Re:Hi from Timor-Leste (East Timor)

Hi everyone,

I've been reading this forum for a while now and had the pleasure to find some useful information. I think that a presentation on my Jimny and its stories is overdue!

I currently live in Timor-Leste, a place where you find the most curious car park. There are no dealerships, so every single car has been imported from somewhere else. I believe mine came from Singapore and was originally silver or so but someone had the great idea of painting it black, which is a nightmare in such a hot country.

It has the M13A engine with an automatic transmission, like most cars here, and it's a RHD. It came in a quite banged up condition but everything seem to work. However, I'd like to share what I found along the way about my Jimny. All that on a next post as I have to run now :laugh:

See you soon!

Thanks for sharing....

sniper

Welcome to the forum. Looking forward to finding out more!

Welcome to the forum

Welcome along. What plans do you have for it?

Kirkynut

Hello and welcome

Hello and welcome onboard.
Any stories or pictures would be good to see.
Must admit I needed to use Google maps, but nice place to drive your Jimny.
Mike

Hi all! Thanks for the warm welcome.

I have no plans other than keeping it healthy and able to tackle Timor's rough terrain. A trip from the capital to the second largest city is 125km and takes 4 hours. In most roads I'm able to reach an average speed of 10 to 20 km/h :lol:

I've been driving the Jimny for 1 year now, mostly urban but on the weekends I'm off exploring. I found it to be a very capable off roader as is and I'll even say that the auto transmission makes it more efficient.

One of my first stories has to do exactly with off road performance. When I bought the Jimny, it came with A/T tyres but in very bad condition. So, I asked a local friend to help me getting a nice deal (locals get different prices). The guy came back with two brand new Hankook road tyres!! Mounted on the rear axle!! Couldn't really blame the guy and what's done, it's done so I just bothered in swapping those to the front. Reality is that I did around 2k km on those over mud, gravel, dirt and not a single problem with traction.

In the end, I ended up replacing all tyres by new Bridgestone Dueler A/T, one of the best options I can get here.

We have some good roads...


Some dirt roads...


Some surprise roads...


Some beautiful roads...


Here it is!


Here it is again!


Yep, it's beautiful around here

Automatic transmission — the full story!

So, as I've said before, this Jimny came with an automatic transmission. It wasn't the first time I drove an automatic vehicle but it is the first time I own one, which made me want to get to know the system better. And I must... the thing has some problems.

Before buying it, I gave it a try and everything seemed fine but, with time, I started noticing that shifting into second gear was a bit harsh. It will downshift into first gear without a problem and all other gears are ok. It will also do a light rattling sound when accelerating under heavy load but no slippage or other funny behavior.

I went online and read as much as I could, comparing different sources and opinions and did every trick in the book. Because parts are almost impossible to find here and mail isn't really an option, I have to rely on people coming in or me traveling to get hold of replacements. That gives me time to study the problem, I guess! :dry:

First idea was changing, obviously, changing the transmission fluid (which looked horrible). I read all about those stories "I was about to scrap my car and a simple fluid change brought it back to life" :lol: . Well, I wasn't that confident but I had to do it anyway. Apparently, inside the transmission sump, there's a filter, so I thought I should change that as well but had to wait for the next opportunity to get it back in the country (finding the right one online wasn't that straightforward too).

So, the time came, drained the old fluid, replaced the filter, put new fluid in and... no changes. I mean, gear changes are slightly smoother but the "first-to-second" problem is still there. At some point I even read a P730 error code and replaced the Gear Shift Control Switch (out of two I could find online). Not a good investment as that changed nothing.

The next step will be trying to figure out if something could be wrong with the transmission solenoids (there are four, inside the transmission sump) and after that I have no new ideas...

It's not very serious, I use the Jimny everyday and just need to be extra careful when I drive the first few minutes. Gear changes get better after warming up. The funny thing is, sometimes, especially on the morning after a big or more demanding drive, it won't shift past first gear. When this happens, I have noticed that shifting into D or R makes a much stronger "clunk". Curiously enough, all I need to do is turning it off an on again.

Let's see how this progresses. Anyway, sorry for the long story. :lol:

You have the ideal vehicle for the use I think!

The fact that the problem goes away after turning it off and back on again suggests to me that the problem is electrical. Maybe a solenoid?

I'd research if they need coding or calibrating to the car or something silly like that before getting them as it doesn't sound like you'll be able to do so where you are. Suzuki don't normally make their cars like that but I don't know enough about automatic gearboxes to know how the electrics in them work.

Kirkynut

Yes, I'm hoping the problem is only electrical. Just this morning I got the check engine light again for P0730.

I found the second part of the service workshop manual (which includes section 7 — transmission) and I'll follow the protocol. Fixing this would be a major win

I'll keep you posted!

Hi everyone.

Update on the check engine light. The light went off again without me doing a thing — cool.

I'm preparing another trip and had an urgent problem to solve before being able to drive over those rocky paths. One of the front wheel hubs had two damaged studs, to the point where I couldn't fit a nut. So, I was keeping the wheel in place using only 3 out of the 5 nuts :ohmy:

I realized I needed to disassemble the hub because of the ABS rotor that sits behind the studs. For this I had to use the famous Suzuki "special tool" that, once again, I bought online and asked a friend to bring in. Having this, it wasn't a hard job — just had to follow the instructions on the service manual.

1. Wheel out
2. Hub cap off
3. Retaining clip off
4. Use a lot of torque to open the hub
5. Take the hub out
6. Gently bang the ABS rotor until it comes off (it just sits on the hub but it fought me honourably)
7. Bang the old studs out
8. Bang the new studs in

Do it all over again in the reverse order and you're ready!