of first. I tried starting in D and shifting up and down through the gears, but it will never shift out of first. I also tried starting out in 1, 2 and 3 and again it always started in first and remained there. I did notice that when I revved it out a bit (30 MPH or so) and let off the gas (but not all the way), the tranny would seem to disengage and the RPMs would rise. When I let off the gas a little more, the RPMs would fall and the tranny would reengage. This was not buttery smooth, but I wouldn't describe it as harsh either. Somewhere in the middle of all this manual shifting the "Check Trans" light came on. The whole time, the gear indicator light always indicated the correct shifter position.
I got back and described what happened and he said that is exactly what he has experienced, though he had never had "check trans" light come on.
I then asked him if he had looked at the range mode switch. He said that the range mode switch and the harness from the transmission to the PCM had been switched out but that he thought they were used parts. At this point, given the symptoms (lights indicated correct shifter position) and that the RMS had been swapped out, I no longer thought the RMS was the culprit, but I asked him if he would let me take a look at it. To his credit he did, so I got my tools out crawled underneath and took it out. It definitely was a used part, as it must have been more than a 1k miles old. I opened it up and it didn't look particularly dirty, but I cleaned it anyway, put it back on and went for another test drive. Same identical issue as before. The only difference was this time the "Check Trans" light did not come on at any point.
He did not say who replaced the 1st transmission, but he did say that he has found another used transmission and that Aamco quoted him $450 to install it, so that makes me think he used Aamco to to install the 2nd transmission. Based on stories I've heard about Aamco, I'm not convinced his 1st transmission was bad. I'm thinking it's something electrical, because I have a hard time believing that a 2nd transmission went bad with the same symptoms 1K miles later.
Here are a couple of other things that may or may not be related, so I'm going to include this info as I have no experience with Isuzus and their quirks.
He has a 1 inch lift that enabled him to install oversized tires without rubbing (305/70/16). I do not know if the lift/tires were installed before the first transmission failure or in between the first and second failures, I need to ask him this.
The Trooper had a newish battery, but it was dead because it had been sitting so long, so we had to jump it. After jumping it and running it for a little while and test driving it (10 minutes total), the battery would not charge enough to restart the engine, but it would work the power door locks. In my experience, 10 minutes is generally enough time to charge a good battery to be able to turn the car off and restart it almost immediately when the charging system is working properly (unless it's a diesel).
I would REALLY like to buy this Trooper, so any help would be MUCH appreciated. Thanks!!!