Joined the Comfortmatic failure club

growly_bear said:
A while ago I read a huge German forum post on the Comfortmatic system. It discussed a great many aspects of the system and potential problems. The thougt of putting in neutral at lights etc was discussed and said to be a good thing and would probably extend the life of the hydraulics. However. Someone used Mes to read the clutch position when in neutral or in a gear. The difference wasn't significant and the pressure in the system wasn't reduced. In other words there was no benefit to putting in neutral...
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Yes that was the thread I was referring to.....
 
Di
Steve-N said:
I can certainly vouce for that, I had a 2019 Fiat with the 6 sp 'comfort-matic' and it failed at 10,800 mls, luckily for me, Fiat upheld my claim for a complete new gearbox and robotic actuator, but I then sold the van on, and ordered the same e van, but with the 9 sp 'proper' auto, and yes . . . It is a dream to drive, and with the newer 2.2 ltr engine easily returns 40+ mpg when motorway cruising.

For once, we'll done Fiat for finally realising the comfort-magic was a disaster !!!
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Did they ever say whether it was the gearbox or the Comfortmatic that had the issues?
 
dunnah01 said:
Our 3.0l Comfortmatic went berserk at about 25k, worked around it by a combination of restarting, resetting parameters with MES and using manual mode for about 20 more limp modes for the next 5k. Finally refused everything in southern Spain at around 30k. Luckily I limped to a motorwaty aire so could try all sort in MES. Managed to get 1st gear but wouldn't go into 2nd no matter what I did until I did the arnagedon ''clutch self-calibratuon enable' routine and voila, all gears and no limp modes or messages. I've done about 12k since then and no problems whatsoever. I've go the confidence back and no longer worry about the dreaded 'gear unavailable' message.
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Help please how do I do a clutch self calibration routine. Regards nick
 
Nick wright said:
Help please how do I do a clutch self calibration routine. Regards nick
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You need a copy of Multiecuscan and the OBD leads to connect to a laptop or Bluetooth dongle that covers your year of Ducato. Once connected to the gearbox ECU it's one of the options. Early models needed to drive about 300m but later models it's a static calibration
 
dunnah01 said:
You need a copy of Multiecuscan and the OBD leads to connect to a laptop or Bluetooth dongle that covers your year of Ducato. Once connected to the gearbox ECU it's one of the options. Early models needed to drive about 300m but later models it's a static calibration
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Shit I was hoping it be more simple than that. Regards nick

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rambo said:
why people are still buying vans with this auto init is beyond me ..
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You could say the same about vehicles equpped with dpf, adblue, cats ,etc. The amount who are ,& have paid, huge amounts of money week after week to main dealers without the fault being corrected is mind boggling when you seem them on the O¡Reilly's dpf cleaning channel.Most of them are not fit for purpose & /or have built in mileage redundancy which should never be allowed .
 
We wanted an auto when we bought first time around, and ours was sold to us as such… we were blissfully unaware of some people’s Comfortmatic issues then, having never even heard of it before - and with a dealer warranty anyway, were not over-concerned once we found out about technical maladies with these things.

We found that on the open road, the Comfortmatic makes for a particularly nice cruise for us, but needs constant overriding on roundabouts and bends where you have to brake or slow down considerably to enter… very noticeable for us as we are based around Milton Keynes - somehow it always dropped the gear too early and caused high revving of the engine and engine braking which had to be overridden.

Ours hadn’t failed before that we know of, the MH was 2019 and at 18,500 miles when we purchased it in July last year.

