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HELP!! Forester stuck in Drive (auto)


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2002 Forester, 4EAT, 266K - After getting home from town, pulled into my usual parking spot at home, went to put the gear selector in reverse to back up by the porch to unload groceries.. only it didnt feel right... tapped the throttle gently and it wanted to go forward... uh-oh!  No matter what I did with the selector, it wanted to go forward - even with the selector in park.

so... I am guessing the selector cable is broken, but is there any way to determine for sure from INSIDE the vehicle? the drive is a mini lake right now, with more rain in the forecast.. do NOT relish the idea of crawling under the car in a puddle.

also, is there anyway I can manually move the trans side selector from inside, to put it in either neutral or park? (apparently it is supposed to be in neutral to change the cable) and which way would i move it if I can get to it?

the reason i suspect the cable is because the selector has always been stiff & difficult to move between the various gear settings..  right now the selector moves super easy, so I suspect the cable has finally let go

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I think you can see the shift selector from the passenger side engine compartment.  Disconnect it and move it by hand.  Make sure you have the car blocked.

Jack it if needed and put on the rain suit.

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lol, yeah, discovered the other half could reach the tranny selector.. she is now in neutral & parking brake is on. and we have verified it is a broken cable.. time to go order part and let the wait begin.

hopefully by the time the new cable gets here it will be a bit dryer

 

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don't need the whole shifter, just the cable, LOL

New cable has been ordered, should be here about this time next week - only $43 plus shipping

I am going to see about pulling the shift lever out and cleaning/refreshing it a little too - and drill a darn hole for the emergency park release - why they hid that is beyond me. had to basically disassemble the whole center section of the dash to get to it. No easy feat with the shift lever in park! The Forester doesn't have the little central trim plate around the shifter like the Legacy does.. the whole section has to come off to get to the emergency release thing.

 

 

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Best of luck on the project. I know it won't be easy but between the both of you hopefully you'll get it done. I'm really re-thinking my manual transmission preference. If that's the only thing that goes on a 4EAT with 266k miles that's not bad at all. If that was a manual transmission I'd guess by now you'd be on the second clutch. I forgot how much it was to replace it in my 2002 Forester, guessing at least $600.

Edited by Stelcom66
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3 hours ago, Stelcom66 said:

Beat of luck on the project. I know it won't be easy but between the both of you hopefully you'll get it done. I'm really re-thinking my manual transmission preference. If that's the only thing that goes on a 4EAT with 266k miles that's not bad at all. If that was a manual transmission I'd guess by now you'd be on the second clutch. I forgot how much it was to replace it in my 2002 Forester, guessing at least $600.

 

change the hydraulic clutch fluid and gear oil regularly, don’t abuse your synchros and hope the VC doesn’t fail and you’ve got a good chance at high miles.

As much as I dislike MTs the 94 and earliers seemed to have fewer issues and much less VC failures. 

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lol, viscous, not vicious - altho.. if it goes south on you, it could be vicious.

and thanks for the luck, I will take every little bit I can get.

but yeah.. 266K + and the silly cable broke. in theory, i could still drive the car if i hooked up a way to move the shift linkage on the side of the tranny, LOL

Will get some pics of things later - we did manage to get the shift selector out of the car, complete with cable attached to it, lol will be much easier to work on things when not lying on your back on the ground under the car.

it broke right in front of the connection to the interior selector - in front of the adjusting nuts where the red line is. C is supposed to pivot freely in the arm, mine is pretty much rusted solid. Gonna take a bit of work to get that freed up - if it will..

if I cant get it freed up and moving properly, I may need that shifter after all, Larry. I cant imagine that the shifter itself is that much different between the models, same tranny should have pretty much the same selector. Trim might be different, but that is cosmetic stuff. gonna go pull some part numbers and do a little comparing...

 

image.png.e80adeb196f52526aba7852a66363738.png

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37 minutes ago, heartless said:

lol, viscous, not vicious - altho.. if it goes south on you, it could be vicious.

 

I can't believe I wrote that lol! Thanks for the catch and pun. I thought it was amusing recently when someone said their old  house is listed with the Hysterial Society - that in itself was.. you know...

Yea age is a factor with our cars too, dealing with rust especially with snow. Not saying it's guaranteed to work, but I always have PB Blaster on hand.

