Hey,

Recently put my 1.6 Marea ELX in my garage as it failed its MOT and will be expensive to repair, went out and bought a 1.6 Brava SX Automatic....

Now... the car has been fine until now, in the mornings when the car is very cold, when i put it into drive, the gearbox warning light comes on and the car simply will not.. well... drive! So, i read on the internet something about it could just be moisty from the cold night, and should drive when its warm, so i put the car into nutral and revved for about 3-4 minutes, the temperature when up so i put it into drive and voila it drove! But i dont want to have to be doing this every morning as it is abit annoying...

Does anyone have ANY ideas on what it could be, or what i could do to repair it.. now if i am going to need a new gearbox, i know the gearbox from my 1.6 marea automatic will do the trick but it will be expensive to have some one remove it from marea and fit it into the Brava... i was just wondering is this problem common and is there any way to fix it that you know of?

Cheers for your time,

Sam

firstly, you really should allow the car to warm up for 3-4 minutes, especially on a cold morning, driving it straight away will do more damage than anything a 17 year old in halfrauds car park could do. your oil wont be circulating around the head until it has warmed up, meaning greatly increased friction causing premature wear to the head's internals, especially the camshaft. that will be more of an inconvenience that the 3-4 minutes it takes to warm the engine up sufficiently.

if you really are that impatient and you dont care about the engine then you could try squirting wd40 on the wiring connector for the gearbox temp sensor, or even better clean the metal contacts and grease it up before reconnecting. that usually sorts the problem out.

Hi,

Thanks for the rapid reply. What you are saying makes sense, i have done as you suggested however i used a product called Damp Start rather than WD40 - I'll also let the car run for a couple of minutes before putting it into Drive.

Thanks for your help!

wow they still sell damp start! i havent seen it for years. basically the same as wd40 or any other lubricant/water dispersant.

Could you give me a rough idea where the temp sensor for the gearbox is?

Cheers,
Sam

if it aint in haynes i dont know because i havent seen one, they're not very common at all. but there arent many wires connected to a gearbox, in your case i'd expect the temp sensor to be the only one (maybe reverse light switch as well but usually not on an auto). if you dont know where the gearbox is its probably better if you dont start pulling wires off things randomly, that can only make things worse

Ah - This is annoying me because i dont want to have to be waiting 10 minutes every day just to get the car on the move - And there must be a fault because there is no way this is normal, i mean my Marea which was the same size and year (pretty much same engine) it NEVER did this and would go into drive first time every time......

Any more suggestions?

its definately a fault, you should be able to select drive as soon as you like.

i'd jack the car up and have a look for any wires connected to it. if you cant see any try removing the battery and battery tray, then you'll have a good view. if you see a wire connected to the gearbox pull it off and then start the car. if you have the same problem and even after 10 mins you still cant select drive then thats the sensor thats causing the problem. before reconecting it try cleaning up the connectors with a wire brush and then grease them.

Last night i sprayed Damp Start all over the wires and connectors around the engine, this morning it was icey cold outside aswell as really wet as it was raining all night, the car started lovely and went into drive straight away with no issues..

Lets hope it is like this tommorow aswell

YAY

Hmmmpp.

I've discovered that leaving the car running in "PARK" for about 5 minutes warms it up enough to get going, but the simple fact is, i should be able to go into Drive when ever i want (My Marea was in the cold for 3 weeks undrivven, started up and went fine!)

I am now totally baffled, i have used plenty Damp Start on it so its nothing to do with this. I spoke to a garage today and they said something about the ECU starving the engine of petrol or something, and it needs to be plugged into a diagnostics computer - that sounds propper expensive

I know i should let it tick over for 5 minutes every morning before going anyway, but its the fact that it doesnt let me has me annoyed..

Any last ideas before taking it to the garage??

Actually i didnt try that thing with removing the battery? I cant get to rather HUGE automatic gearbox... What does the temperature "thing" look like so i know what im spraying...

Also, would an ECU reset do anything? (leaving battery out for an hour)

SamG_Marea said:

I spoke to a garage today and they said something about the ECU starving the engine of petrol or something, and it needs to be plugged into a diagnostics computer - that sounds propper expensive

Click to expand...

thats sounds about right, NOT. its utter poo to get you to take the car in. ecu starving the engine of petrol!! how would that have anything to do with the gearbox engaging drive??

a diagnostics 'should' identify the faulty sensor (i believe its the gearbox temp sensor). dont pay more than £30-40 for a diagnostics, fiat will do it for that and they have the correct equipment so they have a better chance of finding the fault.

My Marea 1.6 Auto will have a replacement for what ever is faulty on the Brava? is it something that is easy to swap?

yep your marea will have the part you need. i've not changed the temp sensor on this gearbox before os i cant say, but on other auto's its been a 10 minute job. the sensor is usually removed with a spanner. easy as pie, as long as access isnt difficult.

Will their be anything in Haynes? if so, i will go and buy it tommorow..

not sure if the auto is included as fiat didn't sell very many. it'll say on the cover. a haynes is your bible, i wouldn't own a car without one.

Before doing it i've been asked to check if my radio or multichanger will have a code on it? As disconnecting the battery will require the code or something? :S

yeah its coded, you should have a code card for it. if not you can get a code cracker program free online, you just put the serial number in and it gives you a code.

Oh God lol.

Where can i find the serial on the radio or multichanger? and the crack :bang: