Researching 2000 Protege ES

[tssmith2002]

My name is Todd Smith and I am looking at a 2000 Madza Protege ES that is on my mechanic's lot sitting as he works on my project truck, 1997 F-150 2WD w a 3.9L Cummins 4BT I4 diesel. The Madza has transmission issues and I want to research the correct parts for daily driver longevity.

I like cars but I don't have the manual dexterity to do much wrenching. I have always like Madza's efforts to use different technology like Wankel and Miller cycle engines, but I have never owned one. My beater Toyota is at 247K and is failing and this Protege looks clean but was a smoker's car and has transmission issues.

Any thing else that the community needs to know, feel free to ask!

Todd

[irishkev90]

Welcome! Do you know anything specific that's wrong with the transmission? And manual or auto?

HTC Droid DNA

[tssmith2002]

Sorry, I should have specified, it is a auto and the general problem is that shifting in reverse is very hesitant. Driving around on a road test, it shifts very roughly and hard. I have read in various places about the E3 shift solenoid and the TCM and/or Powertrain Control Module being problems, but I trying to see what the resident experts might have to say about what mods should be done to a auto transmission.

The owner has a another junkyard pull trans to go back in, but I thinking that if I do buy the cart then I would want to replace any weak areas in the nerw trans before installation.

Any stickys or pointers to good posts would be welcomed.

Thanks
Todd