Originally Posted By: Or
Originally Posted By: TheKracken
Oh another thing that will help is to disconnect the battery for a while. Since the Sienna transmission issues are mostly ECU related, resetting it with new fluid will usually help it relearn.
This is very true, BUT - it has potential drawbacks. Some without experience have done it and fried the PCU, or blown the 100a main bus (which is $5 but a serious hassle to replace). Plus you loose all car presets, which are many. There is a better way.
I have found just changing driving habits will re-set it in short order (heavy braking habit. She drove it daily. I could take the car for the weekend and drive smoothly, and the PCU would re-learn and smooth out the harsh shifts within 100 miles (distance to my parents and back). Then it would re-learn the bad habits by Wednesday after she put about 100/150 miles on it for work and errands.
We went through this totally obvious cycle for two years. She gradually got a lot smoother and the swings disappeared. She grew up in Russia/Moldova and did not really start driving until 2003/4 after immigrating. So until recently, she was the equivalent of a lead-footed 18 year old.
I've had the unique experience of seeing how this car works as a daily driver/shared driver, and researching it on dedicated forums. It's really a great powertrain, really actually fantastic, but has it's quirks.
This is a excellent point and i'm starting to think learning logic may be 95% of the issue. My wife drives the van 99% of the time until recently. She started a job at the same place I work a few weeks ago. We swap cars now at the end of the day so I can pickup the kiddo's on the way home. That means the van is seeing two different driving styles per day, each for ~15 miles. Before this I drove it so infrequently I never really payed attention to it's shift characteristics.
I drove the van Friday-Sunday this week, running around town and on the highway etc. It shifted great the whole time, especially Sunday after I had driven it 100+ miles over the weekend.
Now that it's Monday and she drove it to work, it'll be interesting to see how it drives for me on the way home. She has a much more aggressive driving style than I do. Hard on the gas and brakes. I'm much more easy going when I drive. I can see how it would be confused.
Good experiment anyways... I'm going to leave the Maxlife in until the next oil change in a thousand miles to see how it does. I can say that when it's shifting well like this weekend, it does shift much better than it ever did on T-IV.
I'll follow up later this week.
Originally Posted By: TheKracken
Oh another thing that will help is to disconnect the battery for a while. Since the Sienna transmission issues are mostly ECU related, resetting it with new fluid will usually help it relearn.
This is very true, BUT - it has potential drawbacks. Some without experience have done it and fried the PCU, or blown the 100a main bus (which is $5 but a serious hassle to replace). Plus you loose all car presets, which are many. There is a better way.
I have found just changing driving habits will re-set it in short order (heavy braking habit. She drove it daily. I could take the car for the weekend and drive smoothly, and the PCU would re-learn and smooth out the harsh shifts within 100 miles (distance to my parents and back). Then it would re-learn the bad habits by Wednesday after she put about 100/150 miles on it for work and errands.
We went through this totally obvious cycle for two years. She gradually got a lot smoother and the swings disappeared. She grew up in Russia/Moldova and did not really start driving until 2003/4 after immigrating. So until recently, she was the equivalent of a lead-footed 18 year old.
I've had the unique experience of seeing how this car works as a daily driver/shared driver, and researching it on dedicated forums. It's really a great powertrain, really actually fantastic, but has it's quirks.
This is a excellent point and i'm starting to think learning logic may be 95% of the issue. My wife drives the van 99% of the time until recently. She started a job at the same place I work a few weeks ago. We swap cars now at the end of the day so I can pickup the kiddo's on the way home. That means the van is seeing two different driving styles per day, each for ~15 miles. Before this I drove it so infrequently I never really payed attention to it's shift characteristics.
I drove the van Friday-Sunday this week, running around town and on the highway etc. It shifted great the whole time, especially Sunday after I had driven it 100+ miles over the weekend.
Now that it's Monday and she drove it to work, it'll be interesting to see how it drives for me on the way home. She has a much more aggressive driving style than I do. Hard on the gas and brakes. I'm much more easy going when I drive. I can see how it would be confused.
Good experiment anyways... I'm going to leave the Maxlife in until the next oil change in a thousand miles to see how it does. I can say that when it's shifting well like this weekend, it does shift much better than it ever did on T-IV.
I'll follow up later this week.
