HELP, SH*T, B*LL*CKS - foreign object inside transmission!!!

I was just checking the transmission oil level on my Skoda Felicia (1998,

1.9 VW diesel engine, AEF engine code). I check it periodically because a slight transmission oil loss was picked up a year or so ago on service. To check the level (sez the Haynes manual), you have to disconnect the speedo cable, pull out the small plastic drive gear from the end (about 10cm long), and then reinsert the (wiped) drive gear back into the transmission to use it as a dipstick.

Unfortunately the Haynes manual does not say "Be careful how you reinsert the drive gear, because there is just enough of a gap in there for it just to miss its seat down inside the transmission, fall off to one side, and disappear down into the transmission, completely out of sight and out of touch even if you ram your finger right down inside the hole". 'Cos then I might not have done it.

B*ll*cks b*ll*cks f*ck sh*t *rse *rse c*nt w*nk *rse.

Suggestions? Tow to garage of choice to take the transmission off and rescue it? (possibly with the front wheels up during the tow?) Not something I fancy trying to do myself on the drive (the only place I've got available). How much am I going to be looking at for this cr*p? Car is worth around the GBP400-600 mark, for what it's worth. Probably worth more to me as a reliable (but bloody noisy) going concern that we've owned for some years, and had done to it everything it ever needed.

Reply to
Vim Fuego
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The message from "Vim Fuego" contains these words:

Plastic gear? Just ignore it. If it ends up in the wrong place it'll just get chewed to pieces in seconds without doing any damage. Buy a new bit.

Reply to
Guy King

Ignore it and hope it goes away? If it's a soft plastic you may get away with it. You may be able to get a S/H gearbox from the scrappies for not too much. Getting a garage to open up the gearbox might be a tad expensive given the value of the car. Of course I know nothing about Skoda boxes so this may or may not be bollocks.

Reply to
Malc

I have to confess it was temping to just ignore the bastard and hope that either a) it was well out of the way of anything moving and was going to stay there, or b) if it got into the way of moving metal, the moving metal would just smash it into a billion tiny bits of plastic and carry on as if nothing had happened.

Reply to
Vim Fuego

If the drive gear has a steel spindle can you not fish for it with a magnet on a stick?

Reply to
Al Gorithm

If it did it would be worth a try. It doesn't. :-(

Reply to
Vim Fuego

As Guy said, if it's made of plastic then the gears will take care of it pretty quickly. Any long term damage that may result (unlikely) will be in the future when the vehicle is well and truly dead.

Reply to
Sandy Nuts

As others have said - if it's plastic, just ignore it.

However, what I would do is to drive it for a few hundred miles, then change the gearbox oil, hopefully removing all the bits of chewed-up plastic.

Reply to
SteveH

Good idea. Seconded.

Reply to
Sandy Nuts

So I'm being paranoid (and a bastard) thinking that, what with it doing this noisy hammering at moderately high revs, I should just get it flogged ASAP?

Reply to
Vim Fuego

PS Worst-case scenario, what it this bit of plastic (about 10cm long, 8mmish diameter, with a gear element partway along it about 20mm diameter and maybe

15mm long) finds its way into the gears and falls between two gears as they mesh together at speed? Or could it block the gap between two wossnames so that they can't move together as they need to in order for me to change gear? (As you can see, gearboxes are not my forte :-)

I know it's just a bit of plastic, and we're talking hardened metal gearbox and transmission elements moving at speed with a lot of ooomph behind them, but if I leave it I'm always going to worry that if it got to be in the wrong place at the wrong time then Something Bad could happen.

Reply to
Vim Fuego

FWIW - I'd agree - if it lasts this long then cog has been smashed to bits and getting rid of bits cannot do any harm.... good luck

Reply to
Matthew Millichap

Yes

Good thought, but the drivegear element is about 10cm long, 8mmish diameter, with a gear element moulded partway along it about 20mm diameter and maybe

15mm long. I can't imagine it's necessarily going to find its way with the oil outflow down to the drain plug hole, and even if it did I can't believe I'm going to get something with a 20mm maximum diameter through the drain plug hole.
Reply to
Vim Fuego

The message from snipped-for-privacy@italiancar.co.uk (SteveH) contains these words:

"may well"? You must live in a different universe to me, Steve. You're certainly living up the other end of the bell shaped curve from me.

Reply to
Guy King

Vim Fuego ( snipped-for-privacy@fastmail.fm) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

You are allowed to type vowels (other than E) as well, y'know.

Reply to
Adrian

Vim Fuego ( snipped-for-privacy@fastmail.fm) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Do it.

The car's worth f*ck all. You'll spend the little value it's got on trying to prevent something that might not happen anyway.

Get another widgit, fit it CAREFULLY, put it all back together, and drive it.

If it survives, learn. If it doesn't, you're back to where you started.

Reply to
Adrian

You've lost me now.

It's a fair sized chunk of plastic in a casing packed tightly with toothed metal bits.

It's not guaranteed to make it to the bottom of the 'box.

Reply to
SteveH

Sshh......he thought he was countdown with Vorders for a moment! Dont wake him up!

Reply to
Matthew Millichap

The message from snipped-for-privacy@italiancar.co.uk (SteveH) contains these words:

Just that the idea that it "may well" find its way towards the drain plug is (in my universe) something that would never ever happen.

Reply to
Guy King

Heh, right. I see.

Reply to
SteveH

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