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Good day, so I have done some reading thru some old threads and still wanna just throw out the situation I got and see what comes of it. So got a 2006 diesel, 176000 km, since winter and mainly for sure this spring, generally when I first take off with my car it’ll drive a bit then get the dreaded 3 bars, usually I just restart and good to go. Rarely does it do it again until I sits awhile off and I take off again. I used my Delphi reader and I get P2402 - transmission blockage ; malfunction P2403 - gear cannot be engaged when clutch is closed P1925 - transmission position sensor noe these have been on here for I don’t know how long as I haven’t had my laptop to hook up for a couple months. so anything thoughts with this or does it have to go straight to Mercedes ? All in all car runs great for the most part, seems to take off kinda rough, not sure how to explain it but jerky on the initial take off in 1st also I’ve had for ages now my glow plug light stays on always and I also have permanent code P1482 glow output stage, open circuit bad glow plug or controller? What can I do to check thanks in advance for any help

My 2006 CDI with 190,000km has started having shifting problems. Im going to run through my diagnosis in order to hopefully help others that develop this problem. Problem: Car was shifting fine, then it was making a creaking noise with shifting(lubricated it), then it was intermittently failing to downshift followed by 3 bars (temporary solution, switch the car to neutral, turn off and restart the car), Now the car is failing to shift gears about 50% of the time, and when the car is stopped in first gear it makes a strange vibration(no clutch drag). I drive on a lot of dusty gravel roads, very dry environment. Common problems are clutch actuator wiring, clutch actuator issue, or clutch fork wear, where the actuator rod pushes on the fork. As of right now, a new actuator is $450 cad shipped, new fork is $85. Diagnosis: Ill drive the back of the car onto ramps, get under the car and see if the clutch actuator has slipped(unlikely), then I will put penetrating oil on the 3 clutch actuator bolts. Ill unplug the electronic plug for the actuator and check the wires for fraying. Then I will mark the position of the actuator on the car with permanent marker. I will hit the head of the '3 actuator bolts' hard with a hammer a few times, then take my propane torch to try and heat the areas the bolts thread into. Ill gently try to remove the bolts and not snap them, if they don't come out, ill re apply penetrating oil and repeat the hammer and heat process until they do come out. Once the actuator is off, ill examine the actuator rod for signs of wear(if the rod has punched through the fork). Ill take a pic on my phone of the fork through the hole and see if the fork is in ok condition. That will tell me what my problem is (im going to guess wiring fray due to bumpy roads, clutch actuator sluggishness due to lots of dust getting in, or lots of clutch fork wear). I will give the actuator a good cleaning and regreasing (if this fails ill order a new actuator) If the rod has worn a hole in the fork I will try to weld a washer on the actuator rod to increase contact patch between the rod and the fork. Ill update this post until the problem is fixed.

I'm following Willys advice to post my woes in the relevant Forum. I have a 2005 Smart ForTwo that I bought new. It has about 85K on the dial. Last week on the way to the hardware store I did a too-quick right turn. The car went about 100 feet and stopped, still running. I could turn it off and restart it. It would not go into forward or reverse. There was a very faint clunking noise/vibration when I tried. Each time that I tried to put it into gear I got three horizontal, dashed lines on the gearshift indicator display. I was about 300 yards away from my regular mechanic's garage (right beside the hardware store!). I called the CAA to get it towed to the shop. 45 minutes later the tow-truck arrived, the driver started it, put it into gear and forward it went. I drove to the shop with the tow-truck following behind. The shop read the codes and told me there was some kind of blockage in the transmission. It sounded to me like the car was pooched, so I carefully dove it home, without incident. I cancelled the liability insurance, but thought I should know what was wrong with it before putting it up for sale. I did a google search, found you guys, became a member after several abortive attempts to authenticate my email, I introduced myself, was warmly welcomed and given a gentile nudge in the right direction (I hope). I looked through the archives here, paid my annual fee to evolution.co.uk, successfully authenticated my email there and now hope for the best. I believe that, in a way not surprisingly, the solution is that when in doubt, reboot. I will see if my usual grease monkeys have an MB Star to reintroduce the transmission to the car so that it can once again be a "smart" car and let you know how it turns out. The MB Star device is costly. Is it something that I will need down the road? I had wanted this to be my forever car, and it was doing pretty well on that score.

