My legacy wagon won't go into any gear. I can put it in drive and hit the gas and the RPMs will go up, as well as the speedometer, but the car will not move. HELP!?

What year is your car? Is it awd or fwd? To me, if the speedo is going up with the revs, you have a stripped out axle.

Its a 1990 awd wagon. Thats what I thought but even if I had a stripped out axle I would still move since technically there are 3 others.

^not so true.. I broke the front diff on a 4EAT once and all it did was show me doing 120 MPH standing still and it only took like 4K RPM..

Not necessarily.  Is yours Manual or automatic?  My 90 manual will not move without its rear driveshaft installed.  And the automatic, since it is not truly "fulltime", will not move unless the TCU engages the rear drive.

 

If an automatic, if you unplug the TCU it should put the tranny into a default mode, which should include locking the drive to the rear wheels.

So Northwet, if I do that would it make the car rear wheel drive and would it be possible to drive it to a shop?

It would be nice to know if this is a manual or automatic transmission. I am assuming that it is an automatic from your reference to "drive".  PLEASE clarify.

 

Without knowing what is broken, and how that breakage would affect roadworthiness, I would not chance it.  It would be useful to know if part or all of one front axle turns when you try to make the car move forward. 

 

If and only if it is safe to do so, and with one foot firmly on the brake pedal, have someone observe the axles through the engine bay while you try to drive forward.  The likely possibilities are:

- both axles stay completely still, or

- the inside portion of one axle moves while the rest does not move, or

- both the inside portion and the central shaft move but the outer portion does not move, or

- the entire axle moves but the wheel does not.

if its automatic it may be transmission slipping, or not engaging into gears because there is no hydraulic pressure to the valve body of the transmission, hence it could be clogged with deposits. Check the RPMs when shifting to D, 3, 2, 1, and reverse, and as Eeyore said the TCU may be acting up as well.

broken axle ? any line preshure try pinching the line and see if it pushes back sheared pump shaft ?

Front final drive is turning (speedometer is reading something other than zero), so transmission core should not be the issue.

So here's the full story to help you folks out. I pulled up to a light and I went to pull my phone out of my console and bumped my shifter into Neutral. I then pushed the gas, realized it was in nuetral, and put it into drive and nothing. I could push on the gas all i wantes and it would go nowhere. The spedometer and tach move. Its an automatic, 1990 Legacy.

Almost has to be axle splines. Transmissions just don't work fine one second then not work at all.. splines do that (spoob the bed all at once) another thing, if the speedometer is working the tranny, viscus clutch and all of the is working fine... start checking axle splines at both the wheel hub end and the differential sides 

it does sound like a bad front axle,

but it would have to also have a bad AWD transfer clutch

or rear axle or some part to eliminate power to the rear.

Edited September 26, 201312 yr by johnceggleston

just bumping it into neutral wont hurt anything. either - if you were completely stopped, even bumping it into reverse wouldnt/shouldnt hurt it...there is definitely something going on with axles/driveline.

 

I would get the car safely up on jackstands, start it, put it in gear, and start looking for what is turning/not turning.

Also make sure the linkage is connected and working - it could possibly have popped the shift linkage?