No 4th gear

[QA2]

My daughter was driving her 85 Cabriolet yesterday and she lost 4th gear. She told me there was no loud kind of sound. She was shifting from 3rd to 4th and missed 4th and hit 2nd. She then shifted back to 3rd and proceded to 4th and there was no 4th.

The linkage was scheduled to be rebushed today so I did it a day early. I was not too worried about the "no 4th" gear problem thinking that when I replaced all the shifter linkage bushings, it would go away.

I finished up the linkage bushings and adjusted the shifter and I have the same problem. The shifter does feel better than it did though....

I manually moved the selector through each gear and the tranny did engage in all gears but 4th. There is a different feel when you manually select 4th compared to the other gears. You can hear and feel the shift for move the gears on all but 4th. When it goes to move to 4th, it feels like it is just the selector moving, nothing else.

When the car is moving, you can't move the shifter into any of the other gears without the clutch but it will fall right into 4th no problem.

I search this forum, the bad rabbit forum and looked around the broken rabbit forum but did not find anything specific to 4th gear. I assume this is not a common problem. Any help would be appreicated, I really don't want to pull the tranny unless I am sure I have to. Thanks for reading.

[Beetle.freak]

http://brokevw.com/

[vwdtag]

i would drain the tranny oil and look for any bits of metal. maybe 4th syncro is crushed.

[Beetle.freak]

i would drain the tranny oil and look for any bits of metal. maybe 4th syncro is crushed.

[QA2]

I drained the oil today and no signs of metal in the oil.

THe tranny gave no signs of failing and the rest of the gears still shift with no problems. I have been driving it with 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 5th.

I drained about 55 oz out of the tranny, the oil is pretty black but there is no metal in it. I am going to go back with Pennzoil syncromesh and see what happens.

[Beetle.freak]

What kind of shape is the golf club in ( the black rubber ball on the lever at the bottom end of the relay shaft) ?

[CajunSpike]

What kind of shape is the golf club in ( the black rubber ball on the lever at the bottom end of the relay shaft) ?

Item 2 on this page, the round ball thing on right connected to metal plate.

http://www.germanautoparts.com/Volks...smission/186/1

[Beetle.freak]

This one...... if the rubber has come off it can keep the main shift rod from going all the way forward as you're pulling back on the shifter (depending on how out of whack the shifter adjustment is).....just a thought.