3rd and 4th Gear Missing, problem solved

Basically my car wouldn't shift into either 3rd or 4th gear. No grinding, no nothing. The gears simply weren't there. Anyways, instead of spending a couple hundred bucks having some monkey do it, I decided to rip it apart myself. Turns out, the little tabs on the shift fork were almost completely worn off! I'd imaging these taps should be cheap to replace.

Links are broken.

Fixed. The folder name on my photobucket contained and expletive that the filter on here was kicking out.

That's really an odd wear out.

Who's driving the car with their hand on the shifter?

jasonTDI said:

That's really an odd wear out.

Who's driving the car with their hand on the shifter?

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I thought the same thing. It was probably a case of improper shift linkage alignment because I don't drive around with my hand on the shifter. The tranny was used with 80k miles on it when I bought it about 3 years ago so who knows.

Just went to the stealership, $55 for each tab! Wow! I didn't bring enough lube to pay over $200 for a couple tiny tabs, so I told them to shove it. Just bought the whole shift fork assembly on ebay from a rebuilt tranny for $50. Woohoo!

Nice! That's one of the few times I know of where the assembly cost less than the critical parts you needed. The two things I dread most to here when working on my cars is: "No, we don't have that part. You're going to have to go to the dealer." and "That part is only sold as an assembly."