Gents: Have a humming not unlike dry bearing or winter tire noise coming from rear. Appears at about 40 K, increases, then decreases over 80K. Rear wheel bearings feel good on hoist, have fresh ones with HIs Majesty Tolsen’s grease nipple mod ready to install but now wondering if bearing noise is not coming from sealed transmission bearings. No play or noise, or rumble or chunky whatsoever at low speed turning on hoist, feel perfect but they might if they are just dry. Can a Smexpert with experience on this and good ear have a listen? Car has 135 easy west coast K on it, no snow or salt or grit. Wet winters though. Changed tires, no difference. Slight rumble from rear on hard left or right turn, its always done that. Same volume and frequency of hum whether in gear or neutral. Thanks in advance, Boys. I’m really stuck on this one, don’t want to rent a listen from Stealership or do a bunch of unnecessary work. tt Here are links to 2 videos, one coasting and one under load. Sorry for road noise, best I could do. Cheers coasting https://youtu.be/brHnnL2fMkU under load https://youtu.be/hN4Kr8AbZcI

I am troubleshooting 3 lines on the dash. I took my vehicle to have Star Diag run on it and the TCM was determined to be faulty. Sent the TCM for repair but no luck. I have purchased a used TCM with the same part number as the original. Can anyone confirm for sure that the unit will require programming? With the new (used) TCM installed, I am able to move the shifter, the transmission goes into teaching mode (per the shifter motors shuffling) but still 3 lines on the dash. With both the original and new TCMs I get U0103 and 15/6 Electronic Lever Select Canbus faults. Thank you very much.

I've got a 2005 450 which has been operating fine until a couple of days ago. After being parked outside in a heat wave, I couldn't get it to go into gear. In fact, I haven't been able to since then. This is what happens: the car starts normally, then when attempting to shift into 1st, I hear 10 slow thumps, then I get three dashes. After that I can no longer attempt to go into 1st. However, I can attempt to go into reverse (with the three dashes still displayed), where I'll hear 8-9 much louder and quicker thumps. I can only do that once as well before I have to restart. Am I in some kind of strange mode? This literally happened while the car was parked - it was operating perfectly before then. I'm quite far from a dealer so any advice that can get me back on the road (even in limp mode) would be appreciated.

Hi all, I've been lurking on these forums for quite a while now and have had a lot of success treating various issues on my smart up until this point. As the title says, my '08 Passion 451 has had a transmission issue which has only become exceedingly apparent until recently - meaning it may have been a progressive failure somewhere. Its just hit 69k miles. The transmission has had the current issue for at least 1k miles. The issue is when shifting. After a cold start and in manual shift mode, the smart will not shift out of first gear unless the car is at decent speed and the revs are high (i'd say above 4k, i don't have the tach. pods to tell) In auto shift mode, the car will shift at normal RPMs but then--as the accelerator is depressed--the tranny seems to "slip" out of a low revving second gear and into neutral. When this happens the dash reads 1st gear and the motor is free-revving. I recover from this "slip" into neutral by releasing the accelerator and letting the revs reduce. Then I reapply the gas and will hear the clutch slowly grab/slip until back into a high revving first gear. To get into second from then, I must push the gas a bit harder and shift. It seems to require a strong inertia to catch second gear. Once the car has warmed up after about a half mile of driving, it will then shift from first to second at a more reasonable rev (2~3k). If it has been 50 degrees or more outside, the smart will also show less problematic shifting at cold start. The smart has had its clutch actuator replaced and subsequently configured at a mercedes dealership. I have since adjusted it/moved it away from driver side so that the plunger is closer to the clutch plate. I have also recently replaced the tranny fluid with the correct royal purple fluid -- this helped the smoothness but not the shift issue itself (PS: change your tranny fluid! mine was filthy). I suspect a worn clutch plate, as I can feel it slipping during certain slow take-offs. Many times the upshifts will be harsh as well. An OBD code of P0716 for Input / Turbine speed sensor A circuit range/performance is present. My question is if the problem may be limited to a clutch plate replacement, or if the flywheel has become glazed, or perhaps it is even just an issue of some solenoid inside the tranny housing? I have replaced the transmission speed sensor (the one above the clutch actuator) but the code is persistent. I have also replaced the crankshaft position sensor (which may have nothing to do with the issue).

