4 Speed Auto With Od - Won't Engage Overdrive Smoothly On 1998 Cor

[markborley]

I've just bought a 1998 corolla with the 3C-E diesel engine and a 4 speed auto box with overdrive and although the gearbox works OK for the 4 normal ratios it has a problem changing into overdrive. The problem occurs at an indicated 57 - 64 mph (approximately) but once above that speed it settles into overdrive OK and is quite happy until the speed drops down to about 65 mph again. The symptoms are that the car becomes very jerky to drive and at first I thought the engine was misfiring badly (I'd just filled it up with diesel and thought "damn - I must have put petrol in by mistake") but its definitely not the engine - it's as if the gearbox is going in and out of drive, so the car jerks forwards and then falls back.

Can anyone tell me (a) is this a known problem with this gearbox? (B) what is the cure? I only discovered it when driving the car back from having bought it as a private sale (so I've no come-back on the seller) and it isn't worth very much - certainly if it needs a new gearbox its not worth fixing, so I'm hoping there is an adjustment that can be made, but I'm not very optimistic - I think I will just have to run the car with the overdrive disabled.

Any help would be very much appreciated.

Thanks,

Mark