Jim Child

What track were you on? I've been on lots of tracks and never needed 6th gear. I've been up to 140 indicated on the speedometer and not even been close enough to think about shifting up to 6th gear. From what I've heard Daytona is the only place a 968 with a stock gear box will need to use 6th gear.

Rich Sandor

Portland, without the chicane.

Rich Sandor

HOLY **** I DODGED A BULLET!!!

I just took the tranny apart and it was EXACTLY as Mike had said it would be. The roll pin had sheared off, and the two bits were lying against the access plate. Everything else was in perfect condition.

Now, WTF am I going to use to replace the roll pin...? Same roll pin part# again and wait for it to fail? Or something else?

Eric_k

Nice Rich, I'm glad it turned out to be a 'minor' problem. How did you like the new configuration at Portland? They didn't add straight so I'm sure you really didn't need to use 6th.

Rich Sandor

Like I said, I WAS short shifting on purpose to be gentler on the engine & to save a bit of fuel, but on a couple of "hotlaps" I was pushing a lot harder and I was hitting the rev limiter in 5th before the braking zone. Maybe I have a shorter 5th gear or final drive?

Eric, have you ever done Portland without the chicane?

FRporscheman

Rich, I'm glad the problem turned out to simply be the pin. Can you post a pic? I'm not sure what it looks like. Maybe you can have something machined.

Eric_k

Sorry, I didn't see any mention of short shifting. You must have the stock chip and have been flying to hit the rev-limiter in 5th. I've done a lot of no chicane races at Portland and never run out of fifth. The Cascade 8 Hour is run w/o the chicane and I have done the last 4 of those.

I'm glad it is going to be a cheap fix. How did you get it home?

Rich Sandor

Yah I think I have the stock chip with the lower rev-limit, but FWIW, I was flyin'!!!!

We towed it down there and back with a borrowed 2003 Navigator and a rental u-haul trailer. Cheap insurance. $57 bucks a day.

notthd

VERY HAPPY for you Rich. What I did to prevent failure again ( going to sound funny) is to put 2 roll pins in it. One inside of the other. tapped in the smaller one inside the larger one with locktite, let dry and then tapped the combo pin set in. A little added strength and for 4 years has been fine.

Glad it was minor- Mike

PS- makes me wonder if there are any "blown up" gear boxes out there were swapped before inspection.... hummmmm?

Wipeout

Woohoo!

Rich Sandor

PICS!


- Here's the tranny on my workbench, shifter cover removed:


- Here's how I found it when I removed the cover plate. The two ends of the roll pin were just sitting there, nothing had escaped into the innards of the gearbox.


- Here's a close up, you can see the rod & cylinder assembly that selects the gears. I was able to get another roll pin on short notice. FYI: metric roll pins are hard as heck to source.


- close up

JimV8

I'd worry why the pins failed.

Rich Sandor

When I bought the car, the clutch had been replaced, but as you know, it's nearly impossibel to bleed the clutches on these cars perfectly unless you know 100% what you're doing. Recently, the clutch had gotten so bad that fully depressing the pedal would not fully disengage the clutch. (since the hydraulics take up all the slack in the system)

It was making it painfully difficult to get the shifter into gear, at one point so much so that I couldn't get it into reverse 5 times out of 6. I finally said: "screw this, I'm bleeding it myself" and so I did, and everything was fine thereafter. That was a few months ago. I think the pin failed as a result of that 2-3 month period where the clutch would not fully disengage and the shifter needed more effort to get into gear.

notthd

Another culprit to failure is a sloopy shifter. As the gear selector rod attachment pin wears inside the shifter (the small rod with the 2 E-clips holding it onto the shifter itself) the pattern becomes less exact. What then happens is many drivers start shifting harder or using more force to get the car in gear to make up for the lack in travel putting more stress on the roll pin. On mine I was also having alot of trouble getting the car into reverse as it approached the 160K mile mark so I replaced the push rod and it all went away.....then the pin failed, the damage was already done....

I see a common tread- If you are having troubles getting into reverse check for shifter play and bleed the clutch.

Great pics and repair, makes much more sense with the pictures than the drawing- Good luck, Mike

RajDatta

Looks like you might have gotten lucky there. that has to be one of the cleanest transaxle I have ever seen. Anything cleaner would be something brand new.
Raj