2 Signs Your Transmission May Be Breaking Down
Your transmission takes the energy that your engine produces and then turns it into something that your car can use by sending it to the drive shaft and the axles of the car so that the wheels can turn and you can go where you want to go. It does this by having a series of gears that are various sizes, and that can handle the various speeds that the engine is going to go. Without the transmission, your car may as well be a lawn ornament. That means that you want to make sure that you know some signs that it's going bad.
1. Grinding When Shifting Gears
If you have an automatic transmission, it will shift gears on its own when the engine hits a certain RPM. If you have a manual transmission, also known as a stick shift, then you switch the gear when the engine hits a certain RPM range. When the gears go to shift into a higher or lower gear, then it should switch smoothly and easily. There shouldn't be any kind of grinding noise or feel when you are switching gears. If you feel that happening, it can be a sign that your transmission is breaking down. You should go to an auto shop as soon as possible so that you don't have to worry about the transmission dying.
2. Mushy or Slow Shifting
If your car feels like it's slow on the gear shift or the shift feels like it's soft or mushy, that can mean that a gear may be slipping, so the gear has to kind of work itself into the proper place which can take some time for that to happen. The way that it can make the shift feel mushy is that since the gear is slipping out from where it should be, it won't entirely engage, which gives it that soft, mushy feeling, like it's almost there, but just not quite, but you are still able to have your car in gear. That mushy or slow shifting can also cause your car to slip out of gear altogether. You may notice this effect more in a manual transmission than you would in a car with an automatic transmission.
If you think that you are having transmission problems, then you should take your car to a transmission shop as soon as possible. The longer your car has a problem, the more expensive it's going to be to fix it.