Psychomantis

iTrader: (1)

So i drove my car to the store yesterday and, it was a pain in the *** to get it to go into first and 2nd gear, there was no grinding or anything i just had to rev the car to about 3500 then force it into first from a dead stop and 2nd was the same way inless i was moving past 10mph then it would go into 2nd no prob. the clutch seems fine no sliping and the pedal is tight like it used to be still, im thinking maybe i need some new, gear oil in the trannny, pretty sure the old stuff has been in there a while



So whats a good gear oil to use, and what els causes this problem?

DreamInRotary

iTrader: (49)

I'm looking at running Royal Purple in my tranny and 3rd member here in about a month - supposed to be pretty good stuff.

Psychomantis

iTrader: (1)

Anyone tried Mobil 1, synthetic gear oil? its 1/2 the price of royal purple.

steve84GS TII

Sounds more like a pilot bearing problem....pretty common.

Redline,Mobil,RP.....its all good stuff.....many times better than what our 30 year old trannies were built to run with.

Kentetsu

I've tried most everything, but nothing beats these two choices:

1. Lucas products. They work exactly as advertised. My top choice when it comes to making stuff slippery.

2. A 50/50 mix of standard gear lube (or Lucas) and ATF fluid. This is an old trick from the Datsun race teams. The ATF still provides plenty of lube, but also contains butt loads of detergents. These detergents prevent (and will even remove) buildup in the synchros that can cause difficult shifting. I have had great success with this when it comes to cleaning up old trannys in order to improve shifting or reduce grinding. I have run this full time for decades without any issues, although this last year I switched to straight Lucas (I will see if I experience buildup and clogged synchros with this).

Hope this helps.




.

DriveFast7

iTrader: (1)

Could be bad clutch hydraulics. For the trans be sure to buy something that is brass / yellow metal compliant. As the synchros are made of brass and the newer high sulfur gear oils will corrode the brass. It needs to be GL-4 spec. Almost everything you'll find at the local auto parts store is wrong. Including the Royal Purples; there are tales of Rx-8 owners switching to Royal Purple trans gear oil then it shifts notchy. If it's MT-1 spec don't buy it. API Category MT-1 designates lubricants intended for non-synchronized manual transmissions used in buses and heavy-duty trucks.

MT-90 if you have $ or Sta-Lube 85w90 from Napa Auto Parts. The Sta-Lube can also be used in the diff and is $34/gallon, enough to do both the trans and diff. It's thick and quieter than the cheapo stuff, and shifts wonderfully once warmed up. Kentetsu's 50/50 sounds good.

mikeric

iTrader: (20)

In the same spirit, RP actually makes a 50/50 mix that I have been using and should be considered if price is not too big an issue.

DreamInRotary

iTrader: (49)

I've been hearing a lot about Lucas products and based on this comment I think I may have to try them out now

Kentetsu

RE: Lucas

Seriously. Good stuff.

Heavy Duty Oil Stabilizer: My original motor received an extra 1.5 quarts of oil during an oil change, then quickly blew out the oil control rings. After a mile I turned around and headed home, and ended up shutting down the freeway because nobody behind me could see anything. The dipstick was dry after about 3 miles of driving. Added 2 quarts of the HDOS and ended up with only slight smoking when I let off at high RPMs. That motor lived an additional 20+ thousand miles and died at the age of 213,000 miles. You can also run this straight in the tranny or the rear end (even LSD).

Lucas Motor Oil: Switched over to this about 18 months ago on all 3 cars ('05 Audi Allroad, '98 BMW 328i, and the '85 RX7). Absolutely love it. Quieted the valve/vanos noise in the engine of the Bimmer. The motor in the Audi (twin turbo 2.7) runs cooler and idles smoother. No obvious change in the 7, she's always been smooth as silk since the motor swap a few years ago, but I still feel better having it in there.

Anyway, down off my soapbox now. Call me crazy, but I really like it when someone/something actually does exactly what they/it said it would...

elwood

iTrader: (1)

The specified lube for our cars is 90W gear oil. While there are some transmissions that are designed to run ATF; our transmissions were not. Based on the advice of somebody on the FC forum, I ran Redline MT-90 in my T2 tranny. My bearings went bad. Turns out the stuff is similar to ATF (not so sure it isn't actually ATF). If you do some searching, you'll find story after story of people who have used Redline or ATF or something like it in transmissions that weren't designed for it and had early failures.

I won't run anything again that isn't a heavy weight gear oil, and it'll probably be Mobil 1, since they have a track record of providing extensive test data from independent laboratories to back up all their claims. If you check the lubricants that are recommended by OEMs, Mobil 1 is one you'll see. Most of the others aren't. There's a reason . . .

Oh -- and Amsoil puts out a lot of info regarding lubricants, but it's all generated by them!?

XXXJ

iTrader: (5)

I run Castrol everything in my 7(my premix however is Lucas,) I use Mobil in my truck(Lucas Oil stabilizer with every oil change), and my rock crawler(chopped up Jeep XJ) gets what ever since the worn out motor burns/leaks oil and the diff fluid gets changed quite often.

OneRotor

iTrader: (3)

I've had bad luck with all synthetics in my FB trans. I've used Mobil1, Valvoline, Royal Purple, Lucas (75w-90 AND 85w-140) all with the same results: notchy 2nd/3rd gear when the trans is hot (ONLY when it's hot). The issue (according to a friend who has run/owned a trans shop for the last 30 years) is that they're TOO slippery. He said he's built transmissions with brand-new, OE-spec syncros, and if they use synth in them and they weren't specced for synth, the lube is too slippery for the syncros. He said that the problem is compounded with the age of syncros.

Per his recommendation, I'm putting some cheap-***, parts-store 75W-90 into my FB trans once I get it back operational. I'll report back once I get some miles on the new motor and lube.

7-Zark-7

I switched to RedLine MTL in my old Land Rover and it worked great. Still the same over 45,000 miles later.
based on that success, I'm trying RedLine MT-90 in my FB as soon as it gets warm enough to crawl under the car.

Edit: I just read elwood's experience with RedLine, I think I'll do some more research. I'm not having any shift-related issues anyway, so I might just change he oil with what's spec'd in he manual.

DriveFast7

iTrader: (1)

The thing about MT-90 is some of it's specs are perfect for our transmissions. Low sulfur brass synchro friendly GL-4. Also says Satisifies the gear oil viscosity requirements of 75W, 80W. But is similar to SAE 5W40/10W40 engine oil viscosity which is why it pours quickly and has faster shifts.

steve84GS TII

Huh,Ive had no problems with my trannies running Redline MT-90 for the last decade.
My first TII trans had about 75K on it when I started and it always had a bit of bearing rumble.It went about 45K miles behind 300+ HP and never got much worse.The bearing noise got a bit louder,but there were never any syncro issues.
Because of a tired/badly slipping clutch and the existing bearing noise,I changed clutch/trans out a couple years ago. My new trans has an unknown number of miles,but it looks pretty new (I suspect its a 50K J-spec unit) and is quiet and smooth with the same oil......