Tranny Disaster

[briand805]

Transmission Disaster

Well my trany took a turn for the worse today.

On the way home from taking my elderly father to the dentist 3rd gear went out with no warning. Just cruising along not driving hard then all of a sudden grrrrrrind. 3rds gone. I also have the classic roulette wheel noise coming from the tranny. My regular mechanic is down for an extended period of time with a back injury so I called Mazda. Ill have it towed in tomorrow morning.

Seeing how I dont race the car or drive it hard often I have many concerns as to why this has happened. And of course it couldnt have happened at a worse time...
Ill report back once the car is broke down and diagnosed

 

[tsunami]

dude.... that sucks... 3rd gear. man oh man, i am deffinatly going to go get my tranny checked out, as there a different feel when it is in third...

 

[mazda3zoom]

man that sucks bad. you've got the turbo kit so i doubt mazda will be covering that. but i know how it feels, if u want i can check with the place where i got my motor and see how much they want for the trans, i know it was a manual. PM me if u want me to, keep in mind they gave me that motor with 155 miles on it for $1500

 

[briand805]

After calming down and getting some good advice I defiantely wont be taking it to the dealer to get fixed.
I will be looking for a good trans shop to tear her down.

I would greatly appreciate any input from the forum members.

Thanks.

 

[payne]

How many Km, or wait, miles were on your car when the tranny went?

 

[briand805]

How many Km, or wait, miles were on your car when the tranny went?

11700mi. about 2k of that has been with the turbo.

Found a well known transmission shop thats been in business here since 1966 and has a AAA better Business Bureau rating for all three of their shops with only 1 complaint between them. I hope they can get me in soon.

 

[mobomelter]

damn only 11700? i must have good luck because mine has 34k and i drove it for pizza delivery for most of that and it shows no signs of a bad tranny. hope that tranny place can help you out.

 

[Lord_Nycon]

my 3rd gear went at about 13k. dealer gave me problems but got about 85% of paid cash back, that was after lawyers got involved. i recently got a new tranny curtasy a friend of mine rated for 600 whp. so tranny should not be an issue anytime soon




PS: getting 20K inheritance check in week or so, hiboost here i come. also on list tien coilovers, the electronic ones you can control in car if they make them for our car, if not there regualar coil-overs. brakes/pads and accolade gtvr bodykit.

 

[briand805]

my 3rd gear when at about 13k. dealer gave me problems but got about 85% of paid cash back, that was after lawyers got involved. i recently got a new tranny curtasy a friend of mine rated for 600 whp. so tranny should not be an issue anytime soon




PS: getting 20K inheritance check in week or so, hiboost here i come. also on list tien coilovers, the electronic ones you can control in car if they make them for our car, if not there regualar coil-overs. brakes/pads and accolade gtvr bodykit.

Can you give me more info on your trans..
thanks.

 

[Lord_Nycon]

i don't know all the details. a guy i know owns a transmission shop and he built/installed himself. all i really know is that he said its rated for 600 whp but i'll see if i can't get him to let me know a few of the details. hopefully i'll get back to you guys in a few days. what specifically are looking to find out?

 

[Mazda3ofKent]

my 3rd went after about 20k with just the intake, the delar replaced mine

 

[briand805]

i don't know all the details. a guy i know owns a transmission shop and he built/installed himself. all i really know is that he said its rated for 600 whp but i'll see if i can't get him to let me know a few of the details. hopefully i'll get back to you guys in a few days. what specifically are looking to find out?

everything.

 

[TurfBurn]

I'll do some research for you and see what I can come up with to help you out if anything... we've been workign a lot with the Protege Transmissions, so I need to familiarize myself with the 3 transmission... 3rd gear is the bane in the Protege's... it may be possible to get you stronger gears in the future...

 

[TurfBurn]

Lord Nycon... I'd be interested in your info as well.. especially if it is anything we can do for Protege guys as well as the 3's...

 

[Captain KRM P5]

brian i did get your pm, right now there are no pre-existing parts to internally strengthen the trans that i know of. wish i could be of more help.

