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Transaxle tip: inspect your ring gear thru drain hole
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tencentlife
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:28 am    Post subject: Transaxle tip: inspect your ring gear thru drain hole Reply with quote

Transaxle tip: inspect your ring gear thru the drain hole

I was just servicing my 100k mi. on rebuild Syncro transaxle, and mildly concerned about hearing a very faint R&P whine on overrun recently. I found I had let my oil level get low due to leaky side seals, so I figured that was probably the main reason, but I realised something when I had it drained: You can do a good visual inspection of the ring gear thru the drain hole.

If all the ring gear teeth are free of chips and show even wear patterns, it's a pretty good bet the pinion gear and bearing are also in good shape. All the teeth on my ring gear looked really nice, wear patterns high on the tooth flanks the full length of each, and the same all the way around. No chips at all and not even the slightest pitting, so I feel good about the condition of mine.

If you see any chipped or pitted teeth you can be pretty sure the pinion is also similarly damaged.

If you have a Syncro with diff lock you can rotate the ring gear with a rear wheel. I have an on-board air compressor and use positive air pressure for my diff lock servo (you'll be hearing more about this soon) so I just ran my compressor to maintain the lock. A standard Syncro with a tight vac system should be able to hold it locked without idling the engine.

If no diff lock then you'd need to engage a gear and turn the engine crankshaft to turn the ring gear. An assistant to do so, or careful use of a remote starter switch, would make this job easier.

It's always nice to find a way you can gather some useful data on a major system so easily.
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Zeitgeist 13
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:37 am    Post subject: Re: Transaxle tip: inspect your ring gear thru drain hole Reply with quote

I imagine you might be able to snake an inspection camera up there to see the R&P mesh, but that probably precludes using the starter to turn over the assembly, for obvious reasons.
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gears
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 12:02 pm    Post subject: Re: Transaxle tip: inspect your ring gear thru drain hole Reply with quote

A couple comments:

It's almost always true that wear will show up first on the pinion, which sees 4X the wear of the ring gear. Quite often, a toasted pinion has a ring gear that looks OK.

It's quite difficult to closely inspect an oil-coated gear tooth. The magnet (or filter) is still our best indicator of R&P wear.
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DanHoug
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 7:44 pm    Post subject: Re: Transaxle tip: inspect your ring gear thru drain hole Reply with quote

throw some sawdust in the filler hole and that whine will quiet down right nice...

my Dad talked about that being a ploy for selling high mile cars in the 1950s, but i've never seen evidence of it myself. i have however seen the engine filled with essentially pure STP to stop it smoking long enough to get out the driveway.

-dan
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E1
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 11:35 pm    Post subject: Re: Transaxle tip: inspect your ring gear thru drain hole Reply with quote

Very good info Chris and Paul, Thanks for posting it.
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