I woke up to -20 degrees Celsius with a wind chill of -30 and it dipped to -28 Celsius last night with wind chill of -38. Enough about the crappy weather here.

I started my car this morning (after not being plugged in) and it started up fine. I would say typical for a chilly morning. I left the car run for about 5-10 minutes and then went and boosted my girlfriend’s car. When I took the car back to the parking spot and parked it I shut the car off and noticed the gear selector went to the recessed position and then immediately came back up. It attempted to go down one more time and again popped up before the car went into sleep mode. I then turned the car into accessory mode (just push the start/stop without the break) and again the gear selector tried to go down and again it popped up.

I left the car and came back after about 10 minutes. Went on about a 5 minute drive, shut the car off and the gear selector finally went into its resting position. Anyone see this before? Know the reason why it could be occurring? According to my dealer the rotary dial recall was completed back in Dec 2010.

On another note. My TPMS continues to go off on both the driver front and rear tires. Clearly a slow leak and I am assuming around the valve. Any way to fix this or have to get new valves? I have filled the tires with air about 5 times since October (should probably have them looked at). Any suggestions other than the obvious on this?

Not the car is still under warranty until September 2013 however my dealer is about 2.5 hours away.

Thanks for the advice everyone! Sorry for the long post.

Aaron

 

TPMS should be a warranty replacement. Have yours been replaced with the updated parts? This is essential as the older design fails. Get all four replaced under warranty. The new design has a taller securing nut and a dark anodizing colour.

The slow leak will be around the base of the valve stem. Precision torquing in inch-pounds is essential for a leak free reliable seal. Be aware that many tire techs are still not aware of the need for precision torque when installing these.

Can't help you with the rotary selector. I do know my XF experiences very infrequent apparent software errors. I have had false low battery warnings and recently the steering wheel volume adjuster wheel malfunctioned, just one occasion so far. Possibly your gear selector had a dirt issue which disappeared. The rise and fall is controlled by a motor and drive belt, and is just cosmetic. The selector functions whether raised or retracted, if you can operate it! Do you routinely manually select P or do you let the car do so when switching off? Were you in P all the time this fault appeared?

 

I will double check with the dealer on the TPMS valves. I do not know if they have been replaced at all and my dealer is quite persistant that they need to inspect the vehicle to figure the problem out before they replace any parts (which is fine but I am 2.5 hour away). The dealer is extremely helpful though and the service they have given me is extremely good (probably because I am quite young and they want repeat business haha but up to this point I would probably give it to them).

I always (forgot twice I think) select P before I shut the car down. I wasn't sure if it was "safe" to turn the car off while still in R or D. I had the vehicle in P the entire time. Shut it off nothing, put in accessory nothing, started it and selected D but didn't move then P again and shut off still nothing. It was strange but after a short drive it went to its resting position. I am quite confident my dealer would suggest bringing it in and they would have to try and recreate the senario (which would be hard because it only occured twice in 5 months) before they act on anything. Not to sure what to do.

Thanks for the advice Jagular.

 

Hello AaronW
This just a guess about the gear selector based on the same thing happening to my neighbors XJ. A few weeks ago we had really cold temps and his did the same thing. He took to the dealer and they could not reproduce the problem. A few nights later when the temps dipped again, It happen again. I think some condensation may build up in the well, just enough to freeze and cause a mild blockage. The selector knob comes back up to protected it. You drove the car, just enough to let the temp rise in the well. The condensation melts and the selector goes down. Since we have had milder temps, he hasn't had the problem re-occur. I could be wrong and its only a guess but it would explain alot. IMHO.