Hi all, I’ve just got my hands on a Roadster that’s been sitting for a bit over three years, I’ve got the engine running smoothly, and with the engine off it will happily switch into reverse and first gear, however with the engine on, if I try placing it in reverse, or drive, I simply hear a loud, repeated clicking sound, quite a hefty one, as well as the revs dying down in line with the clicking, almost thumping, and it will simply refuse to go into gear (although I suspect not for a lack of trying) I’m not sure about other models, but it will also refuse to start in reverse or drive, asking me to shift into neutral fast. Understandable. Thanks to the transmission being constant mash, rather than synchromesh, I suspected the clutch was at fault, as this somewhat remind me of what I would expect to happen if you tried changing gears in a constant mesh transmission, without the clutch properly pressed in. I may be mistaken, as I only have a little experience with them. Throwing a camera under my car, I saw that the clutch actuator was incredibly slow, and didn’t sound all that happy at all. For reference, I also looked at the clutch actuator for my happy, healthy, fortwo (450), and saw that the clutch actuator slammed forwards and backwards like you would not believe. As such, I grabbed a spare clutch actuator from a wrecked 450 I had lying around, however it would not move at all in the roadster. Not surprising, given the wreck was in rather bad shape. I then grabbed the clutch actuator off my healthy fortwo, tested it in the roadster, and while it seemed faster at times, still, on occasion, it would actuate rather slowly. Some contact cleaner on the plugs did not seem to affect this. I installed it in the roadster, jamming that dam thing against the clutch as hard as I could with one hand, and while it worked once or twice, activating swiftly, and once, when the car was still on jack stands, it even shifted into reverse, upon lowering the car down and trying again, all I heard was that dreaded clicking sound. From this point onwards, the clutch actuator no longer move forwards particularly fast, nowhere near as fast as it did in the fortwo. Before I forget, I have followed evilution’s guide on servicing clutch actuators on the original roadster actuator, and the one from the scrap fortwo, however have left the one from my working fortwo mostly as is, spare some desperately sprayed in white lithium grease post installation. Additionally, I have done most of this testing with and without the roadster connected directly to the aux battery on my Toyota hybrid, and that thing can jumpstart a freight train, so I am not at all concerned about low-voltage issues. I am wondering if this is an issue with either the power being delivered to the clutch actuator, the clutch actuator, or, perhaps, issues with the clutch itself? The actuator is behaving slowly when not installed against the clutch suggests the issue lies somewhere in between the ignition key and the clutch actuator, but, as this car rested in a rather humid climate for three years, I would not discount the possibility that the clutch is possibly the main problem here. Any and all suggestions are warmly welcomed, short of getting the thing toes to my local smart specialist I am somewhat lost for ideas. Thank you kindly for all of your help, I appreciate it more than I can express in words.

New to smart cars and this forum. I recently bought a totalled off 2006 smart w450 that was side swiped from our provincial insurance provider. The reason I bought the car was to take the motor and transmission out and put it in my 2007 joyner sand spider. The car started and drove just fine when I brought it home. I drove it around the farm and made sure the engine and tranny functioned properly with no faults. I removed the engine/transmission and wiring harness to put into the dune buggy but before I went any further I hooked everything back up with it suspended on a stand. The engine started right up no problems. The dash, throttle and everything else works fine. The issue I'm having is that when I select reverse or drive the display shows 0. No gear selected. Just like if you don't have the peddle depressed in the car. I have the brake peddle switch hooked up and can hear the relay working in the fuse box but still shows the "0" when selecting reverse or drive. Is the brake pedal the issue or is it something else? Is there a way to fool it into thinking the brake pedal is depressed all the time so it will go into gear no matter what? I won't be using the smart brake system as the buggy already has its own brake system already. Any suggestions would help. On a side note when I hooked up the wiring harness to the engine and transmission when they were out of the car I only hooked up the connections I need for in the dune buggy. The SRS system, seat wiring, climate control, brake/antilock brake system, door harnesses, and lights were not hook up when reenergized. Not sure if this would have cause issues with the computers or not. Any info will be appreciated. Thanks

My 2008 smart passion won't go into park. This just happened today. I was coming home and pulled into my driveway and put the car in park and instead of showing P on the dash it showed a blinking N. It drives and shifts fine. I moved through the gears a few times and still comes up a blinking N. After trying a few times I left it in park with the N still blinking and let off the break to see if it would roll back and it didn't. It felt as if it was in park. I also can not remove the key. It will not turn all the way back to the removal position. That really bothers me because I only have one key right now and have to leave it unlocked. The car will not start in the park position. I have to move the shifter to neutral in order to start the car. On another note when in N, R, or D the small lights what show what gear you are in near the bottom of the shifter come on, but the small P does not light up when I put it in park. Any ideas what could be the problem?

