Trans Fail Safe mode (briefly) ... living on borrowed time ?

[nrgetic99]

My X has had some fun in the last few weeks. Got put into the kerb by a dude on a cell phone and ended up getting a new tire and an allignment.
Stealer ended uup replacing coolant expansion tank, sender unit and a few hoses while I was there under the CPO. (BTW, dude on phone stopped initially and then took off, State Trooper said as no one hurt and damage 'under $1000', they would not pursue it).

This weekend, I backed out of a parking spot and shifted from reverse to forward and got on the gas pretty quick as a vehicle was approaching. Tires actually chirped a little then I noticed I had no power.

Cut to the chase, tranny locked in 4th. I got home, turned off ignition and had the "Trans Fail Safe mode" message in the console display." Left it off for 30 seconds and restarted with no error messages and seemingly normal behaviour. I have given a good run all weekend, in and out of sport mode and no apparent problems.

From my research, failsafe mode is implemented when the various ECU's detect an anomaly between demand vehicle speed and actual speed for a given transmission gear, rpm etc....in effect, ECU's determine transmission slipping for whatever reason and go to fail safe.

That could all be explained by the spinning tires and the anomaly as described but I am more worried what caused the tires to spin. I admit, I got on gas quickly after going from R to D and I am assuming, the transmission had not fully completed the shift to D when i tried to take off...operator error on my part.

I do have 26,000 left on my CPO ... from others experience, I did read someone here feels they trashed thier tranny by being not very careful doing exactly this in going from R to D but this, to my knowledge, is the only time this has occured.

So, whaddya think ?? Does my tranny die in 26,001 miles ??

David

[ljnlaw]

just kickin a thought around maybe you should bring it in and have an OBD check done...obviously you should be careful slapping the shifter between R and D. Good Luck.

[vinuneuro]

If it's under CPO, take it in and let them fix/replace whatever they need to.

[nrgetic99]

Agree with all of your comments. I will take it in and have them read the stored codes.

Also, the point about not going from R to D in a hurry is not lost on me. This is the first and last time I will do it as I am now very focussed on it.

Talking with a tranny tech who used to work for a tranny design company before coming to us, he gave me a good explanation of exactly what happened and his opinion is one time like this should not have lead to any lasting damage if nothing is apparent immediately and it is higly likely the failsafe did its job.

However, next time I am in I will get it checked.

David

[UCrewX5]

I've had this pop up a few times over the 127,000 miles I've had my X5 and not once was the root cause with the transmission.

[dkl]

Have a look at the tranny fluid and make sure it's at the correct level. I hate it that there's no dipstick for it.

[WolfX5]

Yes my own tranny went into fail-safe mode the one and only time I was low on fluid (right after the dealer changed the fluid improperly...dorks).

[dkl]

Originally Posted by WolfX5

Yes my own tranny went into fail-safe mode the one and only time I was low on fluid (right after the dealer changed the fluid improperly...dorks).

I think that might be the reason why most tranny failed right after a fluid changed. Dealer don't do enough changes that they may not even know the proper procedures. There's no dipstick to measure anything these days