4Runner won't move forward in Drive when cold

[CajunRunner]

I wouldn't call that dropping the ball, I call that ripping off the customer.

Perhaps, but it makes absolutely no business sense when they warranty their work for 3 years. I think a lazy or inexperienced technician is to blame. It's cost the dealership several days of un-reimbursed labor and parts. I have to believe they correct these types of problems as they come to light. The service manager was perturbed when she looked at the history on my truck and admitted it was ridiculous and I would certainly not be charged to make it right.

 

[bmcnutt]

This may sound crazy, but I was reading another fourm about this same issue & it turned out to be the battery not having enough power !

 

[Qyota]

This may sound crazy, but I was reading another fourm about this same issue & it turned out to be the battery not having enough power !

Yup - something about a minimum voltage not being met to send a shift signal. Once the alternator spins up enough, the shift happens abruptly because it's already in gear. Almost sounds plausible! This thread is more than 1 year old...I wonder what the OP did?

 

[TotalIdiot]

having a somewhat similar issue to this but I'm not allowed to make any posts yet...whats the deal??

 

[dlanyer]

go to synthetic oil. I was having the same problem in cold weather.

In cold weather below freezing ,I would have to put it in low gear to get going once it got going put it in drive and it would be fine for the rest of the day. Next morning same thing would happen. I changed filter and gasket and switched to synthetic transmission oil, and it has been fine this winter.

 

[ktowbes]

I’m having the same issue as the OP. So I got the p770 code, and drive it for a few days and cleared it a few times. Then, one day, I went to leave for class and the car wouldn’t move. I could put it in drive and reverse, but it wouldn’t go anywhere. It eventually got to a point that, if I put it in drive, it would sit for like 30seconds and then slowly creep forward, and I could build momentum up to get it to move. Reverse worked a little better than forward, but it wouldn’t still need to sit for a few seconds in gear before it would move. Isearched the forums and decided to replace the solenoids. I completed that 2 days ago. However, now the car doesn’t move at all.

The fluid was very dark and smelled bad, but it’s got 260k miles and I’m pretty sure the PO didn’t ever replace the fluid. I cleaned the pan and everything before I put it back. I didn’t FLUSH all the fluid, I just added the 4qt that came out. There WERE fragments in the oil pan, but they were plastic, not metal. I figured out that the plugs on the solenoids had become so fragile that the plastic part of the plugs broke into like 15 pieces. I took the metal interior of the plug and slipped it onto the solenoid so that it was very tight.