Transmission ordeal

[Disturbed_beast]

I have big problem i think it maybe the clutch, anyways i was driving down the highway in 5th and the car started to shack so i dropped it into 4th still kept shacking, so when my exit came i took it. When i went to put it into 1st the shifter was stiff, the car moved about 20 ft before i pulled off to the side of the road, where i couldn't put the shifter into any gear it was stock in neutral. When i finally got it into gear the engine rives up but doesn't move, Could this be a clutch problem or something worse a transmission problem, if anyone may know i could us some insight on this

[Reason]

lol I always scratch my head when I read yours posts. I think your 1st problem is driving a manual. So you are coming off the highway and drop it to first???? Anyway thats a different story. Maybe it has something to do with your throwout bearing or the slave cylinder. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong.... Please tell me you came to a stop at the end of the off-ramp lol

[Huffer]

manual... when he exited the freeway, he would have had to slow to a stop, so he went to 1st to move into traffic...

What kind of thing is "shacking"?

[Reason]

What kind of thing is "shacking"?

shaking+cracking= shacking??

[pdawg]

I had a similar problem in my M.G. It was the master clutch cylinder. The clutch did not work at all. I had to shift without the clutch, just feel and i had to start it in first gear. That was fun in rush hour traffic. Once I was rolling it ran fine except for the no clutch thing.

[Disturbed_beast]

I had a similar problem in my M.G. It was the master clutch cylinder. The clutch did not work at all. I had to shift without the clutch, just feel and i had to start it in first gear. That was fun in rush hour traffic. Once I was rolling it ran fine except for the no clutch thing.

Well theres problems with that first through fifth and revise, it doesn't move more the 5 inches in all gears, it's like the gears are not catchin

[Huffer]

Sounds like something is wrong between the clutch pedal linkage, and the clutch itself.

Can you feel the clutch when you depress the pedal - has there been any change in feel from that?

Could be a shifter linkage break...?

Think you'll have to tear it apart.

[Disturbed_beast]

When i push on the clutch pedal it's the same as before when i was driving it the only difference is that when i move the shifter, like into first it's like i have to muscle it into first, second, third, etc. I have not got the point in time to get under the car in find out whats wrong yet, DAMN this school work!

[Wiscon_Mark]

This belongs in Engine and Drivetrain ;)

[AFBeefcake]

Think you'll have to tear it apart.

You mean I'll have to tear it apart. :(
I hope the transmission is OK or at lest fixable. Its to nice a trany to have been wasted.

2003 JDM Turbo Forester 5 speed with 4.444 front diff and a 1:1 center diff.

[gator gt]

Bleed the slave first off. Get any potential air out of there before you decide to start replacing things willy-nilly.

Pop the hood and check to see how far the fork moves. If your fork looks like its moving its full throw, then its not your hydraulics.

If it was the throw out bearing, you'd hear it when you step on the clutch pedal, due to the fact that the TO bearings are now under stress and would probably be screaming at that point. If you don't have squealing when you press the clutch in, then it shouldn't be your TO. I'd also be inclined to think that if the bearings weren't working so swimmingly, then when you engaged the clutch, the motor would start slowing up as well, cause of a lack of good bearings in the TO.

My first inclination was to ask how many miles on this clutch. Not knowing anything else about the condition of your setup, my first thought is the clutch pressure plate.

If you can get the car in gear, get it rolling, and while still in first, after 1500 RPMs, mash the accelerator....if the tach flies toward redline but your butt isn't, clutch is slipping and thats either your disc (not having enough meat), or your pressure plate is dead.

One last thought. In my last escapade at the dealership (see: Why is my temp gauge needle porking the 'H'?) they also replaced some springs and clips associated with the shift fork. I guess they can rust and cause your fork not to operate properly on the pivot ball and/or keep aligned with the TO bearing. If you have to muscle it into gear, then maybe something is wrong with one of those clips and the fork isn't working the clutch like it needs to.

Food for thought.

GGT

[AFBeefcake]

Well Its not the cluch. Its something in the trany or rear diff.
If you let the cluch out slowly you can get the car to move in 1st, but if you give it some gas you can hear grinding and the car will start to buck back and forth.

Now I got to find the time to pully the drive shaft and check the rear diff and if thats ok then I get to pull the trany out.

[BAC5.2]

You put it in gear, but it acts like it is in neutral?

You can KIND of get it into 1st, and slip the clutch out and get the car to roll?

How hard do you drive the car?

If you put the car in neutral, with the car stopped, and let out the clutch, does it make lots of racket?

If not, I bet you blew 3rd.

Not making noise in neutral with the clutch out, means 1st and 2nd are likely in-tact (because in neutral, clutch out, 1st and 2nd gear spin, while 3rd, 4th, 5th all remain static unless the car is moving).

But making noise when you try to drive it, means something that only spins when the output shaft spins, is broken. Usually, it's 3rd gear that sees more abuse than others, and is likely to blow before 4th, or 5th.

It was either 2nd, or 3rd. That's my bet.

Also kind of interesting, depending on what is actually happening, you may have popped an axle. Odd, I know, but I've heard of people not properly installing a rear axle, and having it slide out and the car drive as if the clutch were slipping horribly. Unlikely this is your problem, but a possiblity.

I need more info of exactly what happens under what conditions to pinpoint the problem exactly.

[AFBeefcake]

First off the shifter is very hard to move into any gear.
If you put the car in to 1st and slowly let the cluch out, the car will drive. Then if you start to give it some gas you can hear griding in the rear of the car.