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hehe, yeah, i had a little giggle over that one.

oh yeah, we have a good supply of PB as well. along with another very useful product called Freeze-Off - not cheap, but frequently works when the PB does not. Nice intermediate step before breaking out the hot wrench.

after getting things out of the car yesterday, pretty much everything got a good soaking of PB, to hopefully help when we try to continue disassembly.

was just poking thru parts diagrams, and apparently there are differences between the Legacy/Outback platform and the Impreza/Forester platform.. so.. i may be picking up a couple more pieces for the refreshing job - mainly the lower lever piece and the bushing that the cable attaches to. Cost is not horrible, and that would basically give me a whole new lower end to the gear selector.

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Yep, there's a little bushing between the shifter arm and the cable that is usually seized in there. There are 4 or 5 different numbers over the years, but the dealership I worked at stocked them, as it's a fairly common failure in this part of the world.

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3 hours ago, Numbchux said:

Yep, there's a little bushing between the shifter arm and the cable that is usually seized in there. There are 4 or 5 different numbers over the years, but the dealership I worked at stocked them, as it's a fairly common failure in this part of the world.

yeah, I can just see white plastic at the joint.. no way that is going to clean up and be usable - just ordered the bushing and the lower bracket as well. might as well just get the parts & replace it all in one go rather than spending hours trying to clean it up and having to order the parts anyway. Car is gonna be down for more than a week as it is.. <_<

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well, hell's bells, Margaret... apparently that bushing has been discontinued and is no longer available. <_<

 

Now what to do.. what to do..

Yeah, Larry, why don't you shoot me some pics of what you have handy.. send to northwoods3d at gmail.com

 

 

 

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so apparently there IS a supersede (several generations) beyond the one that is no longer available... and it fits my car... in fact, it fits over 1000 different variants of Subaru from 1987 onward. Only major difference i can see is price, most likely due to differences in material used to make it. And they do carry it so we shall see if they offer it to me... if not, I have it in a cart on another site, for a few cents less... LOL

I am still interested in seeing what you have, Larry - see if it might work.

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1 hour ago, Numbchux said:

Have you talked to an actual dealer parts department? I don't believe for a second that those are not available, we sold them all the time. But sometimes there are some oddball supersessions.

oh, i found the most recent version of it, on another subaru parts site. doing a google search for the part number came up with it - the newer part is listed as being for the Crosstrek, but when you go down to where it lists fitment, that is where you find out it fits over 1000 different Subaru models, across many years, starting in 1987 - and yes, my 2002 Forester is one of them, lol

1st site was subarupartsdeal - they have not offered me the updated part (even tho they carry it), or even mentioned it existed. Order there has been cancelled

I found the updated part on Subarupartwholesale - updated part is more expensive than the old one (almost double), but it is what it is.. the part is needed, period.

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I had my cable (2005 forester) start to bind, from top and bottom I would lube with paste mix of ATF and wheel bearing grease every couple of years.

Well, more the little round thing that holds the cable in the shifter than the cable.

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3 hours ago, heartless said:

oh, i found the most recent version of it, on another subaru parts site....

Glad you found the part - or at least one that's compatible.

50 minutes ago, CNY_Dave said:

I had my cable (2005 forester) start to bind, from top and bottom I would lube with paste mix of ATF and wheel bearing grease every couple of years.

Sounds like a good idea for some lubrication every so often on older models. Something like that, I would have never thought of doing until there was a need for it. 

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yeah.. i have yet to get back out to the garage to get pictures.. but the number one location for problems is gonna be that swivel joint on the shift lever and possibly the cable itself if the boots are damaged.

Larry - I got the pics, and yeah.. not gonna work.. wiring is different and mine has 6 screws, not 4, so.. thank you anyway. (mine is the older version, straight pattern, not gated) otherwise, yeah, that looks like a nice unit - so if someone needs one, hit him up!

 

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whelp - this is probably the last time i order from subarupartsdeal.com - placed the order on May 21st - shipping label was created on May 27th... still has not actually moved. There is no tracking history as of this morning - just that the label had been created.

Meanwhile, the stuff i ordered from SubaruPartsWholesale.com on May 25th is on its way and will be delivered most likely on Tuesday.

Really kind of irritated at the moment.

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'Your item has shipped'

I regularly get this notification from Amazon.  What they really mean is that a shipping label has been printed, but that they have just discovered that their cupboard is actually bare and that they have no inventory.

I feel your pain.

 

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