Recently, a long time customer came in because she had lost the use of 5^th gear in her 2003 Tundra 5 speed transmission. The truck has been immaculately cared for since she got it and the transmission made no noticeable noise, so we were sure no serious problems had occurred. As it happens, Toyota 5 speed transmissions have had a common failure for a long time that is related to a plastic ball socket in the shifter.

When the truck gets old the plastic deteriorates and the shifter drops further into the transmission than it is supposed to. Eventually the transmission housing interferes with the shifter and it cannot move into 5th gear. There is nothing wrong with the transmission, just the shifter mechanism.

A simple test for this issue is to lift on the shifter while moving it into 5th gear. The shifter is spring loaded down so some effort is required, but if the vehicle goes 5^th gear, this could be the problem. The repair costs are reasonable. This arrangement has been used in cars and trucks from approximately 1977 to recently. Some of these include the Toyota Celica, Corona, T100, Tacoma and Tundra. Happy Jap’s would love to help you with this or other transmission problems.