Manual transmission fluid change

Hello I am new the club of owning a TDI. I purchased my 2006 Jetta a few months ago. Since owning it I have changed the oil, fuel filter, air filter and over the weekend I flushed the brake fluid and changed the transmission fluid. Before the change reverse was hard to get into and when it was really cold 3rd would give me issues too. After the change I adjusted the shift cables and now it shifts and the clutch engages like a new transmission. My concern is around the amount of fluid that came out of the transmission. I had the car jacked up in the front and then had it level and only got 24 ounces of fluid out of the transmission. I put 24 ounces back in through the reverse sensor hole. How do I know that it has the correct amount of fluid in the transmission? I am looking for advice.

Thanks Ian

Trans should hold about 2 qts. Bend a little wire and stick in fill hole. Should be just below the lip. Use the fill plug hole. Not the reverse sensor hole. Are you sure you took out the correct drain plug ? Just some things to check.

Col Sanders, this is false.

OP, when draining the trans fluid, you should lock the selector fork in home position and then undo the drain plug. After that, remove the pivot bearing pin, more (dirty) fluid will come out. Install the pivot bearing pin and drain plugs back, remove reverse light switch.

Pour 1.9 L - 2.0 L of fluid back to the trans. Put the switch pack in. Unlock the selector mechanism. You are good to go.

Overfilling the trans by a little bit (50 ml - 100 ml) will do no harm to it. Underfill might a bigger problem, especially for 5th gear.

As the fill plug in the trans is in wrong position, the correct fill procedure is only through the reverse light switch. There was a TSB released by VW on this.

Henrick is correct. Here is more info:

http://www.myturbodiesel.com/wiki/manual-transmission-gear-oil-change-mk5-mk6-tdi/

Max

Henrick said:

Col Sanders, this is false.

OP, when draining the trans fluid, you should lock the selector fork in home position and then undo the drain plug. After that, remove the pivot bearing pin, more (dirty) fluid will come out. Install the pivot bearing pin and drain plugs back, remove reverse light switch.

Pour 1.9 L - 2.0 L of fluid back to the trans. Put the switch pack in. Unlock the selector mechanism. You are good to go.

Overfilling the trans by a little bit (50 ml - 100 ml) will do no harm to it. Underfill might a bigger problem, especially for 5th gear.

As the fill plug in the trans is in wrong position, the correct fill procedure is only through the reverse light switch. There was a TSB released by VW on this.

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I did not do the pivot bearing plug because I did not think very much fluid was behind it. Do you think that is where the rest of the fluid was?

I'm sure. When I did the manual trans fluid service on my previous Mk5, even more fluid came out of there than from the drain plug. And besides, the fluid from the drain plug was more or less gold in color (~90k miles on the clock at that time), the fluid from pivot bearing was almost black.

Henrick said:

I'm sure. When I did the manual trans fluid service on my previous Mk5, even more fluid came out of there than from the drain plug. And besides, the fluid from the drain plug was more or less gold in color (~90k miles on the clock at that time), the fluid from pivot bearing was almost black.

Click to expand...

Interesting thank you for the information.

How often should the Manual Transmission Fluid be changed? I don't remember seeing that on the Service Interval sheet (only topping it off).

I've go an '06 with 105k on it and I'm not sure it's ever been changed.

According to VW, never.
But if you decide to do that, use genuine VW fluid.
Mine at 90k miles looked a bit exhausted. However, my car had hard city miles, average lifetime speed was like ~30 km/h, lots of idle time, constant shifting on 1-2-3, no highway driving.

I'm on the same boat with a lot of city driving.
I do all my maintenance myself, so ~$28 for 2 liters of the VW trans fluid is a "cheap" insurance.
At 90K miles I already done it twice. I know that is an overkill, but I had access to the gearbox already. First time at ~50K I was chasing the coolant leak and second time at ~90K was swapping a clutch to a SMF setup. So it was an extra ~10 minutes (if that) to get it done. Like I said "cheap".

Max

I did mine at 120k miles. It was still golden and looked great for that many miles.

Do the mk4's have a pilot bearing that holds more fluid?
Also, what is 'home' position on the shifter- is it neutral?

^ any more thoughts on the "home" position? Inquiring minds want to know.

Home position is not neutral. You place the trans in neutral and then slightly press the selector down. While slightly pressing it down, turn the plastic arm up 90 degrees. When it's pointing up, it's the home position.

Is it a bit more clear now?

Very much so. Thank you.

Sorry to bring this thread back but I'm confused. Do we measure the oil that came out and put that amount back in? Bentley says to put 1.9 back in, nothing about measuring. Also said to fill thru backup switch.

narongc73 said:

Sorry to bring this thread back but I'm confused. Do we measure the oil that came out and put that amount back in? Bentley says to put 1.9 back in, nothing about measuring. Also said to fill thru backup switch.

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No, follow the linked procedure for draining the transmission (including the pivot bearing pin). Then refill the transmission with 1.9 - 2.0 liters thru the reverse switch.

Measuring only means you'll put back in the same amount that came out, which very well could be too little.

scurvy said:

No, follow the linked procedure for draining the transmission (including the pivot bearing pin). Then refill the transmission with 1.9 - 2.0 liters thru the reverse switch.
Measuring only means you'll put back in the same amount that came out, which very well could be too little.

Click to expand...

My issue is I drained it cold since the tranny is out of the car. I only got 1 quart out. I did follow the tsb. I put back 2quarts. Then I went and googled and found that people said to drain it hot, and someone drained 1.5 after waiting 2 hours. I just put the plug back in when the drip slowed. I'm thinking it's overfilled by a quart. Should I drain some out or leave as is?

Draining it with the car out of car might have caused the issue because the trans was not level. If you lose sleep because of this, you can go ahead and repeat the procedure. Don't forget the pivot bearing pin. Let it drain completely (~1-1.5 hours, while having some beer). Then put 1.9-2.0 liters back through the reverse light switch.