Car Details:
Toyota Corolla (ZRE152)
2008
130,000 km (80,778 miles)
Automatic
Transmission flush 20,000km (2 years) ago. I thought it looked ok when I checked it, looked reasonably clear/pinky. Maybe a bit of darkness to it.
Issue has been present for about ~6 months now
Description:
When I start the car everything is perfectly fine. It is after about 10 minutes of driving (I suspect once it is warmed up) that it starts to shift with a clunk from 1st to 2nd gear. All other gears shift absolutely fine all the time. I can notice that as I get closer to that 10 minutes it starts shifting more poorly, getting a heavier clunk. Note it is not exactly 10 minutes every time, it could be 5 minutes. It just appears to be as it warms up. However I leave it alone for a while and it is fine again for that first 10 minutes.
What could be doing this and are there any tests I can do to get closer to a diagnosis? I don't want to be changing parts unless I am quite confident it is causing the issue.
Many Thanks for any help you are able to give!
Sad but true for the only constant in your transmission is wearing out internally. Not that common of a problem but that hip to my old photographer at CBS years ago with one me I'd advise baby and it because rebuilding those things cost a fortune
2008 is tricky, in the US that means it's an E120 (In other countries I'd probably mean an E150)
I'm also assuming your transmission isn't a multi-mode, but a regular U341E automatic.
The fluid shouldn't be pink, it should be RED. Pink can mean your transmission took in water and that's a lot of damage.
Check the fluid so that It's read and of the required type (check your manual, but If I correctly identified your car, it should be Type T-IV), that there are no leaks and if there's nothing obvious go to a professional.
My guess would be that your valve body and solenoids are dying but that's quite a lot of money - so go to someone who has previously worked on Toyota Corolla automatics so that they can check it.
If you want to dive deep into this transmission, There are quite a few sources online.
http://shop.ukrtrans.biz/wp-content/uploads/catalogs/U341E.pdf
