Help!!!!!

Jimbanjer

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my wife has a 2001 VW Jetta 1.9 TDI with the automatic transmission. It has 225 thousand miles on it. Last night on the way home from church,it had a very difficult time shifting into R, 1st, and 2nd gear. Once it got going it worked fine. Sometime all the gears were shifting fine and sometimes it was hard to get it to move at all. It drove perfectly to church and has never had this issue until last night. I’m thinking it may the the transmission clutches but I’m hoping it’s just something that controls them. I don’t think it related but just in case, ever since we got it, the engine has to be running at least 30 minutes or more to warm up. Also, for the past year or so, the turbo only spools have the time and the other half the car runs with reduced power.
 

Oledirtypearl86

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I have a 01 Jetta TDI mine is the effing Jetta but I would check the trans fluid I might be wrong but for the trans that's what I'd look at as far as the turbo check the vacume lines for the wastegate and the vvt auctuator they can get a bunch of carbon build up and not auctuates the way they should also if you have the egr still on the car the intake can get closed off with soot it's easy to check take the egr off and you can get a good idea of the soot in the intake also do you have a vagcom? If so what fault codes is it pulling
 

Jimbanjer

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There is not a dipstick for the transmission fluid. I know the car has a code for the glow plug wiring harness but it still starts up all the time. When it wasn’t working, the scanner at AutoZone showed there was another code but it couldn’t tell what the code was.
 

Jimbanjer

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Tomorrow I’ll try to take it by again to see if it is showing any new codes for the transmission.
 

Oledirtypearl86

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Ok mine is a manual so it was a shot I. The dark on the fluid check and mine has a glowplug code and I wonder what the other code is did they give you a number ?
 

Jimbanjer

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I don’t remember what it was as it was several months ago. When I get a check tomorrow I will write it down so I don’t forget!
 

Oledirtypearl86

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Ok so I did a little researchand the way you check the fluid is by pulling the drain plug on the pan it has a fluid level tube in the pan also looking at tdiclub I found that your trans problems are pretty common after 100k miles and there were people that said they fixed it with a simple trans fluid and filter change when was the last time the trans was serviced
 

Jimbanjer

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I am the 2nd owner of the car and the trans has never been serviced as the the original owner also thought the trans was sealed. I’m not familiar with front wheel drive but is this the tube and plug you are talking about?

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Oledirtypearl86

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Yes that is the filler in the top pic the level is checked by the drain plug in the bottom of the pan that plug has a vertical tube that stands and will let any and just extra fluid run out when you pull the drain plug the plug will be on the rear of the pand and a 5mm hexhead and probably feel loose the torque spec is only 11 ft lb if it was mine I'd pull the plug take a look at the atf and give it a quick service see if that helps the shifting also it takes a higher grade atf I hope this info helps
 

Jimbanjer

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I got the transmission filter and some Lucas transmission repair from the local auto arts store but they told me I need to get the the transmission fluid from a VW dealership. I called one up and they told me it was $25 a qt. At 5 qts that adds up so it will have to wait a few weeks until I have the funds. I’ll try to look online and see if I can find anything cheaper.
 

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