In between Xmas and New Year we went down to Devon and, due to a local road closure, found ourselves diverted across the hills on a road with a few steep uphill and downhill hairpin bends, and again constantly overriding the Comfortmatic gear changes which again had the engine constantly revving very hard. It felt like harder work than driving a manual gearbox MH would have been…

It made that part of the trip a very unpleasant drive. Then, a few miles further on we came across a hunt, so we pulled in to have a cuppa and get some air watching the hunt - opened the door and wow, smell of burning clutch…

The smell soon dissipated and once the hunt was out of sight we finished up, this time Mrs D went in the cockpit and - by now knowing the reputation these things have, fired the MH up with expectation of Comfortmatic trouble… and it was working fine. Nevertheless after that experience we took it back to the dealer, who pronounced it to be in perfect order, not even needing any adjustment, which I had thought might be the case to reduce that early downshifting…

For us, that whole anticipation of trouble and driving experience is in itself a failure of this gear system. Last weekend we took the MH to the dealer for some completely unrelated warranty work, and on the way - across Milton Keynes and it’s numerous roundabouts - it was driving like a manual again, except with a manual I wouldn’t have had to constantly override the gears to stop the annoying revving and engine braking - and no Stirling Moss style driving either… :giggle:

When we got there and waiting for our MH to be turned around in the workshop, we spoke to another couple who were looking at buying a used MH with Comfortmatic and asked what we thought… moral dilemma… my advice based on my personal experience had to be don’t… spend the extra on a full Auto.

And we’ve just done the same. We ended up leaving the MH there at the Dealership under a part-ex… We were in fairness seriously considering investing heavily in ours anyway, to overcome issues for ourselves personally… raising/fixing the bed for more stowage underneath, adding air suspension, full Lithium upgrade, bigger wheels, replacing the fridge and so on- but that whole Comfortmatic experience and anticipation of trouble would still be there after all that expense - so we’ve bitten the bullet and traded ours in after all… we’ve gone full Auto in a different used MH, though still for a Ducato PVC…
 
Deafender said:
We wanted an auto when we bought first time around, and ours was sold to us as such… we were blissfully unaware of some people’s Comfortmatic issues then, having never even heard of it before - and with a dealer warranty anyway, were not over-concerned once we found out about technical maladies with these things.

We found that on the open road, the Comfortmatic makes for a particularly nice cruise for us, but needs constant overriding on roundabouts and bends where you have to brake or slow down considerably to enter… very noticeable for us as we are based around Milton Keynes - somehow it always dropped the gear too early and caused high revving of the engine and engine braking which had to be overridden.

Ours hadn’t failed before that we know of, the MH was 2019 and at 18,500 miles when we purchased it in July last year.

In between Xmas and New Year we went down to Devon and, due to a local road closure, found ourselves diverted across the hills on a road with a few steep uphill and downhill hairpin bends, and again constantly overriding the Comfortmatic gear changes which again had the engine constantly revving very hard. It felt like harder work than driving a manual gearbox MH would have been…

It made that part of the trip a very unpleasant drive. Then, a few miles further on we came across a hunt, so we pulled in to have a cuppa and get some air watching the hunt - opened the door and wow, smell of burning clutch…

The smell soon dissipated and once the hunt was out of sight we finished up, this time Mrs D went in the cockpit and - by now knowing the reputation these things have, fired the MH up with expectation of Comfortmatic trouble… and it was working fine. Nevertheless after that experience we took it back to the dealer, who pronounced it to be in perfect order, not even needing any adjustment, which I had thought might be the case to reduce that early downshifting…

For us, that whole anticipation of trouble and driving experience is in itself a failure of this gear system. Last weekend we took the MH to the dealer for some completely unrelated warranty work, and on the way - across Milton Keynes and it’s numerous roundabouts - it was driving like a manual again, except with a manual I wouldn’t have had to constantly override the gears to stop the annoying revving and engine braking - and no Stirling Moss style driving either… :giggle:

When we got there and waiting for our MH to be turned around in the workshop, we spoke to another couple who were looking at buying a used MH with Comfortmatic and asked what we thought… moral dilemma… my advice based on my personal experience had to be don’t… spend the extra on a full Auto.

