Hi so during the winter this year my 03 es got quite a beating on the harsh roads where I live (joys of Canadian winters). Right before the winter ended my car broke down.

I was driving to work going a steady 80km/h, the car was shifting fine the whole way and about 5 minutes into the drive I heard a loud clunk and the car jerked, the car revved up to 6000rpm and I pulled over. I shut it off and turned it back on, the car drove but didn't shift out of low when it was in drive. I drove a few more minutes this way as I was almost at work and called my dad who drove it back to his place. Before leaving he said the fluid was full and still a good color, he drove it home stuck in low which took him about 40 minutes at 30km/h. When he got home the transmission fluid was empty.

***Its important to note that the car had no reverse when he went to back it up to go home.

The car sat in the driveway and would stay in park, go into neutral, and drive but drive acted as low. The car wouldn't move when in reverse, but seemed like it was trying to move and instead would jerk forward. In neutral you could hear a ticking from the transmission. In park it seemed fine.

I would start the car every 3 days, for the past two months. (I bought a new car since I work on call). Every now and then I would try moving the shifter to see if it still wasn't working and the other day it was different.

In park it was normal, in neutral there was no ticking, and every other gear seemed like it was in neutral. Usually a car will rev a little when shifting into drive or reverse which it did even when broke, but now it didn't rev at all.

I'm not sure if the tranny is completely f****d or if its just a solenoid, or the torque converter, etc.... any help is appreciated

 

sounds like it is fixable, but you definitely have some sort of failure somewhere