Do We have to Live with Hard Shifting? 99 626

[Toobusy]

We have a 99 Mazda 626. We purchased it from CarMax in 2005. It had a slight hard shift from 2nd to 3rd gear. The card had 84,000 miles on it.

We had read (after we got it) that this car has an undersized transmission on it and people are having to replace transmissions all the time. We have no previous records as to how many transmissions this car has had before us.

April 07, we take a drive to visit colleges for my daughter. It was hot (California) and we drove 5 hours when we started to smell a "refinery" type smell. Soon we learned why. The transmission had just burned up.

We purchased the used car warranty on this car so no problem in getting a transmission replacment. So, in May, we get a rebuilt transmission put in. It too has a hard shift from 2nd to 3rd like the original transmission. We ignore it for a few months. Take it in because it's leaking trans fluid. The warranty company decides to replace this tranmission with another rebuilt on (they just swapped it out with the original company they used for the first transmission because it was under their warranty) based on the mechanics findings that it does have a leak.

2 days ago (Aug 08), we get the car back. No more leaking but it shifts hard between 2nd and 3rd. The mechanic was at a loss. He said he can't imagine 3 transmission with the exact same problem. He then tried doing a computer check to be sure it was not something in the computer that was causing it. Nothing came up. He said that some cars just do that.

So...anyone else have a hard shift 2nd to 3rd that has not caused them any problems. My daughter (17) drives this car and she says she doesn't notice it anymore. I cringe every time I'm in the car wondering if this one is bad too but again, can you really get 2 bad transmissions in a row like that? The mechanic says it should last a good long time. I'm thinking it may be time to trade it for another car that won't leave my daughter stranded at college.

Any thoughts? Oh...hubby is going to put on an external transmission cooler because they say that this car's transmission is too small and overheats on long trips causing it to burn up.