Itinerant Air-Cooled

I was just curiuos how long the average transmission will last. I have 150,000 on mine and it seems to work well througn all gears although it does have a little whine to it on occasion while decelerating in 3rd. Anyone replaced theirs and at what mileage?

Mine had 190K when it went south.

120,000+ for mine, although it took 27 years..........

When I got my Bus, it was already noisy in the final drive, but shifted fine. That was at 208K miles. When I saw what the drain plug looked like, I decided to get it rebuilt sooner rather than later......

Ouch, Don, good idea.

This Squareback has shot input shaft bearings. Its a growler/whiner and the drain plug had a beard like yours.

My bus had a decent 150,000 miles on the original transaxle when i decided to upgrade to a 5-rib. That gave me ten years with unknown total mileage and a penchant for kicking out of reverse. I replaced that with an 091 in 2002 which has gone 80,000 miles since I installed it.
Colin

Amskeptic wrote:when i decided to upgrade to a 5-rib. That gave me ten years with unknown total mileage and a penchant for kicking out of reverse. I replaced that with an 091 in 2002 which has gone 80,000 miles since I installed it.
Colin

Have you kept the original 091 gearing?

I've heard of em' lasting up to 400k miles with proper maintenance....

chitwnvw wrote:

Amskeptic wrote:when i decided to upgrade to a 5-rib. That gave me ten years with unknown total mileage and a penchant for kicking out of reverse. I replaced that with an 091 in 2002 which has gone 80,000 miles since I installed it.
Colin

Have you kept the original 091 gearing?

Nope. I have a little 66mm revver in the engine compartment that wanted at least the 4.86 rear axle from the old 5 rib. That is so I can launch decently with my puny 63 net hp. But, with the earlier 4th gear ratio of .82, I get good long legs for freeway, slightly longer legs in fact, than the stock 091 with the .89 4th they installed to keep the longer stroke 71mm 2.0 engine from flinging its innards.
Colin

My '78 buses tranny has 409,000 original miles on it. I change the non-syn 80w every 10k.
It is still quiet in all gears, though it leaks a little and shifts hard when it is really cold outside.

Brian.
1978 Type II custom campmobile: 409k

stealthcamper wrote:My '78 buses tranny has 409,000 original miles on it. I change the non-syn 80w every 10k.
It is still quiet in all gears, though it leaks a little and shifts hard when it is really cold outside.

Brian.
1978 Type II custom campmobile: 409k

welcome to the forum. did you join just to post an update to a 2007 thread with that stat?

if so - kudo's. that's frickin' awesome.

when do we get to see pics of this machine?

airkooledchris wrote:

stealthcamper wrote:My '78 buses tranny has 409,000 original miles on it. I change the non-syn 80w every 10k.
It is still quiet in all gears, though it leaks a little and shifts hard when it is really cold outside.

Brian.
1978 Type II custom campmobile: 409k

welcome to the forum. did you join just to post an update to a 2007 thread with that stat? if so - kudo's. that's frickin' awesome.



when do we get to see pics of this machine?

Thanks for the welcome... I just decided to join because I recognize quite a few folks on here.
There are pics of my steed on my profile/gallery. You may be familiar with the backdrop ;)

vwlover77 wrote:When I got my Bus, it was already noisy in the final drive, but shifted fine. That was at 208K miles. When I saw what the drain plug looked like, I decided to get it rebuilt sooner rather than later......

I drained and refilled my trans this weekend. When I pulled the drain plug I found something very similar to vwlover77. About the same amount of filings on the plug and I had one of those gear teeth too. Lots more filings were seen in the drained fluid as well.

What does the broken gear tooth mean? How worried should I be? Is this trans on its way out? It has had a howling noise since I've owned it, but that seemed to improve quite a bit after putting in the new gear oil.

mine had 120K on it when it was rebuilt. I pulled the drain plug to find a beard and hardly any oil (I got it with 114K) and it howled and whined.
Too many parts were shot to list but mostly the upper bearing and it toasted the plate too. The ring and pinion were like new thank god.

Keep em full of oil and they will last a long time!

Here are pics of my findings. 134,475 miles on it, as far as I know.

I also noticed this strange blue/green liquid in the drained fluid. Any idea what that is?



And here's what I filled it up with.