Shifter balky on 2012 3.8 Sedan

[JayOnno]

The shifter in my 2012 3.8 Sedan has been giving me occasional difficulty recently, in that it would not shift into Drive. This happened intermittently and at first, it was easily resolved by pulling the shifter a little more forcefully into Drive, or by shifting back to Neutral and then to Drive with a little extra pull.

Then it started happening from Park. Shifted to Drive and the shifter was in the Drive position, but transmission display showed Neutral and car was in Neutral. After that, it also happened a couple of times from Reverse.

Yesterday, after being out running errands, I backed into my driveway and remember the shifter felt more spongy than usual when on shifting to Reverse. I unloaded my trunk, restarted and could not get the car into Drive. The usual tactics didn't work (to Neutral, harder pull to Drive, back to Park and solid pull to Drive). It simply would not go into Drive from any gear.

I turned the car off a couple of times and waited a bit. The last attempt, I locked the car and waited two minutes before unlocking and restarting, to give all the electronics a chance to reboot. No joy.

When the tow truck arrived, I gave it one more go and got it into Drive. Took it straight to the dealer.

With the service rep in the car, I was able to replicate this repeatedly, while sitting on the dealer's lot with my foot on the brake.

I found that if I shifted normally from Neutral to Drive, I could feel a buildup of resistance in the shifter and about halfway to Drive, I broke through this and the car usually shifted to Drive. If I did this really slowly, I didn't break through and the car stayed in Neutral. The service rep sitting in the front passenger seat replicated this himself a few times.

The techs will be looking at the car (Monday) morning.

The service rep cautioned me that if I need a new transmission (hmmm...), it may take a while to get one.

The transmission itself has been working fine the entire time I have owned the car, upshifting and downshifting without issue in the heat of summer and cold of winter, in city driving and highway roadtrips.

I told the rep that it's quite a stretch from a balky shifter to be talking about a transmission replacement.

The car had 63K km when I bought it in November 2016 and is close to 108K km now. It has run really well with the exception of the infotainment system. That's a post for another day.

The water pump, idler pulley, belt tensioner and belt were replaced last February.

I'd appreciate any experience you guys can offer! Have you seen this shifter problem with your Genny and what was the fix?

 

[Benhur]

Yes. We are having the same issue with our '12 Genesis v6 as well. So far I replaced the shifter assembly (shifter in the cabin) from a '13 unit from Ebay. (Dealer had quoted $750 for this work) And we adjusted the cable tension couple times from the transmission side from underneath the car. It is better now but still glitchy. We adjusted the shift cable tension when the car is on the jacks and the car shifted nicely but after a little bit of driving problem comes and goes again. I am thinking about replacing the shifter cable next. Does anybody know if it has spring section? Perhaps there is some give that way? Shifting the car from underneath the car manually seems to work well. You hear the solid clicks and instrument gauge shift indicator confirms each shift correctly, So only suspect is the cable it seems so far.

 

[PF1]

I am experiencing these same symptoms with my 2012 Genesis 3.8 sedan. The shifting problem became progressively worse until I was left stranded with the transmission stuck in neutral. I am now preparing to attempt adjusting the shift cable. If that does not work I will then proceed with replacing the shift cable.
*Has anyone had success with either of these steps? If so, please provide some details.

Below are some instructions from the Automatic Transaxle System manual and a picture of the end of the shift cable on my Genesis where it attaches to the manual control lever.

How To Adjust Shift Cable

1. Insert the shift cable to the bracket and hold it with a new clip.
2. Align the manual lever hole to the hole on the transmission case and hold the position with a bar.
3. Eliminate shift cable free play of the shift cable.
4. Firmly hold the special bolt with a spaner and tighten the nut with the specified torque. Tightening torque : 13 ~ 16 N.m (1.3 ~ 1.6 kgf.m, 9.40 ~ 11.57 lb-ft)
5. Take off the bar holding the manual lever.
6. Shifting the each position, check that the shift lever moves smoothly.

 

[JayOnno]

After my original post last year, I had the shifter cable and inhibitor switch replaced at a Hyundai dealer. My shifter adventure continues, with breaks where everything is fine.

