chaoscreature

I spent a day at the track yesterday and during the last run session the shifter did not want to come out of 2nd gear.
I pulled off the track and experimented with the shifter. The gear would in fact come out of 2nd and popped into 1st just fine.
Going back into 2nd was difficult and slow, but possible.
3rd gear fine
4th gear difficult and slow
5th gear okay
6th gear difficult and slow

There is no new noise coming from the transmission and I just pulled all the pans and confirmed that the shifting rods/links etc are all in working order.
If I grab the rag joint directly and try to work the different motions it's when I try to push the shifter rod into the transmission that gives me the problems (correlating to all of the "lower" gears in the shift pattern).

What could this be? I sure hope I didn't score something internal! I was shifting from 2-3-4-2-3-2-3-2-3-2-3-4-2 all day at the track...

Anyone else ever have this problem? I am going to flush check and then flush the fluid. I wll post later if I find anything obvious. I have a knot in my stomach that this might be something serious

chaoscreature

Just in case anyone was wondering, gear oil was Redline 75W-90 NS.
The fluid was pretty brown coming out, I am filtering some through a coffee filter to see how much of the darkness is metal and how much is just normal "brown-ness". Will report back later.

tonypai

Change the trans fluid, see if you have any metal bits in there.

I had the same problem, spun on track and dislodged all the needle bearings in the differential. One of the bearings got stuck and interfered with the shifter. I had to take out the trans to fix the issue.

Good luck.

chaoscreature

Oh jeeze,
I really hope I didn't do something like that!
I am still waiting for the oil to filter through the coffee filter. In hindsight filtering gear oil through a coffee filter was probably not the best idea
I drove the car home 90 miles after the track event and did not hear anything unusual in the trans. I am not going to discount the idea that something internally is now in need of repair but I am holding out hope that it's something simpler...
Were you able to drive around with the needle bearings loose?
Thanks for the feedback.

Deadeye

Cone shaped paint filters work much better. You might also send an oil sample to a lab for analysis.

Bill Verburg

It's a common problem when /2x transmissions are used on track

they get hot and the plastic street bearing shells melt
look for these sort of pieces



solution, replace w/ /3x steel caged bearings, while you are in there replace the /2x brass synros w/ /30 steel versions , and the wimpy stock shift forks too

It's not going to be cheap

cabrio993

Did you check shifter mechanism? Shift rod, etc?

Could have gotten lose and missaligned, binding in the down position of the shifter (2,4 and 6th)

EDIT: Sorry...I just read your complete post and see that you've check the rod. Keeping my fingers crossed that is nothing serious. Good luck.

chris walrod

Bill is correct, these issues are typically heat related. I've always had the mindset that additional gbx cooling is needed for these cars, especially when run longer than 20 minute track sessions.

Clean, fresh fluid is a must - need all of the heat exchange possible. Again, IMHO.

Is your car equipped with LSD or open diff?

Bill Verburg

Worst case a loose roller gets jammed between a gear and shaft

result you need a new gear and shaft, the gear here is only hanging together by a thread

cgfen

Peter, sorry to hear this.
Any chance that the "newish" solid tranny mount attachment is causing and binding / alignment issues?
I know, not likely but much cheaper that other possible causes.

Craig

User 41421

I had the exact same symptoms awhile back and it did turn out to be blown needle bearing. The bad news was the transmission had to be pulled and all 18 needles located and removed. The good news – added LSD while it was apart.

chaoscreature

Awww crap.
Okay... anyone want to buy a truck and trailer? It sounds like I am going to need some $$$ to get this taken care of...
I didn't have a chance to check my filters before work today, but the paint cup idea is great assuming I am looking for needles instead of micron sized particles!



Craig,
I seriously doubt the transmission mount would have done anything to aggravate this situation although I can't rule it out completely. The last run session was 40 minutes of continuous lapping... I was hitting 105+ down the straight by the camera arrays. I am sure the transmission was warm.

CorrdoBrit

Sorry to hear of your plight. Doesn't sound good if the needle bearings are kaput.

This sorta concerns me. The mantra here is drive the car and drive it hard. Sounds like you were doing exactly that and not for that long. Was there too much stress placed on the transmission dropping from 4th to 2nd gear. Begs the question as to whether these engines/transmissions are as bulletproof as we like to think.

Quadcammer

Your tranny drain plug is magnetic and should have held onto to much of the metal. Of course that leaves the non ferrous pieces

chaoscreature

Coming from Ford transmission (Toploaders and T-56's) I am probably a little hard on my transmission when I am at the track. It sounds like this is something to be concerned about bu definitely not the "norm".
What I can tell you is that this might be my last track day for a while if I lunched my tranny.