Just got a GX and immediately had a road trip disaster… transmission?

[SEAGX]

Just started a cross country road trip (Orlando to Seattle) in my dad’s old GX (2006) he gave me and wouldn’t you know it, two days in… disaster! Had never had any major issues, and we paid for a bunch of both routine and preventative maintenance with our longtime mechanic before the trip, so thought we’d be golden…

But now after almost exactly a thousand miles, we pulled into our hotel in St Charles, MO and shifted into park and… nothing happened. Turned the car off, won’t turn back on - no clicking, just check engine light and nothing. Popped the hood and there’s a bunch of opaque, light pink fluid (think Pepto Bismal) sprayed from down near the battery.

My guess is this is transmission fluid? And fingers crossed that it’s just a leak in a hose or something somewhere that can be fixed relatively quickly? Any thoughts or advice?

 

[sockeyesalmon]

that's your coolant
check hoses and radiator

 

[GrizzlyClint]

that's your coolant
check hoses and radiator

^ This

Toyota uses a long life fluid that when leaking / spraying turns pink and usually crusty a bit.

Looking at the location check the right plastic reservoir and hoses on that side. It’s likely the radiator plastic tank is cracked.

 

[Rednexus]

The radiator should be a easy swap either for yourself in the hotel parking lot (if you are mechanically inclined) or a shop. Bommarito Toyota in Hazlewood, MO (20 minutes from St. Charles) has a huge parts department and can probably get an OEM radiator quickly and relatively cheaply. Unfortunately I can't recommend a mechanic in the St. Louis area as I do my own wrenching.

I have to ask though....were you watching the coolant gauge and did the GX get too hot? If the cracked radiator was also accompanied by an engine overheat you may have much more serious issues and engine damage. Hopefully it just cracked just before rolling in the parking lot and didn't get too hot on the highway.

 

[SEAGX]

Thank you! Was down in there and does indeed look like it’s coming from one of the radiator hoses.

Battery seems to be ok since entertainment/climate/etc come on, but it had been sitting with little use for 6 months (my dad got a new GX460), so I suppose that could be involved.

The most confusing part to me is that it won’t go into park - I’m able to push it both forwards and backwards when it’s ostensibly in park. Not sure how that could be related to the coolant. Unless maybe some debris or something severed both the shifter cable and the radiator hose or something? (My total naivety is showing!)

 

[SEAGX]

The radiator should be a easy swap either for yourself in the hotel parking lot (if you are mechanically inclined) or a shop. Bommarito Toyota in Hazlewood, MO (20 minutes from St. Charles) has a huge parts department and can probably get an OEM radiator quickly and relatively cheaply. Unfortunately I can't recommend a mechanic in the St. Louis area as I do my own wrenching.

I have to ask though....were you watching the coolant gauge and did the GX get too hot? If the cracked radiator was also accompanied by an engine overheat you may have much more serious issues and engine damage. Hopefully it just cracked just before rolling in the parking lot and didn't get too hot on the highway.

I gotta be honest, I wasn’t keeping a close eye on it, so I can’t say for sure. But I had just stopped a few hours earlier to put air in the tires and was checking to make sure the TPS went out (it did), so I had definitely checked the dash a few hours earlier and seen no issues. But I can’t say for sure there were no warning signs on the entire drive…

 

[Rednexus]

I'd remove the radiator cap after it cools down and fill it up with water, recording how much water you add so you can have an idea of how much you lost (full coolant capacity is ~4 gallons but the engine will need to run some to remove air bubbles). Then clean the battery terminals and see if it will start and how it runs. If it was running OK when you pulled in and starts and runs fine after refilling the engine is probably OK, and you can get a new radiator put in.

 

[SEAGX]

I'd remove the radiator cap after it cools down and fill it up with water, recording how much water you add so you can have an idea of how much you lost (full coolant capacity is ~4 gallons but the engine will need to run some to remove air bubbles). Then clean the battery terminals and see if it will start and how it runs. If it was running OK when you pulled in and starts and runs fine after refilling the engine is probably OK, and you can get a new radiator put in.

Thanks so much, Rednexus, will give that a shot - now that I know the coolant on these things is pink (news to me!), it does look like that’s the culprit.

But any reason why that would be connected with being unable to shift it into park? Immediately noticed it felt like there was less resistance on shifting, and I can push it forward and back when it’s in park. Just looked again, and there’s also no gear indicator light. Maybe some debris or something could have damaged both the radiator hose and the shifter cable?

 

[Rednexus]

I'm not sure on the transmission shifting. Looks like the GX has a cable shifter. Perhaps the cable is broken. It probably warrants a crawl underneath to see where the cable enters the transmisson and if anything happens when the shifter is moved. However, I have not worked on that part of my GX before so I'm not the best source of advice .