 

[briand805]

Well the car repairs are done. I don't like to talk about how much I spend on my car but I will in this case. $1100 was the total for the repairs.
Here is what all the fuss was about.

The transmission got completely broke down and cleaned the put back together. I now have none of the notchy shifting which was present from day 1.

I also replaced the friction plate on my flywheel because the replacement part was $89 and we had it open.
Here is the old plate with about 1100 miles on it.

I now have none of the Neutral to first gear low rpm chatter I was hearing.
Weather this was the fix I dont know.

I called the shop before I went to pick it up. They were unable to get the car started. So I went down and started checking things. Fuses, grounds, connections.
Then I checked the MAF connector. They managed to break the black wire off. :?.

Fortunately we were able to take the connector apart and fix the wire. Something I thought was not possible.

Then tried to start it again. Nothing. s***!
I sat there for a second then had the mechanic unhook the negative on the battery. We waited a minute and I pumped the brakes. He then hooked it back up and the car started right up.

I believe I had an existing problem with the transmission from the start. This being said I will still be taking it extremely easy till I can find some transmission parts that are a little stronger.

 

[tsunami]

glad to hear that this is resolved.... for now... so you fixed the tranny with stock parts then... you should have tossed an lsd in their while you had it open. (1600 $$ later...)

 

[Lord_Nycon]

The guy that did my trans is on vacation untill jan so...
anyway I would think you would be able to get something rated pretty high from any trans rebuild shop. Thats what this guy runs. I asked for a faily high rated trans for FWD and fit the 2.3L engine. He asked 600 hp or 1000hp(lol), i said 600, he took a look at the car told me come back in 2 weeks. 2 weeks later dropped car off and next day picked up. The trans is not as smoth as the original but it feels better. Its hard to explain but it just feels better, like i'm not driving on borrowed time. This, as far as i know, is a one time deal i'm sure you could find stuff out there. Looking for whole trans that fit our engine considering how close it is to ford's engine i would suspect there are quiet alot out there.


i know part of the problem with the original trans is the syncro for 3rd gear dosn't slide all the way over (sorry for my explanation) and strips the plastic gear(?) wich in turn puts alot of stress on the acctual gears causing them to strip. I don't know if it is just 3rd but i'll take a look at my old original trans and see if it was for all gears. If i remember correctly it was similar to 3rd just 3rd was worse causing it to go first.

 

[TurfBurn]

Nycon, your description is baffling me a LOT... LOL the synchro only slides up and down on the shaft... and it doesn't actually move all that much.. it is fixed to the ring gear... so not following you..

And I definitely want more info on whatever your buddy is doing on that transmission... because that gear posted up above is a protege gear in all senses... which confirms what I figured... all the same gears from the protege are being used in the Mazda 3, just a slightly different linksage setup and bellhousing is being used and hence the new designation of the transmission as a G35 instead of a G15. But the gears will be interchangeable.

 

[AzMz3]

The guy that did my trans is on vacation untill jan so...
anyway I would think you would be able to get something rated pretty high from any trans rebuild shop. Thats what this guy runs. I asked for a faily high rated trans for FWD and fit the 2.3L engine. He asked 600 hp or 1000hp(lol), i said 600, he took a look at the car told me come back in 2 weeks. 2 weeks later dropped car off and next day picked up. The trans is not as smoth as the original but it feels better. Its hard to explain but it just feels better, like i'm not driving on borrowed time. This, as far as i know, is a one time deal i'm sure you could find stuff out there. Looking for whole trans that fit our engine considering how close it is to ford's engine i would suspect there are quiet alot out there.


i know part of the problem with the original trans is the syncro for 3rd gear dosn't slide all the way over (sorry for my explanation) and strips the plastic gear(?) wich in turn puts alot of stress on the acctual gears causing them to strip. I don't know if it is just 3rd but i'll take a look at my old original trans and see if it was for all gears. If i remember correctly it was similar to 3rd just 3rd was worse causing it to go first.

So you have a 600hp tranny, yet know nothing about it?
I have some ocean front property in Az are you interested!