So im driving down this beautiful stretch of street, smooth, no cracks...clean

i decide to mess with the shifter of my e320

Getting all excited, i accidently double siffted down..i was going from 4to 3...but went to 2 instead .....i was going about 55 ish.....since this isnt the right gear...i heard a very loud pop as my car jerked backward..

i quickly shifted back up


drove her home, even did a straight run from 0 through all the gears(from 1 through 4 to drive)

the onyl thing that scares me is i think I lost some of the pull on my car...it doesnt pull as hard in 1st....or maybe im just going crazy???

I realize I messed up bigtime, somone give me some closure and tell me its something that couldve gone wrong but didnt, and that im lucky to have not effed up anything more than my night????

 

I always downshift when slowing down to save brake pads, however, Iv'e never done something like that. I think you are just imagining things lol, try not to think about it.

 

Since then have you had any trouble like gear shifting? If not, then you should be alright. Just be careful next time .....

 

I wouldn't worry too much about it. The trans has safeguards for accidental human moves like that one.

I would just reset the trans shift back to day one and let it relearn how you drive. Sorta like a fresh start.

 

if it helps i have the facelift e320 with the newer trans setup

looks like this
P
R
N
-D+

i dont have this setup...

P
R
N
D/4
3
2
1

SO its all good u guys r telling me?

 

Can you tell me how to "reset the trans shift back to day one". I have over
20K miles of highway only, and now in town shifts way too early.

 

you're putting a lot more wear & tear on your engine and transmission to save your pads???

let's see:

brake pads: $50/set
engine: $6000
transmission: $5000

 

+1

 

just search the forum(s) for ECU RESET . should bring up variations and updates
of the following sequence. some folks have reported great satisfaction, some
minimal effect...since they drive linke old people (like me).

 

I wouldn't call it a lot more engine wear. Transmissions are made to shift - it's going to shift as you slow down regardless. Transmission braking is common...

 

+2

 

+ Aliens

 

Hmm.. my mother (previous owner and first owner) always downshifted when slowing down. I always down shift when slowing down. My car is at 160k miles and is still on first transmission, and first engine.Now that I think about it, we've never had any transmission problems... It's very common for people to use the transmission to slow down...

 

There's nothing wrong with engine breaking when trying to keep the car below 45mph on a downgrade in the mountains, but to use it for breaking to slow the car down for intersedctions as a general practice... I'll pass.

Continuous, low speed engine/transmission braking shouldn't hurt the components. Using them as stop and go brakes will definitely hurt them.

 

I have never heard of it to be bad to down shift you car coming to a stop. This is a very crazy idea you have. Think about it, from day one of the car we have down shifted to stop and all the cars I have worked on (I use to do it for a living), I have never heard any company tell the customer to not down shift the car. I am very new to the Mercedes world but not the car world so relax and down shift that thing if need be. Hell drive it like you stole its a damn Mercedes not a Yugo!

 

Thanks Raymond,
I did know about the ECU reset, not sure that it resets the tcu as well. I will give it a try today, I have read that the adaptive trans needs 40 shifts to change its programing, if the reset works, great, if not "S" mode and a severe thrashing is in order.

 

OK Home now, the ECU reset did little as far as the shifting, however I beat the hell out of my 430, "S" mode at every stop light real hard acceleration till 3rd gear coast down, punch it to the kick down button 2nd back to 3rd. After 12 miles it changed and started to hold lower gears longer, what a relief it works great now, shifts when I like. Up shifts when I let off just great!

 

yeah....in a stick car

why the hell would anyone use engine braking in an auto?????

OP: if you downshifted too many gears, the engine will just bounce off the rev limiter, you should have no problems after what you did unless there was a previous unknown problem with the trans.

 

I had no idea about the ECU reset. Can I do this with my E300? Is it the same procedure and steps stated above? Thanks,

 

Ed is your 300 a diesel?, if so I am not sure the reset will work, as it is for the ECU on a gasoline engine, spark and fuel.

 

actually, i'm not sure if i should have used ECU RESET as the term because I'm
not sure what all ECU controls. the sequence for resetting i posted above had
to do with resetting the adaptive transmission memory....which could be a diff
animal, in part.

 

well tell me a few things...
i got 97-E320
shift type:
4<>D
3
2

1. when i change from N. to D what mode is car in? D or 4
2. when i move it to left or right between D and 4 there is a litl more than a click sound and the shifter comes back to middle? is it right or it should remain to its selected position?
3. Shifting from E to S mode... when The switch is on the E ... i.e. S visible (what mode is it E or S?)

 

if it felt like you threw out an anchor like the rear wheels locked up, then you did damage to the tranny, it's the weakest link. the electrical nannys should prevent engine overrev , but they can't fix the laws of physics; too fast for the gear ratio. how much damage? don't know, but from your description probably not much, or at least no obvious broken parts. second gear is pretty tall, but rest assured you just put thousands of miles of wear on the tranny. i would suggest changing the fluid and looking at it closely, but what's done is done.

on the braking issue, let's just say that a less than stellar downshift can get expensive in many ways, and that any downshift, manual or auto tranny, produces more wear than no downshift. i personally use my brakes for deceleration. long ago, when brakes really sucked, sometimes it was necessary to use engine braking to help slow a car on a long, steep downhill due to brake fade. not really an issue for the last 25 years.
David

 

just saw this, had to respond. this is absolutely incorrect. a rev limiter will not keep you from overreving an engine on downshift!!! electronically controlled automatics may do some weird things to help prevent overrev, like not actually perform the downshift, but manual tranny cars don't. run a manual tranny to the top of 4th gear and downshift to 2nd and see what happens. i guarantee your warranty won't cover the result!
David

 

i agree with dsmith.. and wish to add some beautiful info to all the misinformed pps out there....

1. tranny is designed to provide for braking purpose as well. thats y it downshifts automatically when ur slowing down and it down shifts when ur ETS is working, it also downshifts to facilitate ABS controls.

2. No need to manually downshift as ur just have to admit that ur not driving a donkey cart any longer. GROW UP FOR AN INTELLIGENT TRANNY that detects when to upshift and when to downshift by itself.

3. Downshifting or even putting the gear knob on R wont do any harm to the tranny, the shifter ur using in MB is electronic not mechanical... i.e. when ur going 120 the shifter is wise enough to understand when u wish to screw it up. or planning to burn it.

ONLY

posibility to break or burn the tranny is doing something that tranny is not designed for i.e. doing trannys part of the job by manuualy downshifting (it wont harm the tranny as it will know how to control itself, but its a bad habit on a wise tranny) as it will hinder the learning process of the tranny. OR if the TCU malfunctions or Shifter module malfunctions or u run without tranny fluid or mis-matched tranny fluid and filters... or some mechanical wear and tear that u dont take care of at the right time.

according to MB,, trannys are designed for life... and according to my experience of owning 3 consecutive different variants of MBs and now running on 4th while my dad and bros also are running on the same beasts... we havnt changed a single tranny on around 20 different MBs that we drove for past 20 years. only minor repairs have been done such as valves, seals, oil, filter, tcu programing etc.

I hope that is detailed enough...