my 05 S. Mann Cabrio started getting an occasional whine in the gearbox usually on take offs (first drive) and only for a sec or so that was last summer... car was put up over the winter and now that its back out i have a few hundred miles and the while comes and goes.. never very loud just enough to hear and after warmed up, gone.. then yesterday it gets different, on my 17 mile trip into work I get a gear noise, one gear on another , and I hear it directly behind me as if its in the differential. I pulled the rear plug and check the oil it dark but fine.. so to be sure I drain it (at work no less) and replace it. there in the parking lot. As a mechanic by profession i know preventative maintenance is everything.. and I head home. seams quiet for a few miles, then gets loud, gear/gear . if i accellerate, it gets louder, and letting up quieter.. I shift up it gets softer.. as well.. so I tippy toe home being i am on my own, after 10 pm and in the country... it grumbles, and makes a whomp about a mile from home, and i manage to sneek it home at at 30mph in 6th gear... Im thinking the worse, as if something has come loose inthe gearbox, or a bearing has failed.. checking the fluid I pulled out, (first sample) there is no metal to be found... so now i will check the second sample, by completely draining and see what develops. I have heard of wheel bearings (rear) and looking for information on gearbox issues all i find is the 3 bars (been there a few times)... another puzzler.. it did do three bars on me on the way home, BUT i could shift through gears up and down. anyone want to chime in on this, I am all ears...I want to hear what you think.. I will tear it down, and it will probably cost me many $$... I will get it fixed, btw I have only 44k miles on the car.. email me directly if you got any tips to share.. thanks.. steveg scg13803@yahoo (dot com)

Hey all! I just wanted to put this out there, I don't know if anyone else has ever experienced this, but here it is. I bought a 2006 Smart For Two in June 2014 (used, from a lady in my city), and she had taken really good care of the Smartie (I nicknamed it) when she ordered it in 2006. Given that she resides in the city, she did not need to drive very far to get to stores and stuff, so when I bought it, it only had about 35 000 km on it. She did take it out in the winter, she told me, because she said people who leave their Smarties sitting for long periods of time have trouble with the car. Everything was fine with it, I loved it SO much, the usual. Then, when it started getting cold here (November, when the average is -5'C and goes down from there), I found the Smartie making these rev-like noises just before it automatically changed gears. I thought it did this because it was cold out (maybe this is when I should have brought it in - I didn't know, I never had it in the winter before, shoot me!). So, on December 29, right before changing gears on a hill, the Smartie broke down, turned off, and the little screen on the dash had these 4 horizontal lines on it (??). The service dealer in my city fixed a few things, and we are now mid-January, he gives it a test drive, and it breaks down just like it did before. We get it towed to the next city to a Mercedes service place, and they find out it's the transmission that has broken. Question 1: when does a transmission break down? I have no idea about automobiles... Question 2: the service guy said when he looked in the transmission, the liquid was not its usual colour, but literally silver with the hundreds of specks of METAL, from somewhere in my car! What does that mean? Has the transmission been a shitty state for a while then? When does one "check up" on their transmission - why didn't the previous owner do so? So, end of my sob story: my Smartie is still in the city 1.5 hours away from me, they will not put in an old transmission (it's cheaper!) because of ethics, I know... I'm just a university student, you know how it is, and looking at piling costs, for (maybe) a transmission, new or old, the other parts that needed fixing, towing, and service pay for 2 different men. I don't know if I'll go all the way and fix it with new parts (but wouldn't it be weird to give an 11 year old Smartie an expensive new transmission?), or just let it go... But I love my baby Smartie! It's orange, and the only one in my city! Ok, done crying, if anyone has any transmission advice, I would be eternally grateful. Sorry for the long post! I am studying literature, so I'm used to writing a lot StudentBallerina

Hey everyone! New to the forum and would like to ask for some advice from some more knowledgeable people. Recently obtained a smart fortwo CDI 2005 model. I've also owned another but have never experienced this problem. I was driving my smart fortwo CDI and was accelerating in the acceleration lane. I attempted a downshift (note that I don't have a tach on the dash) and the car had a bit of a kickback but continued on. About a mile later, there was another kickback (I forget if I downshifted or not) but the 3 dashed lines appeared on the dash. I was still driving at around 40mph and was still able to accelerate to 50mph but once there was traffic, I slowed down and realized the transmission was no longer engaged to the engine. I was unable to shift the car back into drive or reverse and when I do, it is accompanied by a rumble from the transmission. I am still able to start the car but unable to shift it into gear. So the possibilities I came up with are: 1) First two gears in the transmission are stripped, which would require a new transmission. 2) Clutch was already worn and burned out due to downshift at high speed. Clutch actuator was already adjusted all the way in from previous owner which leads me to believe that it was already worn out to a certain extent. Thanks in advance, Cheers!