Good day Scotty,
I recently purchased a 2007 Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT8 with the Mercedes 5 speed auto transmission with 150,000 on the odo. I did some town and highway driving tests and immediately noticed the transmission holds on to (sticks) to gears on gear 1 to 2 and 2 to 3, ultimately snapping / jerking to lock on to the gear. Between 3 and 4 it has a loud whine. At over 120km/h it starts vibrating violently and I have now decided to have the guy who sold it to me fix the vibration issue. After his mechanic dragged me from one form of faulty diagnosis to another I finally decided to take it to a Chrysler specialist who told me I need a front propshaft, all 4 shocks and a clutch kit. I went to the local and only dealer in town but the mechanics there dont really know if there is such a thing as a clutch kit in an auto Jeep. Do I need a clutch kit (which can be ordered online) or a transmission rebuild?
Collen Maruapula
South Africa
Thats 150,000km
New trans.
Look, it’s a Mercedes 5G tronic with 150,000km that’s usually when the torque convertor lock up goes out - it might be that.
“clutch kit” probably is just friction packs and that being a Mercedes 5G tronic - I’d say that “specialist” has no clue of what he’s taking about, that wasn’t an issue on Mercedes 5 speeds since very early 2000s.
The TCM and speed sensor on these is known to fail,
and the solenoids are week - but if you have been changing your oil every 50,000km and been driving reasonably, I doubt that that’s the main issue.
you have to drive around with a fancy scan tool and see what the transmission’s doin. Or just go to tranny shops and see what they think is going on.
Here’s a great video on this automatic (subtitles in English)
https://youtu.be/ek9NwLz5_LM
Yeah given the fact the torque lockup happens in 3rd gear and up, your symptoms seem like it’s that issue.
Go to a tranny shop that has experience working on Mercedes gearboxes.
It’s such a common issue to see the torque convertor lock up go out at 90k~95k miles that I’m sure anyone that knows what they’re doing is going to be able to repair it.
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Alternatively, I’d recommend you buy a used gearbox just in case. It’s worth having a spare gearbox for such a car so that you can use it for a long time (automatics nowadays are the weakspot of every car) 😃
I have a 2000 mercedes benz with that same 5 speed. I know most of the transmission shops around here (SC) wont touch that transmission. Most will give you the option to order a rebuilt one for around 6500 dollars from somewhere on the west coast. Good luck finding someone to rebuild it. Same transmission was on a jeep grand cherokee 2012 which i got rid of.
Definitely check the torque converter first. Service may be difficult in South Africa, I'm not sure.
