This data is from the NHTSA — the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints are spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem.
So how do you find out what problems are occurring? For this NHTSA complaint data, the only way is to read through the comments below. Any duplicates or errors? It's not us.
The transmissions in these vans have a serious problem. I have done research in the Pacifica forums and found many users are experiencing issues with the transmissions. My particular issues are: 1. Sometimes the vehicle jerks between lower gears especially when starting. The danger in this is when trying to go from a stop the vehicle will hesitate and then jerk extremely hard. It's startling and also dangerous when not expecting it. 2. At interstate speeds the transmission will not shift gears sometimes. This causes the van to slow down rapidly especially on hills. The dealership has looked at my particular van multiple times and they have "reprogrammed" the transmission multiple times but the problems still exist.
When pulling into traffic from a stop the transmission seems to try and go into third gear then drops back into second gear. This happens randomly but the result is that the car stops for a few seconds after pulling into traffic. I have complained about this problem to the dealer from the time of purchase. They have done extensive work on the transmission. As the car has aged the problem has become progressively worse. The dealer is now telling me that Chrysler knows the transmission has a problem but it is not endangering the public. The problem is random but we have to be very careful when pulling into traffic because we never know when the car will hesitate and/or stop after pulling into traffic. The problem has occurred randomly since purchase. The date entered below is the date of the last occurance.
Very hard shift of automatic transmission at slow speed from stop at about 15 MPH. Strong jerking motion poses dangerous pause in acceleration and control of ability to steer.
Vehicle hard shifts, and occasionally loses all driver power input while driving. The loss of power last occurred during a left-hand turn across traffic, when the car suddenly stopped accelerating through the intersection with oncoming traffic and coasted through, finally regaining power after crossing the street. Vehicle was taken to dealership, and dealer verified this is a known issue. Dealer stated there is an updated software package which addresses this issue, and it is not covered under my 100k mile CPO warranty.
- Houston, TX, USA
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The vehicle will hard shift after a stop at a stop sign/stop light. Once you have started going, it's like the transmission is playing catch up and not responding to the gas pedal being pushed and the rpms going up, and once it catches up, the vehicle jerks forward as the transmission catches in the gear and it feels like you're being rear ended in a pretty hard accident.
We were about to turn left onto a busy highway. Pulled into traffic and vehicle stalled with 2 adults and 4 children in the car. While stuck in the middle of the high way with oncoming traffic from both sides we started honking the horn and waving traffic to stop. Husband noticed a blinking -??D-?? light on the shifter knob and an alert on the dash that read something like -??shift to park-??. Due to the incline of the road we rolled backwards off the highway. We luckily were not hit by oncoming traffic but completely terrified by the situation. Had that highway been as busy as it usually is we would be dead. Shifted back to park. Was then able to drive vehicle the half mile home. Brought vehicle into dealership where after 2 weeks they were unable to to recreate issue and found nothing wrong. Stalling with no prior warning is a known recall for this vehicle but the recall was supposedly fixed on January 11th of 2018. This did not fix the stalling issue obviously. We refuse to drive vehicle again and take the chance of killing our family. After many conversations with Chrysler care we are 3 weeks out from incident and they have been of no help. This vehicle is not safe to be driven. After reading many forums there are many complaints of this recall not fixing the issue. Chrysler needs to be held accountable. I refuse to be a test dummy for this vehicle.
While traveling on a dry highway, with good tires/new tires, and decelerating from 45 mph and approaching a red light, and a moderate, but firm pressure on the brake to bring the van to a full stop, the speed decreased to 15 mph, with the tachometer stable at 800 rpm and then to 10 mph, with both hands on the wheel, left foot on the dead pedal, and right foot on the middle of the brake pedal. As the speedometer made the transition at 10 MPH, the tachometer surged to 1500 RPM and then to 3000 in under 3 seconds, which cause me to initiate an emergency action drill of stabbing the brake pedal hard three times and rotating the transmission control to the lowest gear. The transmission refused to shift lower, and the control of the vehicle turned on oa wrestling match and the tachometer surged from 1500 RPM, them 3000 RPM, then 4500 RPM, and then 6000 RPM, each time the vehicle acting like it was repeatedly being rear-ended at a speed exceeding 15 MPH. The engine could not be disengaged and aceelaretd uncontrollably to over 40 MPH, through a busy intersection, and required over 24 hard break stages over a 10 second period to actually stop the car, and the engine refused to disengage until stopped. Once the car was restarted it immediately surged forward trying to fight through the hard applied brakes. The cruise control was never on the entire time. I then stut down the engine once I was able to wretle it to a stop with the engine climbing to over 4500 RPM. I then took this vehicle to a safe area, and repeated the conditions, and again as the vehilce speed dropped below 15 MPH, and certainly below 10 MPH, the engine tachometer increased in steps of 1500 MPH, 3000, 4500, 6000 RPM, and no control could be achieved other then violently "stabbing" the brake pedal. Under controlled conditions the behavior was repeatable over 20 times. This is a life threatenign defect, and it appears to be software in origin. I have CAN data streams from the events (23) and video.
I bought my 2017 Chrysler Pacifica in 2018, and it would randomly jump gears while accelerating or stay in a higher gear. The dealership could not duplicate the problem for months. In May 2019, it threw a check engine light code of P0732. This was then repaired at a Chrysler dealer. It started doing that same thing again in January 2021. In September 2021, it threw the same check engine light code of P0732.
