:-\ My 02 outback, when under load going up hills, Mind you I-70 at the Eisenhowser tunnel and other mtn passes, will sometimes downshift and other times will not shift at all.

I had seen on a other tread that someone got around this by taking your foot off of the gas and then back on the gas, a sort of de-revving to get it to shift.

 

Has anyone else ever seen this and is there a fix?????

 

Thanks!

I had to use third to maintain speed on those passes in my '02 OBS. Are you saying that your foot was to the floor and the tranny remained in 4th?

 

The lockup clutch remained engaged also?

Yep, had it floored the whole time and it stayed in 4th, even shifting it to 3rd would only work half the time.

how old is the fluid/filter, and what does the fluid look/smell like?

 

ATs are usually very picky to the quantity/quality of ATF in them. My 3AT does really weird things when its fluid gets bad.

Yep, had it floored the whole time and it stayed in 4th, even shifting it to 3rd would only work half the time.

The signal from throttle position sensor (TPS) controls shift kickdowns and upshift points. You might wanna check that first.