 

[NJGX]

Idk about the lack of gear indicator light, but just double check the transfer case lever didn't accidentally get knocked into neutral. It's a longshot, but it might save you from having to crawl around underneath in a hotel parking lot.

 

[SEAGX]

I'd remove the radiator cap after it cools down and fill it up with water, recording how much water you add so you can have an idea of how much you lost (full coolant capacity is ~4 gallons but the engine will need to run some to remove air bubbles). Then clean the battery terminals and see if it will start and how it runs. If it was running OK when you pulled in and starts and runs fine after refilling the engine is probably OK, and you can get a new radiator put in.

The radiator only accepted a little less than half a gallon of water, but wouldn’t start at all. Just all the warning lights (check engine, oil/AT temp, TPS, maintenance, etc etc) and climate/entertainment come on, but no revving or clicking or anything.

 

[rommelrommel]

If it won’t go into park, are you sure you were in neutral when you tried to start it? If it thinks it is in gear or is actually in gear, it won’t even try to start.

How the shifting and coolant are associated, I have no idea tho. This is probably a tow to a dealer or mechanic, pretty hard to start throwing parts at.

 

[CO_Hunter]

The lack of gear light may indicate a blown fuse and that a safety switch may not be functionally properly. Check for this. Can you check for any codes?

 

[HomersCanyonero]

Wow! Hate it when there’s multiple issues going on at the same time. It’s harder to troubleshoot.

I’m going to throw you some random things to try based on my years of driving….might be completely useless…

1. make sure lo shifter is in high. This is the transfer case. It has to be on hi for street driving…on lo when off-roading.

2. make sure key is original key. I had a duplicate key wear out and was not letting me turn ignition correctly. was locking me from putting into park too.

3. put transmission in neutral. Car will start when in neutral. Put ebrake on when starting in neutral.

4. my shifter mechanism has a broken plastic prevents me from staying in first gear L. It always reverts to 2 if I don’t hold it in place. All other gears work fine except L

5. I had issues with the fusible link near battery cables that prevented me from starting. It would not crank. However, no problem with going into gears.

just rambling on

 

[Jstawgn]

Attached is the wiring diagram for starting system. You could have bad brake switch or the fuse is blown for some reason. Or can be bad battery / bad connection.

 

[Stonefoot72]

I think rommelrommel is on it. It's most likely that you have a neutral safety switch inhibit because your linkage cable failed leaving the vehicle in D. You would naturally have all your warning lights on since they all come on as a test right before startup. My guess is you won't get a gear select light until the engine is running.

Focus on getting your tyranny in N or P manually from under the vehicle... I've not looked at it, but there should be some sort of bell crack with the selector cable attached. Try to turn it all the way up to the rear-most stop. That should be P. I bet it'll fire right up.... Then you can tackle that coolant leak! Lol

The 1/2 gallon of coolant loss is an issue, but I'm certain is unrelated to the transmission issue.

 

[SEAGX]

Thanks so much for the help! Turns out the two issues were a cracked radiator (right next to the outflow hose) and a broken shifter cable. Was able to get the radiator fixed quickly, and the local Toyota dealer was able to order the shifter cable faster than the Lexus dealer, so it arrived this morning and I should hopefully be back on the road in a few hours…

Not sure if both of these things happening in the same 3 hour span is just a coincidence or what. Only thing I can think of is there was a lot of construction outside of St Louis that we had to go through. Didn’t notice any debris, but there was a rough bump at one point that didn’t seem too bad but in retrospect could’ve caused some damage?

 

[Rednexus]

Glad you are about to be back on the road! Your story has heightened the importance of replacing the radiators in these as part of preventative maintenance. I'm going to swap mine out this fall just to get ahead of a potential failure for the next 10-12 years.

Shift cables are an odd one....assuming it's braided cable like a bike brake/shifter, perhaps it was hanging on just by a thread and jarred loose by a bump. Unless you had popped your hood recently, the radiator leak could have been going on very slowly the whole trip or even before. Frankly the shifter breaking probably alerted your to the radiator leak and staved a bigger disaster or overheat that might have happened if you had kept driving it and lost all of your coolant!

 

[SEAGX]

I actually had just popped the hood the day before to recharge the AC refrigerant, so the radiator leak was definitely new. Agreed that the cable might have ended up being a good thing in the end, might've been a while longer before I found out about the coolant leak! Thanks again for all the help.

 

[GrizzlyClint]

a cracked radiator (right next to the outflow hose)

Seems this is the average failure point. My 460’s factor radiator failed in this exact spot.