Transmission Synchro Warranty Work

[Stang70Fastback]

Originally Posted by gtengr

There's plenty of 4th gear action on a road course, even more so with modded cars. And besides that, OP is having trouble in all gears.

I'm talking about my use case. It's an autocross car.

[Imrac]

Originally Posted by mav1178

Did you do any work with this dealer in the past?
Does your car have a history of service work with past dealers?
Do you have a complete history of all repair and maintenance work done on the car?

If you answered no to any of the above questions, a dealer asking you for a diagnostics fee is pretty straightforward, as their labor fee is not free.

The fee is usually refunded with warranty claim approval, or applied towards any non-warranty work in the future. Up to you if you want to take that risk.

-alex

Depends on the dealer too. The dealer didn't ask for the fee upfront, but I basically had to sign that I would pay diagnostic fee if they found the issue not to fall under the warranty.

I didn't really have any other service history with them other then warrantying my floor mats (jokingly asked when I was there for parts, had 10k and a hole formed in the mat). My surprise when the service writer said sure and had them ordered and came in the next day!

[runfrodorun]

Originally Posted by dutchman1

Based on the common issues with these cars it is most likely to be the synchros, as you're thinking.

However, if it's happening in all gears it could just be your clutch being shot/out of adjustment too. Just a thought.

No that's not the issue; you can tell the clutch is adjusted right by coming to a complete stop, pushing the clutch to the floor and putting it in first gear. You feel the primary move to set the gear. Then what you can do is put it back in neutral and then put it back in first without ever releasing the clutch. If it glides in no questions asked, your clutch is adjusted fine. It would have moved again and need to be notchy if the clutch was adjusted wrong.

Also, FWIW whoever asked no my car is bone stock except for MPSS tires, if you can even call that a modification. I like it exactly as it is.

[runfrodorun]

To everybody who replied: Thank you. Update on what's going on: I am geting my car back today, they replaced the transmission and the HPFP for no charge under drive train warranty. I'm thrilled!

-S

[humfrz]

Originally Posted by runfrodorun

To everybody who replied: Thank you. Update on what's going on: I am geting my car back today, they replaced the transmission and the HPFP for no charge under drive train warranty. I'm thrilled!

-S

Yaaaaa...........good for you ......

Now, don't mess this transmission up .......

(jest ah messen wich ya .....)


humfrz

[runfrodorun]

Originally Posted by humfrz

Yaaaaa...........good for you ......

Now, don't mess this transmission up .......

(jest ah messen wich ya .....)


humfrz

Pretty unlikely. I drive everything like a grandma driving a truck. I take my time and double clutch every gear. I'm still shocked that 4th managed to get bombed on this thing. I drove my honda for 10k miles without a clutch before i sold it (parked on hills, and got pretty good at clutchless shifting) and that transmission was still perfect when I sold it. BMW is going on 220k.

[Ultramaroon]

Originally Posted by Stang70Fastback

I'm talking about my use case. It's an autocross car.

Didn't you skip gears downshifting 6-4? Something like that?

[runfrodorun]

So the plot thickens:

After I got the car back, the fourth gear is fixed, and with the new fuel pump the engine does sound a lot better. In the cold the chirp was less present, but seemed to come through as more of an asthmatic wheeze, so now the car is quieter than I ever remember it being.

HOWEVER

They somehow managed to break something in my climate control ducts. Now, when you move the direction of the air to 'feet mode' (I have the manual climate controls) It's like it's blocked or put together wrong. It gets really loud like a blocked vacuum cleaner, and air is coming out at the seams; a little comes out at the feet, a little on head, a little on defroster, because there's so much goddamn pressure in there.

I took it back into them and they just said "we didn't work on that we just did the transmission and the fuel pump"

And I was like "I'm not questioning what you did, I'm questioning what you accidentally broke while doing those things"

I argued with them for like an hour, and they started getting real pissy with me. They said that 'air is coming out we don't understand what you're talking about this seems normal' but it is so very clearly not normal. The day after I got it back I had it on full blast fan full blast feet on max heat and my toes were still freezing off, you couldn't feel a damn thing coming out of those vents.

What the actual f--k? I had that floor heat working fine literally the day before I took it into them, and it is very clearly not working now.

I figured they must have pinched or unhooked/re-hooked-up-wrong the cable that goes to the actuating flap or something but they just kept swearing up and down that they didn't, when I plainly know, having not been born yesterday that something they did caused this to happen, like something got disconnected and reconnected wrong.

AND THATS NOT ALL

The transmission does shift 'better' but the thing is it still bangs into most of the gears, I get some sync slippage going into EVERY SINGLE gear just like it was when I got it. I suppose you could say it's 'within tolerance' since it's nowhere near as bad as it was before, but I have checked again that my clutch is adjusted right, and I drive like a GRANDPA. I've tried single clutching, double clutching, shifting at all kinds of different speeds and it is only happy if I just bang it into gear or double clutch perfectly, even then I can feel it smacking the sync out of the way really hard. Everything else is a total no go. All of my other cars with manuals (of which there are a GREAT many) shift beautifully. I'm borderline outraged that a brand new transmission could feel like crap compared to my beaters let alone the BMW.

THIS is how the problem forms in the first place. little incremental wear that slowly adds up and then hits exponential growth as it gets worse and worse. I am NOT looking forward to putting in a third transmission at 70k. I didn't pay a good sum of money for this car to replace the transmission every 25k miles.

