Hello all,
I was going about 70 MPH on a highway when another car cut me off. I wanted to pass by him and I meant to downshift to 4th gear when I accidentally went to 2nd gear! The engine roared and went into redline and I immediately took it out of gear and put it on 6th. will this do any kind of damage to the engine? I rarely take the car to redline and I feel horrible about it now. Will the rev limiter limit prevent any damages to the engine?

I just got the used 2004 with 34000 miles on it and am a little concerned.
Thanks in advance for your responses.

Tom

 

That's what the rev limter is there for. You're fine. Just don't let it happen again.

 

The rev limiter does not work on a downshift.

 

70mph in 2nd? This is a mechanical overrev where the wheel speed forces the engine beyond redline. The limiter doesn't help you in this case.

Does the car have a CEL?

 

If you immediately took it out and didn't leave it in there then you should be fine. No CEL? Just try not to let it happen again. People make mistakes. Just learn from it.

 

Usually on a miss shift there will be no symptoms that something is wrong until further down the road...where a slight crack or bend in the valve or retainer fails completely

 

I did a quick Google and 68mph is 9000rpm in 2nd on an AP1. If this is accurate, you really don't have anything to worry about. Especially given you took it out of gear immediately. I did this once in my AP2 going about 60mph and it freaked me out but my car is just fine. Just be wise when downshifting to pass if you're already traveling a decent rate of speed. It's not worth the risk if you do it sometime going even faster or if you don't pull it out of gear quickly.

 

He has AP2 and different gearing. 70mph into 2nd could be a problem. do NOT brush this under the rug like what some of the ppl here are saying

you should get your valves checked at the very least

 

Oops, I thought I read 03. In that case it could be an issue.

 

These engines are fairly robust and I believe the tolerances for the AP2 in terms of revving are greater than the AP1 as evidenced by the number of people putting older ECU's that rev to 9k in their cars. I'd say that if you immediately disengaged your clutch when it happened you should be fine. Next time check the under the hood forum.