And we’ve just done the same. We ended up leaving the MH there at the Dealership under a part-ex… We were in fairness seriously considering investing heavily in ours anyway, to overcome issues for ourselves personally… raising/fixing the bed for more stowage underneath, adding air suspension, full Lithium upgrade, bigger wheels, replacing the fridge and so on- but that whole Comfortmatic experience and anticipation of trouble would still be there after all that expense - so we’ve bitten the bullet and traded ours in after all… we’ve gone full Auto in a different used MH, though still for a Ducato PVC…
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On the 2 we owned I never had to use manual or override it, just let it do what it needed.

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MichaelT said:
On the 2 we owned I never had to use manual or override it, just let it do what it needed.
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Same here, we've never had to resort to manual ever, something definitely wrong with the MH.
 
Deafender said:
We wanted an auto when we bought first time around, and ours was sold to us as such… we were blissfully unaware of some people’s Comfortmatic issues then, having never even heard of it before - and with a dealer warranty anyway, were not over-concerned once we found out about technical maladies with these things.

We found that on the open road, the Comfortmatic makes for a particularly nice cruise for us, but needs constant overriding on roundabouts and bends where you have to brake or slow down considerably to enter… very noticeable for us as we are based around Milton Keynes - somehow it always dropped the gear too early and caused high revving of the engine and engine braking which had to be overridden.

Ours hadn’t failed before that we know of, the MH was 2019 and at 18,500 miles when we purchased it in July last year.

In between Xmas and New Year we went down to Devon and, due to a local road closure, found ourselves diverted across the hills on a road with a few steep uphill and downhill hairpin bends, and again constantly overriding the Comfortmatic gear changes which again had the engine constantly revving very hard. It felt like harder work than driving a manual gearbox MH would have been…

It made that part of the trip a very unpleasant drive. Then, a few miles further on we came across a hunt, so we pulled in to have a cuppa and get some air watching the hunt - opened the door and wow, smell of burning clutch…

The smell soon dissipated and once the hunt was out of sight we finished up, this time Mrs D went in the cockpit and - by now knowing the reputation these things have, fired the MH up with expectation of Comfortmatic trouble… and it was working fine. Nevertheless after that experience we took it back to the dealer, who pronounced it to be in perfect order, not even needing any adjustment, which I had thought might be the case to reduce that early downshifting…

For us, that whole anticipation of trouble and driving experience is in itself a failure of this gear system. Last weekend we took the MH to the dealer for some completely unrelated warranty work, and on the way - across Milton Keynes and it’s numerous roundabouts - it was driving like a manual again, except with a manual I wouldn’t have had to constantly override the gears to stop the annoying revving and engine braking - and no Stirling Moss style driving either… :giggle:

When we got there and waiting for our MH to be turned around in the workshop, we spoke to another couple who were looking at buying a used MH with Comfortmatic and asked what we thought… moral dilemma… my advice based on my personal experience had to be don’t… spend the extra on a full Auto.

And we’ve just done the same. We ended up leaving the MH there at the Dealership under a part-ex… We were in fairness seriously considering investing heavily in ours anyway, to overcome issues for ourselves personally… raising/fixing the bed for more stowage underneath, adding air suspension, full Lithium upgrade, bigger wheels, replacing the fridge and so on- but that whole Comfortmatic experience and anticipation of trouble would still be there after all that expense - so we’ve bitten the bullet and traded ours in after all… we’ve gone full Auto in a different used MH, though still for a Ducato PVC…
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Rather surprised by your comments concerning Comfortmatic gear changes. Changing down automatically to employ engine braking is what an automatic is supposed to do. I never found the need to override it by using manual. I now have a 9 speed automatic and again it changes down to employ engine braking, usually triggered by a touch on the brakes. The 9 speed is a nicer gearbox but they are both full automatics, they just do it in different ways.

Your new automatic will probably have a smart alternator. The engine braking is when it charges the battery and recovers the energy that would otherwise be lost to brake heat and wear, so I suggest you let the auto do what it has been set up to do and just ease up a bit on the brake pressure.
 
