Transmission problem

Curious if anyone has had a similar issue, I was towing our camper down the highway last Saturday (only a 25 min drive) and was cruising with tow haul on in drive at about 70mph when suddenly it was if I put the truck in neutral, RPMs shot up. I let out the gas and it immediately corrected itself and I continued on. This drive in total was about 25-30 min and it did it one more time before I made it home. It has been driving fine since without the trailer and I’ve tried to recreate the issue with tow haul on and off and can’t seem to get it to do it again. I took it to dealer and it’s still there, they called today and said that they haven’t been able to recreate the problem and that it has no transmission codes. I have to show proof or recreate issue for warranty purposes. Has anyone else ever had a similar problem? I had wondered if the transmission maybe got hot. I’m just not sure but don’t want problems once my warranty is up. Thank you!

 

No, I have an ‘18 and haven’t had anything like that. 2018 is a Goldilocks year; last year of the dedicated transmission cooler.

I think I read that a lot of guys tow in S5.

I have pulled a boat and loaded trailers, and never had anything occur like you describe.

 

Maybe your shift linkage is out of adjustment causing neutral placement sometimes. Doesn't take much change to cause a problem like this.

 

I have not had your problem but wondering how much did the tounge weight of trailer drop your rear end? I'm thinking if transmission is low on fluid could you have possibly starved the pump for oil causing transmission to loose clutch pressure allowing transmission to slip. What gear do you use for towing? I would tow about 8k trailer that was a no go in 6th, sometimes in 5th if tail wind but overpasses and hills caused a lot of shifting and found 4th worked good which is the direct drive 1:1 drove about 65 @ 2,800 rpm never a problem cept gas. I'm glad I had SR5 upgrade with 38 gallon tank @ 8 mpg. I can't imagine trying to drive across country with a 26 gallon tank that would be 184 miles per tank if you left about 3 gallons reserve, not good in western U.S.

 

kind of same question, tow haul uses the engine as additional brakes by downshifting when going downhill. were you going down a grade when it did it?

 

My truck does something similar when I tow heavy and it’s on cruise control. When it’s on cruise and it’s been at higher rpms for a while uphill it’ll shoot the rpms high and get out of cruise control. Maybe it’s something like that? I think my truck is operating perfectly normal never gets hot.

 

If they claim they can’t reproduce it, hook up your trailer and if it does it again drive up there with the trailer and ask them to ride with you and show them.

 

New to the forum but I just had the same issue towing my travel trailer. It didn't start until I tried to use cruise control. The issue is that it didn't stop on that trip. I was pulling about a 6k+ lb trailer and it was running 4k+ RPMS and just seemed like it would not upshift because I was not pushing hard on the gas at all. I attributed it to the PO, because they put an aFE intake and some sort of tuner on it....not sure if it is a pedal commander or what....I still have to investigate.

 

i hope OP replies and gives us more information. otherwise this thread is dead already

 

Nope, never experienced that.

I just bought a cargo trailer about 150 miles away. Towing it home, I had one hill where it downshifted to the point where the RPMs were running about 4k, but it definitely wasn't in neutral.

I would have been interested to see my transmission temps on that trip, but it was almost all highway so I imagine most of it the transmission was locked anyway.

 

Low fluid level.

or it was tow haul mode doing the engine brake thing.

 

I've had a similar problem with my 21 CM. Towing our TT this summer(@6500lbs gross weight) and just this weekend towing a 2 place snowmobile trailer through the UP of Michigan. The truck has been in the dealer twice already but they couldn't get it to replicate the issue so I hooked it up to my TT and took the Manager for an hour ride, didn't do it. My issues started at 6200 miles and around 90 degrees outside. This last issue (same as before) happened in temps below freezing, while pulling a grade at 70mph, with 2 place snowmobile trailer (under 4000lbs. gross weight). The trans acts like it wants to downshift, RPM's spike but trans starts to shudder and feels like it's slipping, kind of like it's in neutral. The gas peddle goes dead and truck begins to quickly slow/decelerate. This past "episode" happened while in the middle lane, tractor trailers to my right and traffic flying by at 80+mph on my left. I puckered and hoped for the best since we went from 70mph down to around 40mph before cresting the hill. I have another dealer appointment tomorrow morning to address the issue. The crazy part is that my 2018 CM towed the same trailers, loads, etc without issue but this one is unpredictable when towing. So much so my wife now drives the kids in her car and just follows me. Very nerve racking and costly! If I could figure out how to upload the video I would, I mean it has happened no less than 10 times since it started slipping/shuddering this summer and this weekend it was at least 6-7 times it did the same thing. PAID way too much for a truck that's not able to due the job. The truck now has 14,000 miles.

 

I did have CC set when the issues first started ( 07/05/21)but have since stopped using it when towing. The worst part is that I'm at the dealer right now and their reasoning is that the truck has a hazard light code that states it shorted to ground and that's why I'm having issues. I've tried towing in S4 as suggested, D with tow/haul and D without T/H and no matter what the scenario is, it still ends up with the trans shuddering and won't downshift, loses power, throttle pedal is dead and my speed just drops. Hell, in Tow/haul mode the issues are worse (severe shuddering) than without it. After today's conversation with the Service Manager I found that they never checked the fluid level, only scanned the "Black Box" and didn't even check the trans or engine modules for anything out of the ordinary like temps, throttle input, etc. They did do the Toyota Care 15k service though. At this point they'll check fluid level but won't drop the pan OR even let me pay for a trans flush and fill so I can have a fluid sample to get analyzed. The final word was that "my trailer(s)" are the issue so I offered to hook up one of the trailers and road test it with the Tech. No go! Can't have a Tech out of the shop. I'm beyond upset and looking for a way to get out of it and move on. Wish I would've kept the 2018, it was nothing but AWESOME which why I wanted another.

 

I asked today if they had an OBDII recorder and the reply from the service manager was "no they don't have one and would need their computer hooked up to read it" so I offered to buy/borrow one and THEN they could pull the data from it but still nothing. I work in the trucking industry and all of our field technicians have one. What BS!

 

That would be a Corporate question honestly and a field tech job to follow-up at that point IMHO.

Dealerships can be tough to work with, dont feel bad escalating it to a Corporate level. Iv had to do this and it got me a new t-case...