On first picking the car up after the shifter cable and inhibitor switch replacement, everything worked normally. That lasted two days.

The next problem (second if you're counting) was that the shifter would not go into Park from Reverse reliably. I couldn't replicate this at the dealer. When I went to leave, another new problem (third one in less than 2 weeks): the car wouldn't start in Park. The dealer service rep had coincidentally told me on the first service visit that this exact problem was relatively common and was due to a faulty inhibitor switch.

Without me asking, the dealer assured me they had definitely installed a new inhibitor switch and they took the car back in. I picked it up the next day and all was working normally.

One day later... once again, the car would not start in Park. From then on, it happened from time to time, without any pattern (cold start, hot start, weather). The shifter would get a little spongy from time to time, and then go back to normal.

With the problems being intermittent, and life being too short, I didn't take it back to the dealer. The problems recurred enough that I made videos of the issues in August, September and October of 2019.

I'm not driving much right now, but on a couple of recent drives this month, I could feel the shifter starting to get a bit spongy again in general. I had a couple of instances where the shifter was balky and it took multiple attempts to get into Reverse and/or Park, shifting back and forth until it took.

Today, the problems returned with a vengeance:

The car will consistently go to Drive. Neutral now requires getting halfway to Reverse, and shifting to Reverse happens when I get to the Park position on the shift gate.

With the shifter in the Park position, the dash display shows Reverse, and the car is definitely in Reverse and will roll back.

Worst of all, it took a lot of force to get the shifter out of the Park position (where the transmission was in Reverse). A couple of times it took both hands to wrench it out of the Park position, and I'm a fairly strong guy. When it did finally move there was a pop/bang noise from the mechanism. In several attempts, I was not able to get the transmission into the actual Park gear at all, and had to wrench the shifter out to Neutral again to turn off the car. Shutting off, waiting and restarting did nothing until attempt number 5, when I finally got it into Park properly. I shut off the car for the day after that.

The transmission itself seems fine. It shifted all the forward gears normally on the road, with no drama or noise while I was out today, including kicking down to pass on the highway.

I'm going to see if an independent shop I know and trust can sort this out tomorrow. If I find out anything that may help someone else, I'll post it here.

If you've experienced anything like the problems I had today, and found a resolution, I would really appreciate hearing about it.

----------------------
An aside: At the start of this adventure, I tracked down a TSB (attached). In April 2019, the dealer looked at it but did not look for any associated codes. Based on the symptoms I reported, and a look at the shifter cable with the car on the hoist, they determined it was necessary to replace both parts.

The TSB may be of help if you have similar shifter issues.

 

[JayOnno]

Finally some good news!

This may be of help to you @PF1 and maybe you too @Benhur.

The independent shop found the problem and fixed it easily.

If the dealer had been a bit more diligent or sold me one more inexpensive part, I would have been spared a year-and-a-half of problems and worry about the shifter failing and stranding me. I'm just a little frustrated with the dealer right now... that's the oldest story under the car repair Sun, isn't it?

There is a grommet that needs to move smoothly for the shifter to move smoothly. The grommet was dirty and a bit corroded. As best I understand, it's in the bolt assembly that connects the manual control lever to the inhibitor switch. My independent shop cleaned that and lubricated it, and the shifter is now moving more smoothly and precisely than it ever has in almost 4 years of owning the car. The force required is lower too, and shifting now feels crisp.

It's an amazing improvement.

@PF1 there is dirt/corrosion showing in your photo in that location on your manual control lever, so you may need the same thing done.

If the problem even hints at returning in a year or whatever, we'll just change that inexpensive part. For now, the part is in good shape and working properly, so the shop doesn't see a need to replace it.

If the dealer had just done a good job in the first place, they would have spared themselves multiple return visits from me. And they would have had a satisfied customer, instead of a frustrated one.

 

[princelybug]

Glad to hear you were able to properly diagnose and solve the issue!

 

[JayOnno]

Thanks @princelybug! It's a relief to have this solved. Hopefully this info will spare someone else all that grief, and maybe save them a few bucks on repairs too.