02m Problem. No 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th. or Reverse. Any ideas?

['03VR6]

The patient:
2003 GTI VR6
2nd owner
78k miles

I was driving my GTI the other day and when I shifted to 2nd I heard a noise, let off the gas and tapped it and I heard the noise again. I shifted to 3rd and same noise under load.

Drove home in 3rd (Luckily I was 1000 ft from home) and coasted down driveway and then.......


........I went to reverse, nothing, 1st, nothing, no gears, only slight rubbing noise from transmission.

The first thing I came across on the forum was the weak shift fork rivets that shear off causing the fork to separate from the rod, but I have no gears. Is it possible to break a rivet in one shift fork and affect the other two forks?

I adjusted the cables several times and nothing changed. What could be my issue?

Thanks for the help. I love the car and plan to drive it for a while.

[Blk95VR6]

Clutch slave cylinder (inside the transmission) has failed (my synopsis), or (not likely) all your shift forks have broken simultaneously (which I don't think would allow you to shift gears, and would have resulted in a horrific noise/calamity of occurrences).


Did you notice a burning smell (brake fluid on the hot chutch type smell) after it happened?

If you have an inclined driveway, put the car in gear (with it off, don't want you running into anything) and see if it will hold. If you can put it into gear and it holds then your shift fork(s) is/are good.

The more information you can give us on what you've done, the more information we can give you on what else to look for/at...


Mike

['03VR6]

Thanks for the reply BLK95VR6. I don't think it's the slave cylinder because I still have good pedal pressure and the clutch does disengage. For instance, when the car is running and I disengage the clutch, put it in gear, and release the clutch I hear a grinding/rubbing noise that is identical in all gears. Conversely, if the car was in gear and I push the clutch pedal down the clutch disengages and grinding goes away.

I did recently flush the clutch fluid and brake fluid and every worked fine afterwards. I can't see how that affected anything but then usually when something is working fine and then some system is touched usually it's something that was changed or not put back the same.

I tried putting it in several gears and pushed the car. Something in the transmission or differential is not connected as I was able to roll the car several feet. I can shift through all the gears (they sound and feel like they are engaging) and have verified the shift lever on top of the transmission is moving as it should. At this point, I am thinking the differential blew or the main shift rod.

Any other ideas or tests to run before pulling the transmission?

Thanks vortexers

[Blk95VR6]

Sorry for taking so long to reply.



Based on what you've described I'd say you have experienced a massive internal failure of the main shaft or something similar internal to the transmission. I'd say you're going to have to pull the transmission, get it cracked open, and see what's up. Sorry, I am at a loss now...


...you might, however, be able to contact user "Broke", describe your symptoms, and get a diagnosis from him as to what he thinks is the problem. He's a huge source of knowledge on the "O2x" family of transmissions, and if he can't help you, no one can...


Mike

[TBT-Syncro]

step 1.

shift the car by using the shift tower in the engine bay.
what does it feel like?
what does it do?
do all positions feel the same?

['03VR6]

So, my drivers side axle slipped out of the cv joint and was just spinning. $80 empi axle from carquest and were back in business. It was easy to spot once I jack the front end up, but until then it seemed like a transmission issue/noise. Thank you for all your help. It broke two days before moving so it was kinda bad timing. Glad it was an easy fix.