got in my car this morning and the transmision light was on. the car has auto- manual so i tried to change gears and it is in 3rd from the start. i don't know if it will go to fourth but i may get on the highway and find out. just to get the gears to switch. ? it is very cold and reverse works no problem. just drive or weather shifting is keeping the car in third. did change my battery last night but it ran fine after i did that. just a change i made everything else is normal. i will store in my garage and see if the warmer temp helps but i am afraid there is going to be more to it.

UPDATE: i took the car for a drive and turned the traction control off and the car drives fine. (uses all the gears) in the past month the traction control worked fine but i had alot of noise comming from the drivers side tire when activated. (like a metal scraping sound) does anyone have any knowledge on how the traction control works or what is the mechanics that slow the tires down? is it just the brakes are aplied to the spinning tire or is there a sensor or modual that is used along with the brakes? my brakes are fine but something is scraping the rotor?
I have a friend at a chevy dealership and we are going to put in a hoist monday and visually inspect what we can see.

any advise on what to look for in this inspection would be appreciated


any ideas or similar siguations?

any and all help is appreciated. thanx, robert

just thought i would let u guys know auto zone scoped the car and the tranny silinoid A is bad and the dealer told me they do not open the gearbox so it would be 4500-5000.00 to replace.
i am currently looking for a volvo repair shop to see if anyone will touch it.

keep ya potsed.

Any new updates. I just turned on my car and had the same problem.

I had the same problem with my S80. When I first started the car, it would go through all four gears. But after a few miles(almost always the exact same distance) it wouldn't shift down below third.

Solinoid A was stuck or something...Long story short I got a new tranny. The place I brought it to said that they could fix just the solinoid, but often something else would go soon after.

Any word on what happend with this? My car just started doing it and it almost seems like the EXACT same issue.... odd rattleing noise from the car.... Tomorrow Ill drive without the traction control on... Thanks and let me know what you did to fix this.