850RE Automatic Transmission Issue

[70Olds442]

Hello! First time Jeep Wrangler owner here. I bought a used 2020 Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon Recon Edition with the 2.0L eTorque and the 8-SPD 850RE automatic transmission about a month ago. It has 56,xxx miles on it. I bought it at one of the local used car lots we have in town that has a good reputation.

I’m having two issues, one is a CEL that showed a P0003 “Fuel Volume Regulator Control Circuit Low” code and a transmission shifting issue. About 50% of the time when I drive it, the transmission won’t shift past 3rd gear. Even if I put the pedal all the way to the floor it will rev up to about 4200 RPM and just creep along at about 40 mph and when it shifts between 1st, 2nd and 3rd it won’t shift until the RPMs get past 3000 – 3500. If I flip it to “Manual” it will let me upshift through all the gears but still feels ‘sluggish’. Downshifting doesn’t seem to be a problem in either automatic or ‘manual’.

I took it to my local Jeep dealership and the Jeep Tech said I have two issues, the CEL and a transmission problem. They used my extended warranty to put in a new high pressure fuel pump and so far, the CEL hasn’t come back, but I still have the transmission issue. The dealership said there are no codes in the TCU so there is nothing they can do to help me through the Powertrain Warranty. They have actually witnessed the transmission not shifting and said I have a transmission problem and still won’t do anything under the warranty. They said they will take the transmission out, tear it apart and see if they can find anything wrong, but I have to agree to pay for it unless they find an issue that is considered “under warranty”. That could get quite expensive for me and I have to trust that they will do the right thing if they do find something that is covered. Everyone at the Jeep dealership seems pretty cool & straight forward, but they are still a dealership and I’m sure they aren’t looking to give a transmission away

I’m going to go back to the car lot I bought it from and see what they say, but I’m not expecting much from them, we’ll see. Anyone else have experience with this transmission issue? Any suggestions on how I should address the Jeep dealership and their refusal to fix this under the powertrain warranty? Am I expecting too much?

Thanks for any help!!


Ray W

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[Kracka]

Find a different dealer. There's likely an electrical issue of some sort, doesn't sound mechanical, it may just be software needing an update or a quick learn procedure performed. Fresh fluid & filter definitely wouldn't hurt based on your age/miles, either.

 

[Crimson Raider]

I had a similar issue as you with my transmission. 2.0L with the 8-speed. Around 13,000 miles, it started to buck when putting it into reverse. Started out minor and eventually got to the point where it would chirp the tires a bit in my garage. As this was going on, I started having a similar issue with shifting into 4th. The transmission would hang up trying to go into 4th, downshift back into 3rd, then finally find 4th.

I took it to my dealer and they said something similar to yours. Needed to tear it down and all that to check it out. They never once said that this would be a warranty issue. Only said they needed to see if it was electrical/computer related or mechanical within the transmission. When they opened it up, they saw reverse and 4th gear were gone. I had only put on around 3k miles on the Jeep so it's hard to tell if I just got unlucky and had a bad transmission or if the previous owner was just a bad driver.

Long story short, I got a new transmission under warranty and things have been good so far (knock on wood). Hopefully, your dealership does right by you because the warranty should cover it. If you are worried about them making you pay for cracking open that coconut, see if they will do a transmission reflash. That is a much cheaper starting point.

 

[70Olds442]

UPDATE - I took it to the dealership today while it was experiencing the shifting issues and once again, they got to experience the shifting problem first hand. I also had a "pending" P0003 code, which the new high pressure fuel pump was supposed to fix. They had two techs look at it and they looked through their "STAR" system for similar problem.

They found some stuff about wiring harness problems and looked there. Eventually, they found a spot in a harness that had broken lose from its anchor point and was pushed up against a bolt (body mount I believe he said, it was on the passer side) and was rubbing. It wore a hole through the protective aluminum sheathing and tore up a wire in the harness. The tech looked the wire up and surprisingly enough, it was a wire that has something to do with the high pressure fuel regulation.

They repaired the wire, wrapped the harness with some sheathing tape they use and re-anchored it. They also put some sort of cap on the bolt that is supposed to be there to help prevent this type of thing from happening and did a test drive.

So far, with only one day of driving, everything seems good, but I've been through this before so I'm skeptical, but willing to give it a shot! Time will tell!

EDIT - I forgot this part, they believe the shifting issues were caused by the Jeep going into "limp mode" because of the short in the worn wire.

Thanks again for the replies!

 

[There’sOnlyOne]

I think there is thread around here similar to this about a faulty harness connection. Glad the dealer figured it and fixed it.

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