1) Steering - when driving, the steering wheel almost feels -??stuck-?? when turning and going at least 40mph. It feels like it has to be -??jerked-?? back to straighten it out causing concern for over correction. Took to Chrysler dealership and was told they could find nothing wrong but did an update on my power steering. Seems to be happening more often. 2. Power train - while taking off from a stopped position or driving slowly (ie: parking lot) the vehicle shifts so hard it feels like you-??ve been rear ended. Again Chrysler dealership could find nothing wrong but this also happens frequently.
Vehicle motor or transmission lurches and stalls, won't stay in gear, stops for no reason in traffic, slams into gear. But won't accelerate. Arrigo chrylser dealership in fort pierce Florida stated they repaired issue with computer reset or reprogramming but did not resolve. Continues to stall and lurch and lose power.
Everytime I accelerate the car is slow to pick up speed and jumps and jerks like the transmission can't shift gears. It has also stalled out in the middle of intersection as if it couldn't get into gear. Took to dealer reset transmission but it still isn't right. Taking to another dealer this seems to be a problem with several owners the car only has 32k and I bought a year ago never had this much issue with past cars
This is my 3rd problem to be reported to NHTSA on this 2017 Chrysler Pacifica. The "L" gear should typically slow down the vehicle when engaged, especially going downhill, so that you can use the transmission to slow the car down and use less braking. On a recent trip on I-5 the Grapevine, i used the L gear to attempt to slow down the vehicle on a steep and long descent. Instead of slowing the vehicle down immediately upon switching to L, the vehicle actually sped up 10 to 15 mph initially before it starts to slow down the car, creating a very dangerous situation especially when vehicles in front of me were slowing down too on the descent. I took it to the dealer, and they actually replaced the TCM because of another dangerous problem (see Complaint 11405469, March 2021) with the vehicle. I have tried the "L" gear again after, and it still does the same thing. The dealer says they cannot replicate the problem because there is no downhill where they can test for this problem.
Vehicle will not give power on take off and will not give power at 45-55 mph. This has caused many issues where accidents could have been caused. Took to multiple dealerships and they both said it was the way the 9-speed automatic behaved. A vehicle should not behave in a way that is a safety concern. They could not fix the issue because it is the vehicle itself.
Lst year our transmission began to make "clunking" sounds and felt like we were getting "rear-ended". local dealer said it was a needed software update on a computer. Did the repair and worked well for a year. Now, it is starting to do that again but not frequently. I am reporting this because there seems to be quite a few other similar complaints about this.
When in motion, usually from first gear shifting to second gear, the transmission will jolt or bang, at which point I have to let off the gas peddle to allow it to let's say, catch up, on the shift. It clunks fairly hard, not sure why Chrysler has not recalled for this issue. We have also had issues when we go over the top of a hill with the cruise control on and start go down the hill and the vehicle will pick up speed and the transmission will downshift and the engine RPM will spike up to 3000-4000 RPM. As I know this is going to happen, I do shut the cruise off when this happens and it will settle back to normal operation. We have had it to our Chrysler dealer for the transmission issue with the clunking and they just shrugged it off and do nothing at all. I cannot put a date on the actual occurrences because it is ongoing and still does it at random at times. Also, I cannot really give actually dates and mileage as to when this happens as it is random.
Occasionally, when accelerating from a stop, or low speed, the engine seems to increase rpms while the car temperarily slows, and then the car lurches forward and emits a loud mechanical clank. The whole sensation is similar to my car being "rear-ended" by another vehicle.
From a stop at a stop light, when light turned green accelerated to about 18 mph (going straight through light) then lost all power (with accelerator still depressed) while in middle of the intersection. At that same time a notification displayed on the dashboard for about 5 seconds stating "adaptive cruise control (acc) off". after about 5 seconds notification disappeared and power returned to vehicle. This exact issue happened twice in the same day.
I was driving in stop-N-go traffic between 0-25 mph for about 10 minutes, when the car stop responding to acceleration. The engine was still on. I was lucky to be able to pull over to the left shoulder, but there was a lot of traffic behind me, and could have been rear-ended with my family inside the vehicle. Once I pulled over, I saw that the "engine fault", "parking brake fault" lights had come on, and the dash displayed "traction control disable". there were other messages that came up. I tried to put the car in "park", but the shifter didn't respond. I turned off the vehicle and started it back up. All the fault lights were still on, and the shifter was blinking between "P" and "L" for no reason. I shut off the engine again, and attempted to restart a second time, with the same result. I shut off the engine again and waited for about 3 minutes before restarting. This time I was able to put the car into D, and go to the dealer to check up. Needless to say, this was very dangerous, not knowing if the car could malfunction again and if I would lose control again. I have taken this vehicle to the dealer 3 times before regarding a rough gear change at low speed. Each time the dealer updated the program on the transmission control module (tcm) per Chrysler factory bulletin, and told me to drive it and eventually the computer will "learn" my driving habit (as if somehow I am at fault for accelerating the vehicle). On this occasion, the dealer replaced the tcm, but gave me no assurances that these problems would not occur again with the new tcm. Unless Chrysler can explain what was the problem, and what they did to fix it with the new tcm, I feel there is a safety concern/risk with this vehicle.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
- Hartselle, AL, USA