1998 Impreza Outback Auto Transmission Problem

1998 ALL OTHER MAKES ALL OTHER MODELS
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ATOMICNSG
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1998 Outback Sport with 115,000 miles. Recently, in cold weather, when I start driving the vehicle the transmission won't shift out of first gear. This only happens for about 1 minute or less until the transmission starts to warm up. When the car is warmed up, it runs just fine. The colder it is, the more pronounced the problem - it doesn't happen if it is warm. Is this an indication of a pending transmission failure or is there another problem that might cause this behavior? Any help would be appreciated.
Feb 3, 2006 at 8:44 PM
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TCMARTIN
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I've had similar problems with my '99 legacy gt and this is what I've found thru my research. I read an article that stated that some years of subarus (i thought was '99-'01) with 4sp. auto trannies have an automatic transmission temperature sensor. When cold, this will not allow the tranny to shift up (the article also only mentions up into 4th) until the tranny fluid gets up to temp. The article says this is normal operation, despite how it seems and feels, and that there is nothing mechanically wrong.
Mar 23, 2006 at 1:31 PM
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