Does transmission oil come in shiny hard bits?

[bonkfrog]

Drained the transmission oil in my newly acquired GTV 2.0 yesterday. Found some large gear teeth bits in the tray - sh**!. They're straight, so I'd guess the reverse set. Also, if they'd  come from the top of the box I'd expect damage to other gears. There must have been a fair crunch to have done it, but the box is quiet and operating well. In all the 30+ years I've had Alfas I've never had this happen before.
Luckily, I have two spare transmissions; one in good shape but I'm not looking forward to the work - maybe I'll just drive it & see.
Anyone else had this happen?

[Davidm1600]

Nope, not to date, in any car I have owned (be it Fiat or Alfa, and that includes 2 Alfettas), however, I would guess you are on the money re the damage and yes I think wise to get things sorted out ASAP.  Good luck with the change over as it is a pain in the you know what to change over the transmission in an Alfetta.  That is unless you have heaps of experience perhaps.

[Anthony Miller]

Not entirely unusual though, why else would they make the drain plugs magnetic?

[L4OMEO]

Bad news  bonkfrog

I once lost all teeth off reverse gear on a Sud at a gymkhana event, but at least that could be attributed to something (a mixture of the stupidity and mechanical brutality that often comes with youth). Wasn't all bad though - I ran the car for 5 months without a reverse gear, no problem as long as you remember gravity is your friend (park facing uphill, ditto 3-point turns). It lightens the car too, so don't write the idea off until you've tried it.

[bonkfrog]

Progress report: I used Nulon 85W-90 in the transmission & it certainly looked a lot nicer than what drained out! So far there have been no problems. In fact, I think the change is a bit better - or is this the placebo effect?

[Joe Garra]

Placebo effect should give a 25% improvement 

[MD]

If the box is changing ok, you might be lucky for now. However any floating bits inside will cause additional damage and so the box should get a good flush out. To do this will require a complete drain of the oil first. This should be followed by overfilling with kerosene to allow a rapid drain out of this fluid thereby hopefull bringing with it any debris. Do this twice.

Allow a full and complete drain of the kerosene. Mop up any residue inside the box by the use of rags stuffed inside and retreived. Be sure the transmission is on flat ground. If in doubt, flush out kerosene residue by filling with a cheap trans fluid, run box on car stand and drain !

Refill with appropriate tansmission oil of your choice in keeping with an open or limited slip dif. needs.

...wanna be a good box to start with !!!

[barts]

My GTV6 Box dropped what looked like a whole Reverse tooth about 6 years and 40000km ago.
Drained and refilled oil and it hasn't worried it since, although it can occaisonally jump out of reverse on clutch take up.

I am hoping it will die soon so I can justifiy twinspark LSD box, but 164 3L and several laps of QR still can't kill it. I plan on replacing it early next year when I get back to civilisation.

Dan

[bonkfrog]

Thanks MD. As usual, your advice is spot on. I'll take the car to Winton tomorrow (about an hour each way) and see how it goes after having done the oil change. I think I'll go through the good spare transmission & look at the poissibility of fitting synchro bits to first gear before fitting (am I just putting it off?)

[MD]

By all means do what you need to for now. Later (or sooner depending on how many moths you got in the wallet) you might like to swap the transaxle for a twin spark one and get it fully serviced and rebuilt before the installation.

Apart from having a limited slip differential which will come in handy if you decide do a bit more serious motoring, it has a different 1st gear synchro arrangement so that it works like a conventional gearbox when you want to select it. In the earlier transaxles, first gear sychro selection on the move and double de-clutch works fine but at standstill, often it is necessary to first select 2nd in order to select 1st without a crunch.

Keep it in mind. It may pay dividends later for you. The downside is that it is not a strong as the earlier version but is adequate if you look after it and don't do hill climbs.

[Simon Aarons]

I am hoping it will die soon so I can justifiy twinspark LSD box, but 164 3L and several laps of QR still can't kill it. I plan on replacing it early next year when I get back to civilisation.

I am in the same boat, several years of track use (double entering) and lots of inside wheel spin and a 3L and it's still going! And it's actually not that bad....might let my brother drive it so i can put the twin spark in

[scuzzyGTV]

The downside is that it is not a strong as the earlier version but is adequate if you look after it and don't do hill climbs.

gutted! thats the main thing i'll be doing with mine 
any potential, 'cheapish' mods that i can do to help, or is it mainly launch related (like when i busted my sun gears)?

[MD]

Oh I see. An unexpected interpretation!
The entire box is not weaker...goodness no! I can just see the twin spark mob sending out the lynch party now ..
It is only the first gear set up I am referring to.