transmission problems
 

hello guys, i’m pretty new here to the forum and i come here from time to time when i need to find something specific for my car. so currently i’m having transmission problems, not sure if this has been talked about in the forums before or not since i haven’t seen anything related to my problems so far.

so to begin, here are the problems i’m currently having:
-spongey clutch pedal (master cylinder is full)
-could hear a squealing noise from the transmission (which i think could be the TOB)
-won’t go in gear
-can go in gear if the car is off. but when i turn the car on, it forces the shifter to the neutral position and makes a sort of grinding sound.
-i seem to be leaking oil, but it’s not from the transmission assembly, but also not the engine?

so these are the problems i’m having right now. if anyone can help, please lmk. i don’t wanna have to see my car rot away in the garage. if it’s fixable, i would like to know the solution. or if y’all think it’s best to go to the mechanic then i’ll do that instead.

TOB

/thread

any thoughts on how i could maybe prevent this problem from reoccurring in the future? the TOB i have on it right now was installed back in may of this year so it’s pretty new.

Make sure it is the new part number from the TSB. There are likely still a few of the old ones kicking around in stock.
https://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=117440

Does it have an aftermarket clutch? Who did your installation?


It's not normal for the car to pop out-of-gear when it gets started

yeah it has an aftermarket clutch because the stock TOB was shot back in march and i thought it was the entire clutch assembly so i replaced all of it. i also installed it myself, made sure to grease up all the things that needed grease and torqued to spec.

ACT clutch?

If you did it yourself, something does not seem aligned properly. The car shouldn't ever pop out of gear

Not being able to get into gear when the engine is running is a sign of clutch drag. Can be caused by a number of things, but in a nutshell the clutch isn't fully releasing

no, it was from clutchmaxpro on amazon. bad part on my end for not researching them first as i was in a rush to get it running. although this time around i did opt in for an ACT kit.

by not aligned, do you mean the input shaft to the clutch or something else? sorry, i’m pretty new to this so i’m still learning.

Check the master and slave cylinders. Did you remove the hose when you pulled the trans out?

He asked because the ACT has a nasty reputation around here. They are known to be troublesome.

yep. prevailing theory seems to be them including a sloppy alignment tool that doesn't really align it properly. a few people swear they haven't had any issues once they reset with the OS Gilken billet alignment tool .

did not remove any hoses when i pulled the trans. i just removed the slave cylinder off and set it to the side.

so will a new alignment tool kinda fix that problem then or do i need more than that?

Supposedly using the billet os gilken alignment tool fixes all issues.

Many would rather solve by buying something other than an act clutch

Simply put, act's seem to have consistent issues on the forums here. Maybe the installers are bigger forum complainers, maybe the installers are horrible monkey wrenches, maybe there's actually an issue with act clutches, or maybe their alignment tool really is that bad.

I don't really think there's enough info in any direction to draw any definitive conclusion.

What I do know is that there's plenty of other clutch brands that don't seem to have the same issues, and I don't like taking my car apart on the garage floor more than is needed.

A couple of other things come to mind.


Have you adjusted the clutch. If you have a lot of free play before the clutch disengages, lengthen the rod under the dash. You still might need to bleed the system.



Did you properly install and adjust the shifter so that gears can fully engage.

i believe i installed the shifter properly, had to play around with it a little bit so it'll go in gear smoothly when i put it back together. what what do you mean by lengthen the rod under the dash, i'm not sure what you mean by this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zr_ogcPOPY


Recheck your shifter alignment. If it's popping out of gear, it's not going all the way into gear.

-UPDATE- dropped transmission and this is what i came to find.
https://i.imgur.com/6npfwzO.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/y0UkbVT.jpg

WTF?
How did that happen?

Attachment 215175

There's yer problem.

I've seen worse for sale on the member classifieds.

Well, I know where not to get a clutch now...

That is pretty much what mine looked like when my TOB had it's meltdown.

Wow
Really?
How did that happen?
I've had two TOB's bite the dust but never had any damage to my clutch disk.
In fact, I wish I kept the first clutch, it was pristine. The second time I just left the clutch there. It was fine.
Now I guess it's gonna fail tomorrow.

I ignored it too long and it literally melted, went off center and blew the whole works apart.

Was my own bloody fault for not taking care of it when I knew what the issue was.

Unfortunately I don't have a picture of the clutch plate but it was only slightly better than that one.

I have seen worse friction welds then that on parts that were supposed to be friction welded :D

Between the weight reduction and only having part of it make contact early I could really feel the engine rev up more freely.

And people waste money on lightweight flywheels :bonk: All they have to do is destroy a clutch.

Yep. Just ignore that squeal. It will go away eventually.

given enough time, all noises stop after you ignore them for long enough!

i just wanna day thanks for everyone who helped me try to figure this out before dropping transmission. i decided to upgrade to a 6-puck kit, currently just waiting on flywheel to come in and i should be done with transmission problems for a while, i hope. on that note, i was also told to not replace transmission oil and instead reuse the old oil? is this something i should do or should i flush it?

Somewhere around is an article on clutch types. 6 puck clutches are for high power high heat usage. With street and light track usage it will probably wear out faster than an organic clutch. It will also chatter for about 2000 miles (ask me how I know). I had an ACT 6 puck clutch from another Subbie project. I put it in my na FRS with a light weight flywheel. (I installed an Aluminum driveshaft too! WOW, did THAT turn out BAD!) In hindsight, I would stick with the stock flywheel and a good quality organic clutch (and a stock driveshaft).

Nothing wrong with the OEM clutch. If you have OEM power why go aftermarket?
Just because something costs more doesn't make it better.

If your fluid is old (more than 30k miles), you should just replace it.

If the fluid is still pretty new and you want to save some money, you can reuse it as long as you can keep it clean while you drain and refill it

it's not really as oem as i thought it would've been at this point and when i first blew my clutch was back in march with the stock clutch (aftermarket exhaust + a lot of spirited driving). then i replaced it with another oem organic (exhaust, catless headers, E85 tune + more spirited driving), then 2 weeks ago it blew again. so i wasn't sure if the clutch just couldn't handle how i drive maybe or i just don't know how to control my driving.

it's about less than 1k miles on it as i replaced it the first time around back in march.

curious are you launching the car a lot? And when you say OEM are you buying from Subaru/Toyota or someplace like rockauto and getting an OEM replacement?feel like something else could be causing this or there's a lot of bad quality parts out there right now with inflation/component shortages etc

It cant make noise if it cant MAKE noise.