FTO AUSTRALIA

Hey all,

Hoping someone can point me in the right direction with this annoying problem.
I have a 94 tiptronic GPX that has just started not wanting to get out of "park" occasionally.

I start the car, put my foot on the brake and try to put the gear selector in Drive but the button on top of the selector only goes down about halfway which wont let the selector move.
The annoying thing about it is that it only happens occasionally, you can quite literally sit there and put it in drive, push it back into park and then try to put it in drive again and the button will stick. Leave the car for 30 secs, come back and the button will go down and the selector will move freely.
Other days it will take 10 mins of playing around with it before it'll go in gear and some days i wont have a problem with it at all.

I have checked all the fluids, wiring and plugs and they all seem to be ok.
Im guessing that there may be a pressure switch or relay somewhere that could be acting up but the sporadic nature of the problem makes it hard to find a fault.

Has anyone else had this type of problem or know where i could start looking for a fault?
Failing that, anyone know how i can bypass the "foot on the brake to get the button to go down" safety feature?

Any advice or info on this would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Do you have an after market gear knob?

^^ THIS

Had the same problem on a friends gpx which had a aftermarket gearknob,we put a std one in and the problem was fixed

Thanks for the reply.

Nah, the gear knob is the factory one.

It is mechanical, something needs adjusting between the gear stick and the gear box, but I can't remember what

one of few things.

1. The button is getting caught with some sh*t under it.
2. The selector cable is not right as in not allowing g/box to properly select P
3. Most likely its the bit that requires you to step on brake to remove from P etc this is just a wire from brake line to shifter and may need adjusting or even removing (been a long time since mine was auto cant quite remember how mechanism works properly)

Thanks to all for the input.

I'll take that info and use it to give the ol' girl an attitude adjustment.

Thanks again

There is the inhibiter switch, which stops the car from being started in anything apart from N.. I am not sure if the wire to see if the brake is pressed is the same wire.. Or if it is different..

I don't have an auto with me at the moment so you may have to do some hunting around for it..

I think itmay more be gear selector cables..

The knob has an adjustment under it. The adjustment involves a bit of white plastic that works on the thread of the shifter. If its not would down low enough, the button does not work (its probably just eventually shifted). To adjust you need to remove the knob. What you have to do is stick a small flat head screw driver or butter knife or something down each side of the knob. Youll need to be careful you dont break the knob though. This will release the clip on each side and the knob will come out through the top. Then twist the white bit a turn or 2 and see if that is better. Youll have to fiddle with it, but this will be what is causing your issue.

Well it seems that turning the white adjuster did the trick for now.
After playing around with it for a bit i finally managed to find a spot where it didnt lock anything in or out so will see how it goes.

Thanks again to everyone that had a comment on this, its given me a trouble shooting list to refer to if i ever have dramas with it again.

That's what we're here for..