followup on GL-5 "experiment" with my A4 manual tranny

in reverse order:

1. ball joints are not usually that expensive. unless you're stuck with one of the "replace the whole suspension arm" deals. and most ball joints these days last a good long time. they only usually go after some retard with a pickle fork cuts the boot when they pop the joint. beware of that for the future.

1. a torsen is geared, it doesn't have clutches. many limited slip diffs /do/ have clutches, but they're not torsens.

2. "metal debris" in a transmission is absolutely normal. the only question is how much there was and the particle size. if it has a magnetic drain plug and the thing is covered and pulls out 3x its own size in metallic goop, then that is excessive. but if it's simply got some gray stuff that wipes off on a rag, then it's not. what matters is how the transmission is performing. if the synchros are gone, or it's whining excessively, then you've sustained damage. if the only thing you've noticed is "metal debris", you don't need a rebuild.

Why? Put the proper fluid in it, see if it behaves. Sure, there will be some metal debris in there, the transmission will be worn a little bit more, but it might still be good for another hundred thousand miles too. Put the proper fluid in, and drive.

If you're going to drop the transmission, change the clutch and the clutch throwout bearing. But just because you found some metal in the fluid is no reason to drop the transmission unless it's very clear something else is wrong.

How do you not notice a bad ball joint? I'd be a LOT more worried about that than the transmission. Fix it, fill up the transmission with proper fluid, and drive. Keep a careful ear on the transmission sound and look for changes in the shifting feel, because sooner or later you will need a transmission rebuild. But it could be 200,000 miles from now.

--scott

That's arguably understandable. You don't want to piss off apparent gearhead customers by suggesting they don't know what fluid goes where, or that they might not know as much as the tech.

Audi and VW owners especially are well known for gearheadedness and excruciating attention to minute details, often no matter how seemingly irrelevant.

When a local dealer opened a VW store a Man-Rep came and warned the sales force VW customers are "different". They demand a salesperson to know, literally, everything about their prospective purchase, and then some.

Gear ratios, optimum shift points for economy and acceleration, every damn dimension, every weight and capacity, how many polyesters died to weave the seat material and what is the thread count? What breed of cattle were harvested for the leather, and were both seats covered from the same hide, and was it a steer, cow, heifer or bull, and what was its name, and what year was it born...? The list is endless.

"Do you want to carry it home, or drive it..." would be met with unamused stares. They're also not known for their senses of humor, or patience.

I'd put the correct fluid in it and drive it til it broke, too. I subscribe to the practice of giving things ample time to fix themselves. -----

- gpsman

gpsman wrote in news:2562f72a-f49c-4b38-bc57- snipped-for-privacy@f5g2000yqp.googlegroups.com:

And then they want to go and put the wrong fluid into it...

It does have the proper fluid in it: Castrol GL -4+ with VW specs previously I made a (fatal?) mistake of putting GL-5 in it for a month or two which apparently damaged the 2nd ger synchros (or finished them off)

The teardown of the tranny costs under $250 (worst case) according to the shop owner. Hence it seems not terribly expensive for a peace of mind (and new bits).

The clutch is 10k miles old and I expect it to be in good shape.

Well, I was not very thorough in the 1st post. I have difficulty shifting into 2nd. The other day I just had to give up after a few rev matching attempts and just went up straight into 3rd-> it just would not mesh in 2nd.

Granted, it was still pretty cold and this rarely a problem when the tranny warms up. But still.

You'd laugh. The icy ruts are pretty deep around here and I have sport suspenders (sport package) on A4 dropping it a full inch. So there is 4" to 5" of ground clearance left on that car. I have written off an occasional thud sound as the skid plates hitting the top of the packed ice and snow between the ruts due to the low ground clearance. I never had a car sitting so low to the ground. Not that I mind it, it's just a handicap I have not adjusted to just yet. I do like the fact the car does not squat off stop, dive while braking and roll in turns.

Also there is no noise when I skip the ruts if there is enough way to run a parallel course 1' to a side.

That's funny cause A4 has "leatherette" meaning, it's 100% fake.

As I said before. It quickly became apparent that GL-5 was a no go and I put castrol GL-4+ with VW specs on the bottle in the tranny at which point the shifting has improved quite a bit.

it does not whine. But I wonder how effective would be judging the amount of metal on magnetic plugs given that GL-5 is a poison for the synchros. Which are in my understanding made out of non magnetic alloy.

I have difficulty engaging 2nd gear. Especially when tranny is still cold.

ok, the priority until you can fix the bit i'm about to tell you is that you learn to double-clutch. done right, you can smoothly and effortlessly change gears on a vehicle with no synchro. that method will save any "challenged" manual transmission from wear or even destruction.

the reason you're having trouble in second might be compounded by a little synchro wear, but the /cause/ is the clutch disk not floating properly in the input pinion. this means that when you release the clutch, it's still pressing on the flywheel a little, and thus the drive is sufficient that the synchro ring can't grab and brake the gear. to fix this, you need to drop the transmission and antiseize the pinion properly.

when you have the clutch out, you'll see that the disk is worn on one face more than the other - typical symptom of lack of float. along with worn-out synchros.

be very careful of "bait and switch". shops love to get you into something then "discover" another much more expensive item once you're committed. $250 would be cheap for parts alone. i can't see how they can then do the rebuild labor for that.

doesn't mean the pinion was antiseized properly. it's /very/ common for this to be ignored or botched by shops when they install second clutches.

that's a clutch issue. if the synchro was gone, it would go into 2nd after grinding.

oil viscosity affects synchro grab, but no oil viscosity change can over-ride excessive drive from a non-floating clutch. get that thing fixed asap - you can probably forego the rebuild if you fix the clutch and revert to the correct oil.

in fact, there's a negative to rebuilding - very few shops operate in the "clean room" conditions in which the transmissions were initially assembled. grit and abrasive dust can and do get introduced as part of any rebuild. that grit and dust then proceeds to abrade gears and bearings. rebuilt transmissions rarely last more than 50% of the original.

I'll have to negotiate access to the area where they'd be dropping the transmission with the clutch then.

You are saying in case the wear is uneven hold off on transmission rebuild cause there are no guarantee it will be done in sanitary conditions and just lube the pinion with antiseize. I found this

googling what the pinion bearing on A4 might look like.

Planning to go for a second opinion about the ball bearing to the shop that installed the clutch: there is no issue with customers looming over technician shoulders there. Will see how your "idiot with the wrong tool accidentally(?) tearing up the ball joint boot" theory pans out.

thanks JB!

correct. especially if the transmission otherwise works with the correct oil, and doesn't whine excessively. as said by others, you might get another 100k out of it before a rebuild becomes necessity.

> while googling what the pinion bearing on A4 might look like. ouch, that's a sorry looking transmission. you'd notice the noise if your transmission bearings looked like that.

what i'm talking about though are the splines on the input shaft, not the bearings. where the splines go into the drive dog of the clutch plate needs to be antiseized so the clutch plate can both center between the pressure plate and flywheel, and more importantly, "float" /off/ the flywheel when released. oem japanese use a synthetic ceramic, just like the expensive pink brake lube you can get from permatex.

it's not the bearing.

your ice story would do it too. in the land of used hondas, ball joints tend to get separated by pickle forks, and that always screws up the rubbers, and thus the joints go shortly after.