I have a manual and I change down a gear, or two for sharp bends and steep hills.
 
I've never had the "pleasure?" Of driving with a comformatic gearbox, but I did drive a 7.5 tonne ISUZU truck with a robotic gearbox for several years, it never broke down but it was a horrible driving experience, especially at roundabouts, where as you pulled onto the roundabout it would contemplate the nature of the universe for a while before changing gear, you had to put it into manual at every roundabout or junction pulling into traffic otherwise you stood a very good chance of being T boned. I wouldn't consider a robotic gearbox on any vehicle I owned, be it comformatic, sprintshift or other.

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We had a 2.3 180hp comformatic, our experience was that it was fine on flat ground, even slightly hilly, but as soon as the terrain got steeper it was an absolute dog!
If left in auto it wouldn’t change down early enough, it would change up a gear at the bottom, just before you needed a low gear to climb, it would then take ages to change down, such that the revs dropped. On two occasions it stalled.
The only way to drive on hills was in manual.

Laika Ecovip was a good van, spoilt by an awful gearbox, it’s gone thank goodness.

Neil
 
Neilh said:
We had a 2.3 180hp comformatic, our experience was that it was fine on flat ground, even slightly hilly, but as soon as the terrain got steeper it was an absolute dog!
If left in auto it wouldn’t change down early enough, it would change up a gear at the bottom, just before you needed a low gear to climb, it would then take ages to change down, such that the revs dropped. On two occasions it stalled.
The only way to drive on hills was in manual.

Laika Ecovip was a good van, spoilt by an awful gearbox, it’s gone thank goodness.

Neil
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That's what the UP button is for,, went all over alps and pyrenees in ours with no problem using said button.
 
Just for a change from the doom and gloom about Comfortmatic gearboxes I can only say that having driven 30,000 miles in the last three years in our 3.0 ltr 5.5t Carthago with a Comfortmatic gearbox that it was a pleasure to drive and we never had a single problem,fluid changed and recalibration at Adams Morey.
 
Our previous two vans were Comformatics, did over 75,000 miles in them without any problems. Last one was 150hp 4.5t done loads of mountains never a problem, just remember to use the up button in hilly areas. Always drove it in auto mode, never needed manual.
 
MichaelT said:
On the 2 we owned I never had to use manual or override it, just let it do what it needed.
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Minxy said:
Same here, we've never had to resort to manual ever, something definitely wrong with the MH.
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Same here, never touch it apart from putting in neutral and back into gear and alls fine so far.

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Two comfortmatics in 9years, 2.2 aclass and 3lt pvc only ever had to go into to manual on tight uphill bends in the mountains…

I have to say the 3ltr is a dream to drive and much better then the 2.2, it’s just so much more sure of itself and I think better mated to the comfortmatic, 138 thousand miles now and still drives like new…😎
 
Just smiffy said:
Two comfortmatics in 9years, 2.2 aclass and 3lt pvc only ever had to go into to manual on tight uphill bends in the mountains…

I have to say the 3ltr is a dream to drive and much better then the 2.2, it’s just so much more sure of itself and I think better mated to the comfortmatic, 138 thousand miles now and still drives like new…😎
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Long may that continue.
 
Not sure if good or bad - we popped in to the dealership today to drop off some last bits on the MH we traded in… and it was nowhere to be seen.

Turns out that the Comfortmatic unit WAS faulty, and the MH has gone off to be fixed at a specialist somewhere, from what the salesperson commented on… she didn’t know what was wrong with it, and their workshop was closed today, so we couldn’t ask them.

We just knew after test-driving both a Fiat and Ford auto MH last weekend that our Comfortmatic wasn’t right… happily we’re now traded up to a full auto and newer MH, so won’t be concerned about these again anyway…
 
WESTY66 said:
If I had the know how and spare time I would buy the required equipment and offer the service to all funsters for just enough to recoup the costs of the equipment!!
But I’m a numpty and have no spare time, cos I’m still working for the man (and all your pensions😁😁)
Is there a list of people (garages) who can do this AND make a good job of bleeding the system at the same time?
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Adams Morey in Portsmouth fixed mine when I lost all gears. Wasn’t cheap but the warranty paid for most of it.
 
