DescentBB

My 2001 Impala seems to have a hard time shifting out of park or any other gear. Everything else works fine. It's an automatic.

Any ideas?

Transmission fluid?

linky

Seriously if you have not checked that yet.. We will take your new license back.

Shame on you for buying an automatic in the first place, real drivers use stick!

Try http://www.naioa.com - a lot of knowledge about 2000+ Impalas over there.

Bubba, I know nothing about cars, well almost nothing. The fluids I get changed on a regular basis. I'll check the tranny fluid today. Should of been fine since I had it checked not to long ago.

CDN_Merlin wrote:Bubba, I know nothing about cars, well almost nothing. The fluids I get changed on a regular basis. I'll check the tranny fluid today. Should of been fine since I had it checked not to long ago.

Ohh, a car question. Right up my alley.

Has the car not been driven for a long period of time, or rarely? Or has it been parked on a slant/hill for a couple of weeks? The reason why im asking that is if you havent driven it for a while or the transmission fluid is shifted to one side, the parking pin does not get lubricated, and hence its harder to shift from park.

The remedy for this is twofold. First, when you park the car, dont make like a woman driver and allow the car to slam into the parking pin. Normally when you shift to park, you release the brake, then the car moves just a little bit until it rests on that pin. Instead, hit the brake, shift to park, then SLOWLY release the brake until the car rests gently. An alternative is to set the E-Brake, then shift to park.

The second remedy is to just keep driving it. Slosh that fluid around a little bit, then after 1 week the problem will dissapear.

The other thing to check is to make sure your shifter is sitting properly. THere's a clip in the front/bottom of your shifter that holds it down to the metal rod. Pat that shifter all the way down, then make sure that clip is tucked ALL THE WAY in.

And remember that when checking the fluid level, you wipe the dipstick clean, then you go in and shift at all points, stopping at each one for at least a full second, shifting down then up, then check the level. And dont overfill, because it can just be as dangerous as overfilling it.

I drive it daily, never park on a hill. I'm actually out of town right now on vacation. I've talked with other friends and they all think it's just a linkage problem. I had the fluid changed about 3 months ago and I haven't put that much mileage on it.

I always hold my brake and release it gently after putting my car in park because it can roll about 2-3 inches after I release the brake. I release it slowly so it's not a full bang into the stop position.

I did have the pan cleaned also recently. I'm not gonna drive it much until I head back home and have my garage look at it. But I did find info on fixing my drivers side window not coming up easily on those web sites mentioned above.

Top Wop had awesome advice with the shifter sitting properly , and it seems your parking awl needs adjusting too as thats also a fault point. Goto a shop and ask them to perform these two adjustments. You could get yourself a Haynes or Chiltons manual and learn how to tackle most repairs yourself. Cars can be fun

http://www.repairmanual.com/automobiles/2001/8/6614

By the sounds of it, all you need is an adjustment. It doesnt sound bad at all.

Canuck wrote:Top Wop had awesome advice with the shifter sitting properly , and it seems your parking awl needs adjusting too as thats also a fault point. Goto a shop and ask them to perform these two adjustments. You could get yourself a Haynes or Chiltons manual and learn how to tackle most repairs yourself. Cars can be fun

http://www.repairmanual.com/automobiles/2001/8/6614

Chiltons is good if you need a brief rundown. Personally, you get what you pay for, and I hate em. Especially for a newbie like I once was, they dont always flesh out the details or present relevant information. Instead id find a cheap factory service manual on Ebay and make the investment.

EDIT: -OR- in place of the chiltons/haynes you can go here: http://www.alldatadiy.com I have accounts for all 3 of my cars. You can also check your public library as typically they have an Alldata Library edition that is free for anyone to use.

You mean the car manuals have degraded to useless jibber? I remember having a Chilton's or Hayes that covered everything, including tricks. Oh well Alldata is what the pros use.

Well, after parking my car in my underground parking last night, I tried to start it this morning and it won't turn over. The lights on dash come on like normal but no sound from engine. I'm getting it towed and I've been told it's a transmission issue. Hopefully it won't cost me an arm and a leg.

Neutral Saftey Switch, again related to linkage alignment.

Yeah that's what I figured.