Buick/Olds: 99 Buick Park Ave 3.8L non-supercharged., buick park ave, throttle position sensor

Question
Hello Ray,

I wonder if you have any ideas for me about my car's transmission. Like you, I work on my cars to save money and sometimes I enjoy it too. Mostly out of necessity though. Being a relitively newer car, it just left the warranty period, turning 100K recently, and started doing something that is hard to describe. I;ve noticed that it seems to want to shift into overdrive a little bit early now and when I need to downshift, it is taking a little bit more gas pedal travel to achieve this. When it does this, it almost feels as if it is going in and out of gear fast so that it imitates a sort of sputtering, but no real sound, just mechanical. It really is like someone turning on and off the light swithc in relatively fast succession for a few moments, then it shifts and is fine. I assume these cars are equipped with some kind of electronics around the trans so there might be a sensor or something going bad. But no check engine light is on and I'm at a loss of what to do now. Any ideas you may have would be great. Thanks for your time.

Answer
I am not sure when the last time you had your transmission flushed.  I would have you do that immediately.  Also, ask your local dealer or local auto store about a transmission fluid additive called "Lucas".  We have it here in my area of Indiana.  What is does is it thinkens the tranny fluid so that if provides a better coating of the gears.  The problem you are having may be due to low tranny fluid or it could not have anything to do with the transmission at all but more along the lines of a throttle position sensor or something along those lines.  The transmission flush is required anyway, so that's a good idea to preserve the life of your car's drivetrain.  In addition to that, a complete tune up should fix what you are experiencing.

Thanks,

Ray Barham.

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