[BAC5.2]

That's common. Lots of times peices of gear get stuck between the shift rails, and the car doesn't like to shift into any gear.

Does it make noise when in neutral, clutch out?

[AFBeefcake]

No, I don't think it made noise in neutral.

[Pwise2326]

Well first of all....is the ratio of the transmission the same as the rear LSD? You may have fried the center diff if the front wheels are spinning slower than the rears. Otherwise it sounds to me like it could be syncros...but then again after you muscle it in gear it should drive. If you got a brand new clutch....did you baby it for the 500-1000 miles to let it set properly? Cause if you let the boost bug get you dropping clutch from day 1 you could've easily glazed over your clutch, hence revving w/out forward movement with the clutch engaged. You couldve also burned the flywheel, which could give you an uneven or shaky feeling due to improper "binding" of the clutch. Also, if you've never really driven stick before, and have a more powerful engine....I'm thinking unskilled driver grinding gears, breaking something and having that metal chunk break other things as it whips around the transmission case. Unfortunately, I saw this happen with my buddies first RB20DET swap into his nissan 240sx, and he is a very skilled driver, but it still can happen. His second gear syncro separated when he was launching one time...we thought it wouldn't be too much of a big deal, he had to ease it into second to avoid awful grinding...no such luck though. Eventually some loose piece of metal ended up taking out quite a few teeth on quite a few gears and got lodged somewhere. He still managed to sell the car for 4 grand to some dumb kid. Now he's a little more careful with his new RB20, even nice clean looking tranny's aren't invincible.

The other thing you should check out is the shaft created when the two halves of the transmission come together. This is what the throwout bearing rides on. In many Subaru trannys, this wears out over time causing the throwout bearing to "kink", producing the lovely "clutch judder", premature throwout bearing wearout, premature clutch wear, and abnormal wear to the pressure plate. If the shaft is pretty worn, the throwout bearing can disalign a bit and break the clips Gator was talking about on the clutch fork. This wear can also cause the slave cylinder to go bad and problems with the master cylinder. Best bet, check this out first....you have 2 options: buy a new transmission case, or get it sleeved - I posted a product by PDM that fixes this for 100 bucks as opposed to 1300.

Either way good luck!

[AFBeefcake]

The trany was almost new there was no ware on the input shaft or the case where the bearing sits. The clutch was used, not new.


The rear diff used was the stock 4.44 Legacy GT rear diff (which was not LSD).
Basted on the numbers on the trany it was from a 2003 JDM turbo Forester with 4.44 front diff with a 1 to 1 center diff, but the center diff may have been switched with a USDM WRX center diff which would be 1.1 to 1. This I have not confirmed yet, but I'm suspecting the center diff.

This all happened when the car was on the highway in 5th gear.
So if the center diff was 1.1 to 1 and not 1 to 1 the center diff could have exploded.

I wish I had the time and place to remove the trany and find out. :(

[BAC5.2]

You wouldn't have exploded the center diff.

The center diff is a vicous type diff. It uses fluid to transfer power from front (the default) to rear. As you drive, the fluid heats up. When the wheels slip, the fluid heats up further and expands. Since the center diff is sealed, it creates some hydraullic pressure and forces the spider gears together in the diff.

If it gets TOO hot, like if you ran a center diff with non-matching front and rear diffs, the fluid would shear and completely break down.

BEFORE that happens, you would notice the car feels EXTREMELY like it was front wheel drive.

Of course, I could be wrong. I have been before.

If you broke a differential, you would not be able to move the car at ALL without hearing some hanus clunking and grinding noises. ESPICALLY with the center diff, since there would be no place for the bits and broken peices to go.

OO OOOOO another option I thought of!

You could have destroyed the 5th gear selector hub!

Yea!

When you shift REALLY aggressively (as this tranny probably was, espically since it came from Japan and if it was from Japan it was probably in a junk yard), you can damage the synchro selector hubs. The problem is that you are only shocking the hubs OTHER than the one you are shifting on. So you shift hard from 1-2, the 3/4 and 5/R selector hub receive the abuse from it. Shift 3-4, and the 1-2 hub and the 5/R hub get all of the abuse. See where I am going with this?

So every HARD shift, the 5/R synchro hub received the abuse from. If you are in 5th gear, on a failing hub, going on-boost, or under any type of load, could be the straw that broke the back, and finally gives out. When that happens.... clunk clunk clunk clunk.

You can drive it slowly, but then give it gas and it stirs up the bits of selector hub, and clink grind clunk grind nastiness.

Just another option. Doesn't make noise in neutral because nothing at that end of the transmission is spinning to stirr up the gross broken bits. Blown 3 or 4 would probably make some noise.

[sheepdog]

I tossed the rear diff in the impreza on the way back from CT. You can DEFINITELY tell haha, its one of the most horrendous sounds I've ever heard a car make. Its really obvious its the rear diff tho, you can hear it from the back.

[AFBeefcake]

Just to rap up this. The center diff had no gears left in it. The problem was that someone switched the whole extension housing with one from a US WRX trany. So it was 1 to 1.1 center with a 4.44 front and rear diff. We replaced almost all of the parts in the extension housing including the housing its self (it was cracked in a couple places) with the right parts to make it 1 to 1.

We got the car almost all the way back together. But, now the car has a problem with the fuel pump relay. I bypassed it and it runs ok for sitting for a year. Anyway just want to post saying the car will be back on the road bosting again soon. :grin:

[Sarra]

Sweet, and good hunch. :lol: