003 Automatic Transmission seals refresh help

[Sage79]

I think I've exhausted the posts and haven't found concisely what are the seals that need to be replaced on a 1973 003 automatic transmission. I've purchased a basic refresh kit which contains a lot of seals, o-rings, and gaskets and want to make sure I've got what I need before tearing into it. My transmission has only 73,000 miles on it and has run great in my first season of driving it after being stored about 15, but due to warnings on the Samba, I want to change the seals between the transmission and the differential before something bad happens.

Is there a good sketch showing where the key seals are located? The ones I've seen, including Bentley, are not specific. The descriptions in prior posts have also not been clear or have been hi-jacked by the later tranny folks. I don't want to do more work than necessary but also don't want to be caught short.

Since it doesn't need to be rebuilt, I'm looking for input from the experts on the 003 on what maintenance is advised. Thanks,
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Dirk
'79 Westy 2.0FI
'77 delux 2.0FI 090Auto - now my son's

[Westfabulous]

This is always a challenge. If you want to PM me, and are okay with paying for a long distance call, I can put you in touch with my transmission guy. I had my transmission done recently, and it has 40,000 +/- original miles on it. It needed no rebuilding, but we had to assemble various seals and gasket kits for the project, as they were not all available in one set. Essentially, at the end of the day, we replaced about 25 seals, gaskets, and O-rings all with OE parts. Your transmission is a little different than my later version, but we did things such as all the basic seals, torque converter seal, final drive seal (to prevent cross contamination of ATF/ final drive oil), piston seals, piston upgrades, 2nd gear piston servo upgrade, pan seals, axle seals, etc. The transmission was fully disassembled, inspected, and put through a cleaner. It looked like new inside so there was no further work required. The cost: about $600. Cheap, and money so well spent. I recommend that you get some advice on this if you really want to deal with all potential issues. For $600, there was no question in my mind that I was going to have a pro do the work. I think it is a bit like heads.....better left to the pros, unless you are experienced or adventurous. If you just want to do a few basic seals, then you could do it yourself. I could not be happier with leaving my work to a very experienced expert on this project.

One tip I can give you about making inquiries in your area is this: I phoned around for days and nobody wanted to touch the automatic transmission; this was fueled by pure ignorance as most had already worked on this transmission before, but in a different model of VW, they just didn't know it. I knew that the transmission was pretty commonly used in other cars such as the Jetta, and Golf, so I called a VW dealership buddy and asked who they used. They referred me to my guy, who estimates that he has worked on thousands of these over 30 years. Your dealership might actually be a good place to make some inquiries if you are looking for a local expert. Talk to the proverbial old guy who has a bit of history with these issues.
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"I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today."

[Frozenbutt]

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=258439&highlight=


this link has the 5 seals you need to replace

[Frozenbutt]

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=516066

a good post on rebuilding the 003 automatic from the Type 3 forum

[Wildthings]

Easy rebuild it you can get the parts, just make sure you put it back together just the way it came apart. The Type 3 Bentley has a good section on the 003, not sure if the info in the Type 3 Bentley is the same as in the Type 2 Bentley or not.

I think these are the seals you need, don't know their correct names.

Inner pinion seal
Outer pinion seal, where the two sections mate
Governor seal
Torque convertor seal
2 output shaft seals
There is also the one big o-ring that doesn't come in all kits

I have had problems with some brands of governor seals being a very tight fit and becoming damaged during install so I would buy an extra if I went into one again, maybe try to get a couple of different brands.

[Sage79]

After completing this I thought I'd follow up for others who found the information confusing prior to actually opening a unit up. The Haynes manual has a pretty good exploded view which I color coded for clarity:

I had to reuse the big O-ring around the housing since the only one I could track down by part number was way too big and I couldn't find the #40 O-ring around the pinion nut either.

Note that this is for the final drive used with the 003 Automatic. There are indications that the drive used with the later automatic is similar but there must be some differences because that big O-ring wasn't even close.

For reference, the transmission from my 1973 1700 engine is stamped 003 321 105D and drive is 011 507 111.
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Dirk
'79 Westy 2.0FI
'77 delux 2.0FI 090Auto - now my son's