Still have Hard Brake Stalling AND Sluggish Forward Movement in '01 LGT Auto, will th

[SubeeTed]

Hi ALL!

I still have my 2001 Legacy GT Wagon with Auto and 162 K miles on it .

 

I still have the forward sluggishness problem, now that it's colder, it really shows. I have done the TransX thing, it helped some.

 

I also have the stalling upon hard braking thing. I have replaced the Master cyclinder, that did nothing. I have cleaned the the IAC. I have a good ground . I have sort of given up on what to do , untill I came upon the post hee of the guy on Youtube swapping out his OEM tranny fluid on his Honda for Synth, by using his ATF pump, link below.

 

I am intrigued and terified of the concept of doing it to my '01 LGT. I'm thinking that my Torq Converter is the problem. I did experiment and did had braking in Neutral, stalling goes away. So I'm thinking if I do this, BOTH problems go away, or at least helped greatly, OR the Tranny DIES!

 

I'm thinking replace OEM ATF with Valvoline Maxlife Dexron III then top it off with a can of fresh TransX. Then replace tranny filter with a fresh one after all this ! OK.....just how STUPID is this idea !!!????

 

SubeeTed

 

Video .....

[lmdew]

I flush the transmissions this way all the time. I use a gallon milk jug and do it about 3/4 of a gallon at a time. 4 gallons of fluid is about right for a Subaru Trans. If you have internal damage this will not fix a thing, but it won't hurt the trans either.

[Fairtax4me]

Transmission is not the problem. Stalling when braking is an engine problem. Vacuum leaks, possible incorrect timing, maybe just needs a tune-up. All vacuum and breather/ PCV hoses are the first things I would check.

 

The ECU can mask vacuum leaks at idle by adjusting the IAC but it can't always make enough adjustment when driving to keep the engine from stalling under hard braking.

Sluggish acceleration is also a key indicator of a vacuum leak. Fuel mileage may not suffer, but you will notice hard /strange shifting from an auto trans because of the increased throttle input when accelerating. A higher throttle sensor angle tells the TCU to shift quicker.

[nipper]

I really would start with a tune up, including the PCV valve and all filters first.

[Fairtax4me]

Just read over your previous thread. Curious if you ever tried driving in D3 to see if it would still stall?

I still can't imagine the torque converter lockup is the problem. Since the example was set by GM, I'll go that topic a bit. The converter lockup on the GM cars was just a solenoid to control line pressure, very similar still on newer cars but the systems are much more advanced now, and the solenoids are designed differently to prevent lockup at all if the solenoid goes bad. In the days of the famed TCC solenoid failure, putting the trans into neutral would allow you to stop without the engine stalling. However, the lockup was still engaged so when you put the trans back into gear to drive away the engine would stall immediately. Turn off the engine and restart, go into gear and it would stall again, and again, and again, until the transmission cooled and THEN the lockup solenoid would finally disengage. You could then drive until the transmission got warm again, and if you exceeded 45mph in 3rd gear the lockup would engage and you start the stall fest all over again. It wasn't a stall every once in a while kind of thing, once the solenoid failed the engine would stall any time you stopped after going over 45 mph.

 

More often than not stalling issues are due to engine problems. A lack of power just drives home this point. There are quite a few sensors that can affect engine power, MAF, ECT, knock sensor, all without setting codes.

[WoodsWagon]

With it idling in park turn the A/C on full blast. The idle speed should jump up a couple hundred rpms. If it doesn't, you need to take apart and clean the pintle in the idle air control solenoid. It's on top of the throttle body.