Tlenaburg

We just got a ‘04 MDX as part of a trade. It won’t shift correctly. I start it, it will go into drive, after a few minutes it goes out of gear. I have to turn it off wait a minute then I start it and immediately have to put in gear and it will drive again, but it will continue to go out of gear and have to repeat the same process. Suggestions please. When I first got it, it wouldn’t go into gear at all, messed around with it, i then realized that the trans fluid was overfilled, drained it to normal levels that’s when I was able to get it to shift into gear as was mentioned. The shifter moves but the transmission isn’t shifting gears.

Skirmich

Hi and welcome!

If the car is shifted into Drive and it slips the gear (Like a Manual transmission when you depress the clutch while in gear?) its a clear sign that the transmission is bad, Under no circumstances the transmission should slip! This is no surprise given that the MDX from early 2000s suffered from badly designed transmissions that got bad prematurely. Usually 01-02s are the worst but there are some cases of 03-04s that are hit and miss too, They got almost completely fixed by 05-06 models then The transmission was completely re-designed for +07s so they dont suffer from this.

Also since the car was overfilled it seems to be that the previous owner tried the Band Aid fix of replacing the ATF completely to give it another stretch of life (Usually works for another week or so).. So that is to me what is happening here... For confirmation the car should trigger an OBD Code usually is something along the lines of "P0740" (Transmission Lock Up Solenoid) this is almost an instant tell tale that the transmission is toasted.