93 E36 Barely moves

budzbox · 02-19-2009, 01:50 PM

My 93 325i automatic has had a problem for a while, and I need some ideas. I have not really driven it in 6 months or so since this happened.

When you start the car, it sounds fine, idles fine, runs through the RPMs great. When I put it in gear, you need all the gas you can give it to make it creep along at <5mph. I can barely get it in the garage.

When I got it on 4 jacks, I checked the fluid, which was fresh and full. I ended up starting it up and putting it in gear, and it shifted through the gears and got me up well over 70mph no problem. Put in on the ground though, and same old crap.

Anyone have any ideas what this might be? Where I can look? I get no codes and no other indicators as to what it is. I ended up getting a used tranny recently, and I might swap it out, but that is my last ditch thought due to the amount of work, and the fact that I am not even sure that is the problem. I was thinking it could be some sort of fuel problem or something, and would rather not change that tranny with some way to confirm. Putting it up on jacks I figured it would react the same as on the ground, so I have just been stumped.

Any ideas would be great. Thanks

Scott

Manolito · 02-20-2009, 05:44 AM

You should be able to tell by the way it sounds and feels whether it is an engine problem or a transmission problem. I take it that this is an automatic, correct? Does the engine rev up freely when the car is in gear, or does the engine sound like it is pulling a load and not rev up?

If the engine revs freely but the car does not move, and the automatic tranny fluid is good, then the transmission is toast. If it is that bad, you will want to change, or at least flush the torque converter when you swap out the tranny.

budzbox · 02-20-2009, 08:10 AM

Thanks for the reply. It is an automatic, and the engine sounds fine really. It gets up into the higher rpms to get it to crawl, so I guess it is the tranny. I got a converter along with the tranny, so I will flush it when I do the swap. I guess I need to order some tools now, and get back to it. I will be glad to get it running again, I miss the MPGs.

My next goal is to get the locking system to work properly, but that is another impossible thread.

Thanks,

Scott

Manolito · 02-20-2009, 11:16 AM

If you have metal filings or clutch facing in the pan in the bottom of the tranny, you will want to back flush the tranny cooler and lines to make sure not to contaminate the new tranny with debris.

The locking system on the early e36s is quite a pain when it fails. The later e36s put most of the electronics in the door locks into a single pug-in module that you could swap out with a new or a junk yard module rather than going through a detailed diagnosis.

budzbox · 02-20-2009, 12:16 PM

Thanks for the tip on the shavings. I actually grabbed the cooler and lines off the tranny donor, and I am going to swap those as well, so I will go ahead and flush those prior to install as well. Last time I looked in the pan there was a little bit of super fine, powder shavings in there, but nothing significant. It did not even cover the entire magnet in there. But, I am swapping the tranny anyhow, so a flush is in order.

I wish those locks were at least somehow easy to troubleshoot. I changed out 3 of the actuators, and that didnt do a thing. The worst part is that I am unsure if anyone has ever really done troubleshooting on them here, so there is little data to go on.

Thanks again,

Scott

Manolito · 02-20-2009, 05:33 PM

On the later models, all of the microswitches are inside the actuator except for the one next to the key lock that detects when you turn the key past the lock position and closes all the windows and sunroof. On the earlier models, my understanding is that the microswitches are scattered around on the latch mechanism so things are more complicated. I have never actually seen the earlier style assembly.

There are a dozen or so BMW enthusiast boards on the net. I would search all of them for tips.