1986 Camry auto-tranny shudders in gear

[stoth47]

I need some advice from the automatic tranny ghuru’s.
1986 Camry DLX with 2SEL engine and automatic tranny that has “power/norm” switch on shift lever.
I had both the engine and transmission swapped out by a local shop with warrantied units from a Japanese wrecking yard. Everything ran great for a week then the differential destroyed itself on the freeeway because the shop forgot to put fluid in the differential (pretty scary actually). The shop replaced and installed the tranny again at their cost – fluid in the diff this time.
Test drove the car and now the car has a shudder on acceleration when the tranny is in gear. No shudder in park or neutral. The car was put on a lift, put in gear, given some throttle with a little brake drag with one of the mechanics checking under the car in an effort to locate the source of the shudder: the motor mounts were badly worn so the conclusion is the shudder is due to worn motor mounts which they will replace at no labor cost since they should have been replaced when the engine was replaced.
I’m thinking this might not be the problem and here’s why: the car ran vibration free prior to the tranny swap with the same worn motor mounts and has a shudder after the tranny swap. Maybe I’m wrong and the differential destroying itself really hammered the engine mounts and that IS the problem, but I’m not so sure, although the car was lurching and stopping pretty violently .
I checked a 1989 factory service manual I have for another Toyota and under Automatic Transaxle General Troubleshooting it indicates possible causes for shudder on acceleration as control cable out of adjustment, throttle cable out of adjustment, valve body faulty, transmission faulty in that order.
I don’t think it’s the control cable as the gear position indicator appears to be indicating correctly.
The throttle cable wouldn’t seem to be a cause for a vibration.
That leaves the valve body and bad tranny issues to my way of thinking unless there might be something else causing the problem that an experienced toyota tranny tech would be aware of.
How can I check this out?? I’m not a Toyota expert and need some solid input on how to determine what’s wrong and how to get it fixed so the shop can take care of it. The shop is honest and standing behind their work and will do what has to be done to correct the problem. The owner is an experienced mechanic but works on everything not just Toyotas.
I spent a couple hours in the first gen forum doing searches and didn’t find any info that might help.
Thanks.

[stoth47]

I posted this thread originally at 5:30AM after looking around for two hours for info (couldn't sleep) - so I got a little sleep and then drove the car again.

My description was incorrect - it's a vibration, under load, when the gas pedal is depressed in 1st, 2nd, third and reverse. In a "cruise" situation there is no vibration. No vibration in neutral or park.

So I'm thinking now that the shop may be on the right track - normal engine vibration being transmitted to the body by a shot engine mount(s) when the engine is pulling under load. I'm going to have them go ahead and change out the engine mounts and we'll see what the results are.

Any opinions and feedback is welcome.

[white90dx]

It could also be loose/worn suspension parts. I would get the mounts replaced first and go from there.

Good luck!

-Charlie