So far I've been relatively pleased with the Comfortmatic on our motorhome - touch wood - apart from a couple of annoyances: it does have a tendency on some inclines to "hunt" which annoys me; also, if I override the gear with a "tap" it refers back to full-auto too quickly - like in 4 or 5 seconds. Of course, I could just pop it into manual but would prefer not to have to do that. Now when I drive off I activate "Up" straight away which minimises the negatives. It's certain not like the automatic on our old BMW 220d but that was truly sublime. I'd say it's closer to the auto on our Kia Sportage hybrid. I miss the BMW.

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mgibbons said:
So far I've been relatively pleased with the Comfortmatic on our motorhome - touch wood - apart from a couple of annoyances: it does have a tendency on some inclines to "hunt" which annoys me; also, if I override the gear with a "tap" it refers back to full-auto too quickly - like in 4 or 5 seconds. Of course, I could just pop it into manual but would prefer not to have to do that. Now when I drive off I activate "Up" straight away which minimises the negatives. It's certain not like the automatic on our old BMW 220d but that was truly sublime. I'd say it's closer to the auto on our Kia Sportage hybrid. I miss the BMW.
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We bought a new Hymer 150 on comfortmatic in 2012 and after 8 faultless years sold it to move on, loved it.

Edit: During that time for U.K. touring towed car on a frame .
 
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Bit apprehensive about posting this in case the “bubble bursts” regarding my 3 litre Ducato’s trouble free performance. Am down in Cornwall at the moment towing a twin axle trailer with a old car on it (not the first time and, hopefully, not the last) using mostly uphill mode. In the next day or so my 2010 reg motorhome will have done 80,000 miles and in that time I have had no problems with the Comfortmatic system. I too am a regular at Adam’s Morey to have it serviced and have also met a few other owners with similar experiences to mine…..so there are some out there. Will continue to keep my fingers crossed and also wish all well.
 
So any lawyers here……..went to buy a labelled Automatic motorhome and looked very nice and just what we wanted…..ie automatic to drive like the cars we have!! So we thought……..
Paid a deposit and all excited to only realise the next day it is in fact a ComforMatic !
Salesman didn’t even know what one was when I rang him less than 24hrs later…. Advised them that not as advertised Ie ComforMatic not Automatic and has refused the return of my £2000 deposit! .
Do you think I have a leg to stand on……when I look at how different it is to drive than a conventional Auto & I see Fiat actually call it a computer assisted manual gearbox!

Nb…..(I see now they sold it shortly after)
 
SirHectors said:
So any lawyers here……..went to buy a labelled Automatic motorhome and looked very nice and just what we wanted…..ie automatic to drive like the cars we have!! So we thought……..
Paid a deposit and all excited to only realise the next day it is in fact a ComforMatic !
Salesman didn’t even know what one was when I rang him less than 24hrs later…. Advised them that not as advertised Ie ComforMatic not Automatic and has refused the return of my £2000 deposit! .
Do you think I have a leg to stand on……when I look at how different it is to drive than a conventional Auto & I see Fiat actually call it a computer assisted manual gearbox!

Nb…..(I see now they sold it shortly after)
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Firstly were you told it was a non refundable deposit? And did you expect it to be a holding deposit.

Hope this helps

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3. As described
• The vehicle you buy should match the description in the adverts or the sample model showed in a showroom
• The vehicle’s specs and appearance should be the same as what was mentioned before the purchase

• Second-hand cars’ condition and performance should be as described If the car or any other goods and service purchased by you don’t meet any of these three criteria,

you may have the following options under the Consumer Rights Act. Again

, consult Citizen’s Advice and Money Advice Service for a detailed explanation of whether these rights apply in your situation.

Hope this helps

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