Technical The one and only Dualogic failure thread

[Troubles with 500c]

Unless you know they were using Fiat specific software I’d be reluctant to pull out the gearbox.

Find a Dualogic specialist near to you.

 

[Jus71n]

Unless you know they were using Fiat specific software I’d be reluctant to pull out the gearbox.

Find a Dualogic specialist near to you.

Not planning on pulling the box right away, going to take some covers off & check fluid levels, fuses etc, I've found a place that will overhaul the Dualogic Selespeed for £475 so that would be my go to if all else is ok, I'm sure its not the actual gearbox.

I'm in Lincolnshire, UK if anybody has a local specialist recommendation

 

[A3jeroen]

No alfa selespeed specialists in the area?

gr J

 

[Troubles with 500c]

I always promised myself I would try this if the Dualogic begins to play up;

 

[welshlad46]

my wife's 500 has randomly started dropping to N usually from 4th or 5th when approaching a roundabout or junction. I have taken the car to work and asked the garage to connect there diagnostic's machine to it an these were the codes from it...

P0710 - Temperature (from CAN)
- Intermittent

P1742 - Gear selection sensor
- Intermittent

Please if anyone can help it would be most appreciated.....im trying to chase up the garage I purchased the car from as I had issues when I got it then where on cold mornings it wouldn't go into gear (reverse if I recall) so they changed the oil at there garage and still it played up so they informed me that it had to go to a Fiat dealership for a new gearbox. Now I purchased the car in early 2019 but it had 74k on it then with the "new gearbox" and my wife now only has 81k on it so surely it would not of gone already?

Any help is massively appreciated as my wife is scared to drive the car now as she has nearly had a few vehicles go in to the back of her even though as soon as she hears the N beeping noise she puts her hazards straight on

Thank you in advance

 

[jrkitching]

my wife's 500 has randomly started dropping to N usually from 4th or 5th when approaching a roundabout or junction.

Sorry to hear about your problems.

Now I purchased the car in early 2019 but it had 74k on it then with the "new gearbox" and my wife now only has 81k on it so surely it would not of gone already?

Without knowing exactly what was done and what was replaced, it's hard to say. Sometimes garages faced with a warranty claim on a dualogic will only do the minimum necessary to get the car working again, and these repairs are often quite short lived. If you''ve read the rest of this thread, you'll know that dualogics with this kind of mileage have something of a reputation for being troublesome. My concern is that you could put quite a bit of money and effort into getting this fixed, only to be left with recurring intermittent issues.

I can't imagine you'd have any kind of warranty claim on a used car bought almost four years ago.

If your finances permit, the easiest way to restore your wife's confidence in her car would be to trade it in for something else, and that's what I recommend you do.

 

[puntodeltathema]

The good news here is possibly the Gear Selection Sensor error. The sensors are cheap and easy to replace. But you'd need to identify which one. Not sure where you are but if you can find someone local with Multiecuscan software they could get more details for interpretaion. It would also be worth them checking hydraulic pressure etc (more generally, slipping into N is a sign that the hydraulics are getting tired). But a first step might be to change the relevant sensor.

Worth being clear if it was the oil in the gearbox itself (mechanical side) or the hydraulic actuator that was changed by your garage. If the actuator, the strict requirement is for "Tutela CS Speed" or equivalent Dexron III fluid. NOT regular red ATF or brake fluid which will knacker the seals in short order. The correct Tutela stuff is available from Fiat dealers or (better) Shop4Parts online.

As general advice, Carl Douthwaite at CD Motors in Stoke (on Facebook and also advertises dualogic repair services on eBay) is probably the leading expert on these boxes in the UK and is generally happy to chat on the phone. He can refurbish the actuators for reasonable money.

Nick

 

[welshlad46]

thank you for the reply's. So I'm trying to chase up with the garage I purchased it from as they informed me that when it wasn't fixed via changing the oil that it would have to go to Griffin Mill which is a Fiat dealer. They told me that it required a new gearbox and I thought at the time that I was lucky to have it done and that it should last a long time as my wife doesn't put a lot of miles on it.

But I've checked back through all my paperwork and there is nothing confirming this work done and looking back I should of asked for a receipt. I have emailed them a few days ago and up to now I've heard nothing back so if I get no reply by Tuesday I will give them a ring but being a 2nd hand car sales garage they probably are not going to care much :-(

I have phoned Griffin Mill who I am sure he said the car went to and they have no records of the car being there. But what ever work was done back in 2019 solved the issues and the car has been perfect until a few weeks ago with the issues mentioned. If it is the sensors then it would definitely be worth replacing as I imagine even at a Fiat garage it wouldn't cost crazy money? I know a few good garages where I take my cars but I doubt they would have the software needed to complete the work :-( I live in South Wales just outside Cardiff.

