New owner question about gear changes when in automatic

Have had a car with tiptronic before (smart car) but i find the C3 a bit strange, i wouldnt say its a fault but maybe someone can tell me if the symptoms are normal and if not whats happening.

Just bought a C3 Hdi 70 2005 tiptronic and when in automatic mode the change between 2nd and 3rd sort of judders, as if it cant decide what gear it should be in, sometimes dropping back to 2nd then up to 3rd in a very short time, making it feel like its juddering.
Once up to 3rd the rest works as it should.
When set on manual it works fine.

On motorway runs where you are accelerating quickly in automatic it seems ok.

The car has been a disabled car and has done very low mileage so i would suggest mainly around town, its only done 40k.

It will be doing much longer runs with me, have also filled it up with decent diesel, i know the earlier owner used supermarket stuff as it was more convienient but doubt whether that has anything to do with it.

Is the above normal and something i should get used to or something else?

g4jnw wrote:Just bought a C3 Hdi 70 2005 tiptronic and when in automatic mode the change between 2nd and 3rd sort of judders, as if it cant decide what gear it should be in, sometimes dropping back to 2nd then up to 3rd in a very short time, making it feel like its juddering.
Once up to 3rd the rest works as it should.
When set on manual it works fine.

Hi g4jnw. The C3 sensodrive has the autoadaptive ECU that learns from the driving style when to change. It could be the that ECU needs to learn the new style of driving.

Interesting, as im different from the previous owner then does it take long to learn?

g4jnw wrote:Interesting, as im different from the previous owner then does it take long to learn?

I think its quick to learn and quick to forget, but I don't have any data on time.

it's change from 2 to 3 when speed reach nearly 30km, but that happend with me when my car cold, but when it's hot it's become normal and chenge from 2 to 3 when the speed between 39-41 km