B4Ugo
Veteran Member
- Joined
- Nov 21, 2006
- Location
- British Columbia
- TDI
- 96 Passat 1Z, 2003 W8 TIP, 2004 GLX 4motion wagon 6spd tdi.
So I picked up this 2005 Passat, cheap. Lots of maintenance and repairs including BSM delete. One of the services was the transmission fluid 10K miles ago. The car now has 230K kms, or 144K miles.
But, the transmission is "toast". Or so the mechanic told the PO.
I checked it with VCDS and found no codes.
The symptom seemed to be mostly that it would engage into reverse normally, then disengage after a second or two. Forward gears appeared to work ok, but I didn't do a lot of test driving.
I found a replacement trans, but thought, why not see if it can be saved?
I dropped the fluid (about 3qts) and it didn't smell as I would have expected (didn't have that strong ATF smell) and was dark.
So now I'm thinking that the mechanic that did the fluid change may have used the incorrect fluid and/or wrong fill procedure. There's hope!
I then refilled with Valvoline Maxlife using the correct procedure.
Now it engages reverse with two fairly harsh clunks, but actually stays engaged!
Forward gears are working well (I don't have a great comparison here on the before and after, but it shifts very well now). Still no codes.
So here's the question for those ZF 5HP19 experienced folk:
Do I:
A)accept that it's failing and start yanking it out, or do I
B)drop the pan, do the filter, and refill again with a Pentosin fluid.
Or option C) suggestions..
But, the transmission is "toast". Or so the mechanic told the PO.
I checked it with VCDS and found no codes.
The symptom seemed to be mostly that it would engage into reverse normally, then disengage after a second or two. Forward gears appeared to work ok, but I didn't do a lot of test driving.
I found a replacement trans, but thought, why not see if it can be saved?
I dropped the fluid (about 3qts) and it didn't smell as I would have expected (didn't have that strong ATF smell) and was dark.
So now I'm thinking that the mechanic that did the fluid change may have used the incorrect fluid and/or wrong fill procedure. There's hope!
I then refilled with Valvoline Maxlife using the correct procedure.
Now it engages reverse with two fairly harsh clunks, but actually stays engaged!
Forward gears are working well (I don't have a great comparison here on the before and after, but it shifts very well now). Still no codes.
So here's the question for those ZF 5HP19 experienced folk:
Do I:
A)accept that it's failing and start yanking it out, or do I
B)drop the pan, do the filter, and refill again with a Pentosin fluid.
Or option C) suggestions..
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