I have also found a specialist Fiat garage in Cardiff who said they would do a diagnostic check of there own and try to find the issues with the car but I have a Fiat dealership literally less than 1 mile away.

If it is worst case I guess it is stupid money to get sorted and would probably have to think about the car going, but my wife loves her little 500 and the simplicity of how easy it is to drive as she's not had a manual in years and the first car outside of a 500 she looked at and fancied was a Toyota Aygo VVT auto box which I believe is a similar system to that of the dualogic ....

 

[jrkitching]

Thanks for the update. What you've posted is consistent with the way used car dealers typically deal with issues with these transmissions. Top up the selespeed fluid, reset the fault codes, maybe run the clutch calibration software and hope it makes it through whatever's left of the warranty period. This usually works for a few thousand miles, then the problem recurs, because the fundamental cause of the fault hasn't been properly dealt with.

If you're planning to take it to a franchised dealer at this point, do check first what they'll charge for the diagnostic - some have had a nasty surprise. Come back and tell us what they're proposing, and we'll take it from there.

Fingers crossed for you that there's something they can do for a reasonable cost.

 

[ET Alien]

my wife's 500 has randomly started dropping to N usually from 4th or 5th when approaching a roundabout or junction. I have taken the car to work and asked the garage to connect there diagnostic's machine to it an these were the codes from it...

P0710 - Temperature (from CAN)
- Intermittent

P1742 - Gear selection sensor
- Intermittent

Please if anyone can help it would be most appreciated.....im trying to chase up the garage I purchased the car from as I had issues when I got it then where on cold mornings it wouldn't go into gear (reverse if I recall) so they changed the oil at there garage and still it played up so they informed me that it had to go to a Fiat dealership for a new gearbox. Now I purchased the car in early 2019 but it had 74k on it then with the "new gearbox" and my wife now only has 81k on it so surely it would not of gone already?

Any help is massively appreciated as my wife is scared to drive the car now as she has nearly had a few vehicles go in to the back of her even though as soon as she hears the N beeping noise she puts her hazards straight on

Thank you in advance

I have solved the problem of dropping from 5th to N myself, it took long time so I'll share what I know.
Off course, first make sure that you have the correct oil level and the pump builds pressure as it should. Then It's a fairly easy fix !
The main culprit, withe other things being fully operational, is so called "stop" solenoid. It changes the movement of gear selector shaft between 1-2 , 3-4 and R-N planes.

After you unscrew it, there is a spring loaded nipple which, when activated, protrudes into the barrel behind it to generally block the internal plane seletion barrel :

The problem is that the internal mechanism is oiled and greased, over time gunk gets under the nipple and further into the solenoid, causing it to stick. The spring is not strong enough to push back the solenoid shaft quickly, this is why sometimes people cannot engage any gear for a couple of minutes after dropping to N -it needs time. The lower the outside temp, the more likely this can happen - greasy gunk being thicker.

option 1 - quick fix - It should be possible to reach and unscrew the solenoid - 500 offers less space than my Lancia Musa , but it should be possible after removin battery holder plate. Put some foil beneath so as not to drop screws, spring and nipple. Put the car in N first. Screws are phillips , there is no pressure in this part of robot. Tighten back with care.
Clean the solenoid by slowly spraying something like WD40, then brake cleaner, rubbing alcohol etc over the little shaft, let them drop sink inside. Do it many times in turns until the shaft moves fairly freely. The liquids will drain through plug assembly. Apply brake cleaner as final, give time it to evaporate, you can even heat it up to make sure it's dry inside. At first, you might need to use a 9v battery with two cables to pop the shaft back out.Don't worry about polarity. New solenoid is pricey and there is no need to change it if it works.
While solenoid is out, also clean the nipple socket in the barrel from any old grease to prevent it from sticking.

Option 2 : Full, long term fix is to take the robot out and clean the whole "barrel" inside and then re-grease it with high quality, wide-temperature-graded synthetic grease . You can see this being done here:

screenshot:

Option 2 best made by a mechanic, unless you really know what you are doing, followed by factory calibration in MES

Of course, there might be some other underlying issues. Then it needs to be properly diagnosed and possibly overhauled.Find a mechanic whoe deals with dualogic.
Hope that Helps.

I have actually done a complete overhaul of the robot myself, it is quite a durable and bulletproof device with just a few soft-spots. It requires all components to work properly, with very little margin for error and then it will serve years on.

 

[DieterHFuchs]

Re: Dualogic gearbox nightmare......

Hello and welcome to the forum .

Sorry it's in such unfortunate circumstances.

I suspect it's the selespeed unit that your dealer is looking to replace, not the complete gearbox - that would likely be more expensive still at main dealer prices.

You're not the first to have experienced this issue, and sadly I doubt you'll be the last - though I'm surprised it's completely unrepairable at such a low mileage. A chap named Ahmett may be along in a minute; he's had one of these replaced recently after years of problems and many attempts (with varying degrees of success) at repair.

You might be able to get your existing selespeed unit fixed, though you'll need to go to an independent Fiat/Alfa specialist for this - Fiat main dealers will likely only replace it complete. If you can get it repaired/patched up at reasonable cost, my advice would be to do so and then, er, hmm, sell the car as soon as possible.

You'll get a good price for a one lady owner low mileage 500, and IMO you'd do better to take the money now & put it towards something else than keep it into middle age. Again just my opinion, but the 500 has too many niggly faults, praticularly in dualogic form, to make it a good long term keeper for someone not well versed in the ways of cars and handy with the tools and spanners.

Aber ich bin heute Abend voreingenommen; meins (im gleichen Alter wie Ihres, nicht viel mehr Laufleistung und nicht so sehr gut gewartet, sondern bis auf einen Zentimeter seines Lebens verwöhnt) ist gerade einem der bekannten 500-Probleme zum Opfer gefallen und mein Display sieht jetzt so aus eher wie eine Disco als ein Armaturenbrett.:verrückt:

Glücklicherweise habe ich es nach Hause bekommen und ich glaube, ich weiß, was los ist - ich werde es mir genau ansehen, wenn ich mich beruhigt habe, und es an der entsprechenden Stelle posten.

Warum zum Händler?
Ich würde erst einmal die Batterie nur schwarz abklemmen und 10 -15 Minuten warten. Neu starten und Geräte einlesen lassen dann 20 - 30 Minuten fahren, sollte es wieder anfangen wird wohl der Weg zum Händler erforderlich sein

 

[lczoccante]

Hi everyone,
While driving my Fiat 500 0.9 TwinAir semi-automatic on a busy road, I suddenly received a warning on the dashboard that read "Check transmission see handbook." As a result, I lost engine power and was unable to engage any gear. I ended up having to stop in the middle of the road. Despite trying to turn the car off and on again, the error message continued to display (similar to what happened in this video attached below).

After a few more attempts, the car finally started working again, but the experience was quite scary. Has anyone else experienced a similar issue? After doing some research in this forum, it seems that a low level of transmission fluid could be the cause of the problem, but not sure. it was a damp road, I was wondering if could be some electronic issue ?

Anyone has any suggestion ?

I am from north London UK if anyone know a good FIAT specialist in London that can look into this dualogic system ?

Thank you.

 

[jrkitching]

Hi everyone,

Hi and welcome to the forum.

Dualogic faults are, sadly, by no means unusual. Finding anyone with sufficient detailed knowledge to work on these transmissions isn't easy.

Anyone has any suggestion ?

Whatever happened will most likely have logged a fault code. I'd say it would be worth getting the code read; that will help us to advise you better. It will likely need a specific Fiat code reader to do this; it's possible there may be a forum member not too far away who has the right tool for this. There's one in particular I'm thinking of who's been one of our most helpful members - he's south of the river if you can make it across to SE London.

 

[Dave Cin]

Hi everyone,
While driving my Fiat 500 0.9 TwinAir semi-automatic on a busy road, I suddenly received a warning on the dashboard that read "Check transmission see handbook." As a result, I lost engine power and was unable to engage any gear. I ended up having to stop in the middle of the road. Despite trying to turn the car off and on again, the error message continued to display (similar to what happened in this video attached below).

After a few more attempts, the car finally started working again, but the experience was quite scary. Has anyone else experienced a similar issue? After doing some research in this forum, it seems that a low level of transmission fluid could be the cause of the problem, but not sure. it was a damp road, I was wondering if could be some electronic issue ?

Anyone has any suggestion ?

I am from north London UK if anyone know a good FIAT specialist in London that can look into this dualogic system ?

Thank you.

Hi Iczoccante and All, my wife Fiat 500 1.2 semi auto got the same last Saturday. She was driving at 50mph on a busy A road and there was a car trying to cut into the lane slowly then she pressed the horn turns out the gearbox jumped to Neutral and loss of power. Also tried to re-start it for few times but no luck. Called AA the mechanic had no idea to fix on the road and towed the car back to my home. Afterwards when the car back on my driveway he tested all fuses one by one using a test probe and restart the car then it working again, he said it's quite strange he had never seen. I'm now trying read some threads to see any ideas before taking it to garage or dealers. Luckily I found this forum and lot of information hope can find some clues what's happening on my car.

