You know how people always say things like, "I passed him like he shifted into reverse!" Well, lately its actualy been happening to me. From time to time, especially when the temperature is in the single digits and lower, the reverse lockout solenoid fails. But its very strange that sometime it will work and sometime it will not, even if I havnt slowed down enough to have the lockout release. For instance, i may be on the highway in some traffic, and I may shift between 4 5 and 6th gears a bunch. sometime it will fail, then itll work, then it will fail again. I was under the impression that the solenoid failed in the lockout position. With no current applied to the solenoid, it should lock me out, right? Well once youre going faster than a few miles per hour, it locks you our tight? Why if it works one momen, would the ecm add voltage to get it to release, even if im at highway speeds. Weird stuff, man. I just needed to vent.

 

Lets try this in here...

 

I've seen that @ the track a few times. It's usually an internal trans problem with the shift forks that I've heard as the cause.
It is when your shifting into 3rd when people say they see the reverse lights?

 

No no... its just a problem with the solenoid. Sometimes it just isnt locking me out, so when i go to hit 5th gear, if i move over too far, it hits reverse. All I really need to do is be careful selecting gears and im fine, but ive gotten so used to just pushing as far right as I can when going to 5th.

 

I had mine replaced 3 times under factory warranty! They just go bad! People I have talked to said its random, they just fail. Mine all locked me out of reverse... lol so I had to be careful how I parked so I wouldn't have to push my car to backup... lol

 

Ok , so lets do this again. The reverse solenoid is normall exende so in order to "activate " it/ release the load, it needs 9 volts min.So if you are getting the gate easily, you are powering the solenoid = this is a classic inverted plug( with the skip shift solenoid) symptom. If the solenod fails it fails with the load on. Although the load is high, the reverse is not really locked out.
There is no internal linkage failure issue its just people missing a shift and gooning reverse at the track. Yes, missing two gates( 3rd and 5th).

 

Thats why this is so weird. Forget about racing or at the track. This dosnt happen all the time, and it wasnt the result of a botched shift. My tranny shifts all gears perfectly fine (for a mexican built tremec ) This will happen on normal commute, while driving like a grandmother. It is definately proportionally linked to how cold it is outside. I happens much more frequently when its in the negatives outside.

My guess is that there is something in the ECM that semds voltage to the rev l/o solenoid during normal driving from time to time, probably to avoid it freezing. However, it is actually freezing when this happens and sticking in the open condition from time to time.

I was thinking it could be a problem with my VSS reading 0, but my speedo seems to be fine.

 

are you sure you don't have the skip harness plugged into the reverse solenoid? Gotta be a bad/ wrong signal going to that thing for it to do as you say.

 

Yes, Im positive. I havnt been poking around down there at all. CAGS is disabled via HPTuners. Nobody works on my car but me. Its been working fine the last 3 or 4 days since its been warmer out. If I didnt experience it myself, repeatedly mind you, I would tell anybody else that its just not possible. I would cite all the things that were stated above. But I assure you that something is pulling that lockout solenoid out of the way at highway speeds.

Maybe the solenoid has voltage going through it normally until the clutch pedal goes down? I also read something about it being released while there's no load on the tranny, but im not familliar with any "load sensor" lol. Who knows.

 

Back from the Dead..... Did you ever figure out your problem? My car has been sitting since sept. and i jumped in it to do the rearend swap and while driving i was able to throw it into reverse (not on purpose, it was a accident) i went home and hooked up my scanner and ran a function test on the solenoid and it's clicking when activated but i can still put it into reverse it's not easy to do it but it's possible and was never before. when i don't activate the solenoid it will shift into reverse fine with ease and no problems. Do i need to replace the solenoid or look for another problem? Fuse is ok btw. ive only heard of it failing and not allowing reverse but not failing and allowing reverse.

 

From what you've said abpve, the solenoid is working as intended. It is NOT a lock out it is an inhibitor. Therefore you can over ride it ( with higher effort) by design. If you are getting a low-effort reverse shift at speeds above 3-5mph, your ECM must be giving a 12V signal to the solenoid. This is an aftermarket programing flaw not a transmission issue.

 

No, sadly I havnt found any fix for this. Ive just learned to shift more carefully into fifth to make sure I dont accidentally hit seventh gear.

 

My concern is this has never happened before and going into reverse at 30mph and grinding the gear is not fun at all, i wish i could blame it on massive muscle strength and im just over riding the inhibitor but it's not, like i said it takes a bit off effort but if this is how it was designed i probably would of hit reverse more times then just once my shifting style & computer programing hasent changed since the car was put to sleep for the winter. The only thing that has changed was the rear end gears I went from 3:42's and a Stock LT1 complete rearend to 2:73's and a Stock LS1 Complete Rearend. Computer programing hasent been touched yet. Now could that cause this problem?

 

It's happened to me in twice in the past to weeks. It's like it just stopped working on me those times, very aggrivating. QUICK QUESTION- Will a short throw shifter eliminate this safety feature all together?

 

No, the solenoid is in the transmission housing, not the shifter.

 

I'll add, again, if the load is removed, the solenoid is being powered. The failure mode for the solenoid is to apply higher load so the above conditions are NOT due to a transmission problem although you are ripping the nads outa reverse..

 

And Ill add, again, that we are IN NO WAY OVERPOWERING THE SOLENOID. Something is giving this solenoid power to pull back, or perhaps, the solenoid is sticking in the open position even when its released.

 

This sounds like a SOLENOID sticking. If it happens when is cold I would bet on it.

 

You may have a pinched wire on "B" of the wire that goes up to the PCM and it is going to ground. The PCM grounds out the circuit and operates the solenoid.

Just something else to look at

 

ok if in fact its sticking because it's cold which i can believe since temps are around 20-40 degrees on any given day... what can i do to stop it from sticking?