Date:         Sun, 20 May 2018 14:34:20 -0700
Reply-To:     Gene P <olgreywoof@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Gene P <olgreywoof@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Sudden shift linkage outage
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"

Hi folks –
A careless moment led to my 87 Wolfsburg (the Woof) going to the body shop to fix rear hatch cosmetic issues.  When I picked it up Thursday, I couldn’t get out of the parking lot – no first gear.  No warning in weeks prior, smooth easy shifting.  New UCA bushings a few weeks ago, followed by alignment at the VW dealer who checked routine stuff and test drove – no issues.

After too many minutes at the body shop, I figured out if I went for reverse, there I found a first gear, and then if I kept pushed down and drew straight back, I had second.  Normal first and second position seemed to be 3rd and 4th, so what I really didn’t have at all was reverse.  I drove home that way and facing a busy weekend, just did quick adjustments at the stick, transaxle and guess at the splines.  Got all gears now and I’ll drop the spare and do it right tomorrow.

My question – what can happen, or what can somebody do, to cause that linkage to suddenly get that far out of adjustment?  

Sent from Mail for Windows 10