hi. newbie here. first post. i own at 2004 3s 4 door.

last weekend i had my AT and check engine warning lights come on. i had just left home, the car was cold, and i flipped on the AC just as it was switching from 1st to 2nd gears. the car jolted forward a bit. and the lights came on. i pulled off the road. turned the car off. and turned it back on. warning lights came back on. note: ive had issues with the gas cap causing the check engine light to come on once in the past, but never along with the AT light. and mazda corrected this issue for me. but i double checked the gas cap anyways. no dice. ran my errand and took the car home. started the car up about an hour later and the warning lights were no where to be seen. and they haven't come up again all week.

thoughts?

 

It might've simply been a temporary glitch in the system. The AT is controlled by its own separate ECU that may have been affected by the power surge situation you described. All these electronics can improve a vehicles overall abilities, but can also get finicky and be a bit of a mystery to most of us sometimes. The fact that it reset itself is a good sign, imo.

I would keep an eye on it, as I'm sure you will anyway, but don't lose sleep until it becomes necessary to... if you know what I mean?

Oh, and next time... get the MT. Less trouble overall than any AT.

 

hello. thanks for your input. i try my best not to worry, but since i know so little about cars, hard to do sometimes.

yup. ive got my eye on it. and if for some reason it ever pops up again, ill take it in to have it checked out. but its been good for a whole week now, so knock on wood. its just weird to have a warning light come on for an hour or so one day and never to be seen again.

p.s. i found a 50 dollar rebate on tires in the header. how did you know i needed new tread??

 

We are psychotic here. Oh, sorry. I mean psychic.

A CEL will take a while to clear off by itself. What caused it in the first place may have only lasted a split-second, then an hour to readjust and reset.