Date:         Fri, 07 Apr 95 08:56:29 CDT
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Joel Walker <JWALKER@ua1vm.ua.edu>
Subject:      Re: 1985 Transmissin'

On Thu, 6 Apr 95 23:07:00 CDT THOMAS CARRINGTON said:
>     The tranny on my '88 will not engage 3rd or 4th gear.It has 116k on it.I
>     have yet to look at what the problem is. There are some metal shavings in
>     the gear oil, and some are kinda gold colored, which indicates a stripped
>     synchro and/or operating sleeve.I will be doing the rebuild myself, and
>     will let you know what the results are. The interior shift forks are not
>     really accessible without complete teardown.

this happened to me, and it's the 3rd/4th gear syncro that is cracked and
about to destroy itself. vw knows about the problem and they have (according
to my parts guy in atlanta) stronger parts for it. it cost me $1400 to find
out. :( be warned: if you don't have somesort of special tool, to hold things
in the right position as you take the thing apart, you can damage the shift
rod ... which the asshole idiots in birmingham (no, i didn't take it to
atlanta ... i was afraid the transmission might self-destruct. :(  ) didn't
bother with until AFTER they had already damaged (bent) mine. $200 just for
the shift rod ... except they couldn't get one from anywhere: "wull, there's
like a boat coming from germany, and we think there are some shift rods on it,
and we'll like know in a month or two."  !!?!?! boy was i pissed!! so i found
a transmission rebuilder in california that shipped me a used shift rod for
$60 and got the $#@&%$ b'ham dealer to put my transmission back together.
stay the hell away from Crown Mercedes/Volvo/VW/Infiniti. the mechanics might
be worth a damn (two, count'em, two vw mechanics), but the service advisor and
the parts dept are idiots and crooks.

joel
oh he of lighter pockets now