I think I'm going to drive it as is for a while, and if the transmission or the fuel pump start f--king up again, I'm absolutely going to do an LS2 swap because this is getting embarassing. I just don't want to have to deal with crappy transmissions and fuel pumps etc.

WHY the f--k did subaru let toyota do ANYTHING with the drivetrain. WHY

I hope you are all having a better time than I am.

[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by runfrodorun

I think I'm going to drive it as is for a while, and if the transmission or the fuel pump start f--king up again, I'm absolutely going to do an LS2 swap because this is getting embarassing. I just don't want to have to deal with crappy transmissions and fuel pumps etc.

Yep. That will fix it. Nobody has issues when they swap engines and transmissions.

[runfrodorun]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

Yep. That will fix it. Nobody has issues when they swap engines and transmissions.

Maybe sarcasm is called for, but what else can I do seriously? just sell the car? everything under the hood has been kind of a disaster. I'd take the problems of trying to swap engines with a kit over letting the one that's already in it break my heart over and over again.

As far as I know there's no aftermarket options for transmissions, and I haven't checked for fuel pumps but I don't have high hopes.

I want to like this car so bad but it aint making it easy. I've had it for 3 years now and I don't want to get rid of it but yet...

At least with a swapped engine I can rest with the knowledge that the pain is self induced, not because I paid 25k for a car that has tons of problems and nobody willing to take responsibility.

[DaBoBo21]

That's a bummer about the climate control.. As for the trans, maybe you should just give it time to settle in...? This car is raw and does all kinds of quirky stuff. One of the many things that makes it unique. If a smooth, quiet transmission is what you desire then maybe this car isn't for you? Just sayin'... I reckon swapping the engine and trans would be more of a headache.

[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by runfrodorun

Maybe sarcasm is called for, but what else can I do seriously? just sell the car? everything under the hood has been kind of a disaster. I'd take the problems of trying to swap engines with a kit over letting the one that's already in it break my heart over and over again.

As far as I know there's no aftermarket options for transmissions, and I haven't checked for fuel pumps but I don't have high hopes.

I want to like this car so bad but it aint making it easy. I've had it for 3 years now and I don't want to get rid of it but yet...

Well the fuel pump is what it is and isn't broken in any way.
The transmission is a different matter. There are a few guys that have had issues but the majority seem to be fine. I have over a 100k miles on mine and it shifts perfectly every single time. The good ones outweigh the bad ones by a huge margin so maybe just swap a whole different tranny in.


You realize just how difficult and expensive an engine swap is right? It isn't just a matter of buying a kit and slapping it in in an afternoon. Even when (if?) it is complete you will have more reliability issues than a noisy fuel pump and some wonky shifts. That isn't even getting into all the other things on the car that you can and will break with the swap.


Totally get the frustration but the swap could very well end up with you going from bad to worse.

[runfrodorun]

Originally Posted by DaBoBo21

That's a bummer about the climate control.. As for the trans, maybe you should just give it time to settle in...? This car is raw and does all kinds of quirky stuff. One of the many things that makes it unique. If a smooth, quiet transmission is what you desire then maybe this car isn't for you? Just sayin'... I reckon swapping the engine and trans would be more of a headache.

Well the thing is this is exactly how the semi-working gears behaved in the old transmission. Who knows maybe they told me they replaced the trans and lied to me. That's totally possible as well, but I'd like to think that's not the case, but even in that worst case scenario where they just repaired the 4th gear synchros, they're still behaving just like the 2nd and 3rd and 5th and so on.

I have no issue with loud and obnoxious transmissions, it's just that I think this is what is leading to the synchro damage. After all, if it grinds every gear change it's only a matter of time until they're worn out, and compared to the silky smooth that my old beater honda had after years of abuse I'm inclined to think that that 'matter of time' is going to be markedly short.

[runfrodorun]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

Well the fuel pump is what it is and isn't broken in any way.
The transmission is a different matter. There are a few guys that have had issues but the majority seem to be fine. I have over a 100k miles on mine and it shifts perfectly every single time. The good ones outweigh the bad ones by a huge margin so maybe just swap a whole different tranny in.


You realize just how difficult and expensive an engine swap is right? It isn't just a matter of buying a kit and slapping it in in an afternoon. Even when (if?) it is complete you will have more reliability issues than a noisy fuel pump and some wonky shifts. That isn't even getting into all the other things on the car that you can and will break with the swap.


Totally get the frustration but the swap could very well end up with you going from bad to worse.

Willing to take that risk.

I've been under a lot of cars, and I did a V12 from an 850CSI into an E24, so pretty well aware of what goes into it. and that one was a bear.

When there's at least a mounting and OBD kit available it's at least a little easier, and I have seen examples of LS2 in BRZ. so willing to take the risk.

I'm not sure why I'm having so many transmission problems. As I said to the other guy just before, who knows... maybe they just did a synchro repair and then told me they replaced the trans but actually didn't. I just find it really upsetting that they both could be having trouble grinding.

I'm sure it's only exacerbated by the cold that we have in the midwest this time of year as well. I'll have to see how it wants to behave after I get it out of the garage next spring. Fingers crossed maybe it will be alright.

the matter with the fuel pump is when it was at its worst for me it was really crazy how loud it got. It sounded like loose belts (it wasn't) and it's embarassing to be seen in a car that the know-nothing folk mistake for a ferarri when they see how clean it looks, when it's also chirping away the perception changes a lot. That's not what you want. Might not matter to everyone but it matters to me.