 

[jrkitching]

Hi and welcome to the forum. There's plenty of background reading in this thread, though sadly still no simple fix. It can't hurt to check the battery is in good condition, and that the connections are secure (particularly the earth leads). That should at least rule out simple electrical faults.

A couple of basic questions; how old is your car, how many miles has it done, and are you the first owner?

And well done for searching first and posting in the right place

 

[jrkitching]

I'm now trying read some threads to see any ideas before taking it to garage or dealers.

If you've read this thread, you'll see the basic problem: most independent garages haven't got a clue about how these transmissions work, and franchised dealers think in terms of replacing major assemblies, rather than trying to repair what's there. A knowledgable independent Fiat specialist is what you need; if you fancy a day out in the country, you could do worse than give these guys a call.

 

[Dave Cin]

Hi jrkitching,
I'm the 3rd owner of the car which is a 15 plate with 44k miles done, just bought it for 6 months and the car trader provided 3 months warranty already past. Probably not going back to the trader to diagnose as that company is not reliable after I bought the car had minor issues but no follow-up.

I have the same thoughts with you that the battery might be gone, it is an original Mopar battery I just tested with multimeter today with the car off it gives 12.3v which is very marginal. What I can try first is to replace a new battery anyway as the current one is 7 years old and I've ordered new AGM battery to be replaced by myself to see any different. Hope it can solve the problem otherwise I'll keep reading the posts here to get some more clues. Thank you!

 

[jrkitching]

Thanks for the update.

If you read through this thread, you'll see that this is the sort of mileage at which these transmissions start giving trouble.

At first, resetting the fault codes and running a relearn procedure in software generally gets them working again for a while, but this is at best a temporary solution.

Finding anyone who can repair them at reasonable cost isn't easy; franchised dealers generally replace the actuator complete; at the time of writing, list price for the part is £2435.60, with fitting on top of that.

Some owners, faced with choosing between a massive repair bill or living with an increasingly problematic car that can't be relied on, cut their losses and trade it in. Anyone else reading this who may be contemplating the purchase of a secondhand dualogic should be aware that the previous owner may have done just that.

I'm sorry if this all sounds negative. What's really needed is for us all to pool our collective knowledge to gain a better understanding of what can be done to properly diagnose and repair faults with these transmissions that doesn't involve replacing major components at a cost of multiple thousands of pounds.

 

[VonNickstein]

Hi, unfortunately I'll have to post a message in this topic as well. Hoping to meet someone with similar experience.
The Fiat 500 gearbox broke down almost 1 year ago. The local garage replaced the shaft bearing and clutch.
All was fine, after we went back for a recalibration of the clutch which they seemed to forgot.

Now couple of months later, the car is having issues going into gear from cold start.
It is trying to get into gear, you can hear the dualogic making the move, tries a couple of times but does not succeed, finally ending in N.
It does go in reverse with a huge grind and clunk as if the clutch is not fully released.
After waiting for a couple of minutes and keep trying, finally the car goes into first gear and once driving everything is fine.

We did a recalibration with MES and car now drives completely different than before. Much smoother.
Unfortunately, the issue that the car when started won't go into gear is still there.
Sometimes in the morning, sometimes after the car is parked for a couple of hours.

Car threw the gearbox issue code P060C - Control unit faulty (microprocessor) a few days ago, but I've been told this will also be the case when the ECU is not able to shift due to mechanical issues.

What could possibly cause this issue where the car won't budge, but reverse is working.
Are we looking at something mechenical/gearbox related or does this sound like a familiar dualogic issue?
Local garage is offering replacement of entire unit without any diagnostics. Don't want to spend another fortune on this car after the recent gearbox repair.
Any help is appreciated.

 

[nad87]

Hello, I am the new owner of a 2019 Fiat 500 Dualogic 1.2. The vehicle has covered 16k miles. The vehicle has unfortunately developed a problem after a month whereby when setting off, its quite jerky/judders. Once I accelerate it goes away and drive normal. You can feel it on gear 2 slightly. All the other gears change/work as normal. Its quite more noticeable when the engine is cold. It goes into all the other gears fine. It is just that initial setting off whereby it hesitates. If I apply minimal pressure on the accelerator, it tends to not judder/ shake as much. I would be grateful if someone could shed some light to this as I have taken it to a mechanic who ran the diagnostics and said that it was all clear with no fault codes. Apologies if this has been covered.
Thanks in advance.