mobinakhtar

It rained really hard last night and flooded most parts of Houston, but I kept my ML on the high driveway. This morning, I started her up and took her out of drive way. I noticed Reverse to Drive was jerky. Next I noticed, I was stuck in 1 and the display for gear is a solid blank.

Could moisture have caused this?

I say that because I parked her in the sun for 30 mins and when I restarted the car, it shows park, and then R for reverse, however - it still says R when you put it in drive. Also after that it refuses to go back to park. It goes into N and thinks its in P (blank display but cannot move shifter). Turn vehicle off and you can put her back in park. WEIRD.

Check engine light is NOT on. No other lights are on.

I do have the dipstick from my E420 so I checked tx fluid and its full, no smell- perfect condition.

I donot think this relates, but my wife noticed that all but one brake lamps were out so I purchased bulbs from Walmart and installed them in the ML third light and right rear brake lamp. Has been working fine. I was pissed because my 1997 E-420 would complain about lamp failures, and here I am driving 3 yrs newer newer ML for couple months with just one brake light on. Since brake pedal, switch etc are involved in the transmission shifting (from P to whatever) I thought I would mention this. I can however press brakes and shift the shifter.

Vehicle has 117K miles. At 114 when I bought it seven months ago (Yes I only drove it 3K miles in 7 months), Dealer informed me they had to replace the TCM and do a transmission service (?) because of rough shifting. 4x4 motor for low gear was also replaced at that time because low 4x4 light kept flashing. Honestly transmission felt new after I took the delivery.

The people I bought from are no help and will not even discuss it even being a reputable (yeah right) porsche/ferrari shop.

sosh

Sounds to me like an electronic module for the trans has a problem. This is usually due to water or sometimes a spilled drink. As for the dipstick you used, its different than the ML dipstick and will not give you an accurate reading. However it does not sound to me like a fluid problem anyway. As for the brake lights, unless the brake switch has failed it would have nothing to do with that and you have no other lights lit so its not that. No the W163 has no lamp warnings but the new W164 I believe does. Could be that when they replaced the TCM they used a used one and it failed. For this a dealer is your best bet

marcelc

There's an electronic circuit board under the shifter, you can prize up the square surround and see some of it, I can not remember if you have to take out the whole centre console to access it properly, but that is not a very big job.

If you think water might have made it to that circuit board then drying it with a hair dryer (and the ignition key removed) could possible save you a good deal of money. That circuit board is probably where shifting requests are generated and probably the source of the signal to feed the 1,2,3,4,D display.

The problem could also be a wet plug/socket.

Please let us know the outcome.

mobinakhtar

Thanks guys. Another user had exact same problem, but apparently he returned the car to where he purchased from (happened the first week of ownership apparently). I tried searching forums and discussions. Any ideas on what search words should I use to pinpoint the shifter behavior? transmission alone returns pages and pages - failure added to the phrase returns even more results.

I am hoping after 6-7 hours of sun, it will dry up and return to normal. If not, where should I start digging. There is absolutely no water, moisture, or spill even near the shifter. This AM, I popped the trim to inspect under the shifter. It was bone dry.

marcelc

I've been half a mile at one third to one half a metre depth of water and had no problem, but I was driving slowly, were you driving fast in the floods causing a lot of water spray?

mobinakhtar

No actually the vehicle had not been driven in 3-4 days. I agree with fellow members that water (or more likely moisture) got trapped in a wire connector somewhere for this to happen. Vehicle was parked in sun today.

I had called wifey earlier to check the shifting and she said its shifting normally again. The lcd reports everything correctly and all is well again like nothing ever happened.

thanks for all the input gang! I was scared ****less!!!!!