railguy wrote:
Last week I took my '05 CRD in for the F37 recall. Computer was reflashed and torque converter replaced. Afterwords I set out on a thousand mile plus round trip to see family. This included dry open road driving, bad weather driving, some in-town driving, and some deep snow driving (in my driveway when I got home).
Bottom line: no problems. My CRD did not suffer horribly from the infamous 55 mph "shudder" before F37, but it shifts much smoother now. It still "hunts" a little in an out of overdrive at about 55 mph, but not any worse than other vehicles I have driven. I can't see that power has been affected appreciably. Driving over Vail Pass (over 10,000 feet), I was able to leave the cruise control set at 65 mph the whole way up the pass--the CRD never shifted out of overdrive! Left a couple of V8 Land Rovers in the dust as they tried to slobber their way up the pass at about 45 mph to 55 mph--obviously dropped down into a lower gear. Very few SUV's can keep up with the CRD on the passes, even ones with big V6's or V8's that get half the fuel economy. And speaking of fuel mileage, I got between 24 and 28 mpg (hand-calculated) on the trip. That is about what I expected from winter-blend fuel.
Maybe I'm just lucky, but the F37 seemed to make my CRD run better and smoother, with no noticeable ding to performance or fuel economy. It's unfortunate that so many other people seem to be having problems with the F37--I can't help but think part of it is attributable to techs not knowing what they are doing. I've also been driving diesels vehicles for going on three decades--so I'm used to them.
Not only will it not shift out of O.D. while pulling long hills, it will accelerate up them in O.D.. That is the diesel experience I love.