Torn, help?

[Kevin M]

Originally Posted by cody

Let's be honest, all of our opinions are anechdotal. I just wanted nightwalker to know that the transmission is the weakest link in the WRX.

Scott and Dean's assertion that they personally know of no gear failures is factual, not anecdotal. I personally know of 2 broken gears (wait, so do you Scott!). SECCS member Nick (doubleurx) broke his gearbox at a track- with a complete Vishnu Stage 2 and lots of track miles. Exact same scenario for SRIC member Mike Egan. He stripped 3rd gear after like 10 track days on a VS2, and promptly bought an Sti as did Nick. So what does it take to break a bugeye WRX gearbox? About 350 hp, lots of 3rd gear pulls (speaking of which, Egan's car had about 1000... On the dyno alone. His car was a test mule for Vishnu.)

So, fact: No WRX that any SECCS member knows through direct personal contact has experienced a transmission failure without being asked to do far more than it was ever intended to do.

Finally, since your '03 is so bad, why haven't you broken it? On top of that, have you experienced Tyson's? He may have the best factory 5 speed ever to come from subaru.

[Kevin M]

Originally Posted by Dean

I think the weekest link in the WRX is the brakes. Where is Aaron... Lets see how many WRX trannies S^2 has done on cars that were not highly modified or had bad drivers. Heck, how many total have they done? I think the tranny thing is blown out of proportion, mostly by drag racers.

Agreed.

[sybir]

Originally Posted by Dean

I think the weekest link in the WRX is the brakes. Where is Aaron... Lets see how many WRX trannies S^2 has done on cars that were not highly modified or had bad drivers. Heck, how many total have they done? I think the tranny thing is blown out of proportion, mostly by drag racers.

Totally agreed. Most trannies we end up replacing are due to serious abuse (that's kids with too little power trying to clutch-drop, people trying to powershift without knowing how, way too much power in lower gears).
We've had exactly 2 transmissions that I can think of that failed on a normally driven, mildly modified car, and it was on the same car; he blew the tranny up bad. We replaced the tranny with one out of a drivetrain swap we had, he drove it for ~200 miles and it blew up again; the rear diff was tweaked somehow and abusing the output shaft and center diff. We replaced the tranny and rear end, no more problems.


On an unrelated note, we had a guy come in and request an Exedy multiplate (read, way more agressive than a hyper single) in his otherwise stock STi. We told him it was way too stiff, he wouldn't listen. Gave him the car back Tuesday, he went out and was doing 6k clutch drops with DCCD locked to rear, and "broke something."
Towed it in, and it had snapped one of the rear axles clean in half.

In half.

Tranny was perfectly fine, rear end was perfectly fine.

That's a strong damn transmission.

[cody]

Actually it's anecdotal. For instance, I don't personally know anybody with cancer or AIDS, but those diseases are prevelant.

Please stop putting words in my mouth (a popular practice on this board I'm learning). I never said my 03 tranny was bad. I actually said "I don't expect any premature failure" from it since I don't abuse it or have much more than 300 CHP going through it.

There's nothing wrong with pointing out the fact that the transmission is the weakest link in the drivetrain. If I point out Subaru paint chips to no end, am I going to get to hear about that too?

Originally Posted by BAN SUVS

Scott and Dean's assertion that they personally know of no gear failures is factual, not anecdotal. I personally know of 2 broken gears (wait, so do you Scott!). SECCS member Nick (doubleurx) broke his gearbox at a track- with a complete Vishnu Stage 2 and lots of track miles. Exact same scenario for SRIC member Mike Egan. He stripped 3rd gear after like 10 track days on a VS2, and promptly bought an Sti as did Nick. So what does it take to break a bugeye WRX gearbox? About 350 hp, lots of 3rd gear pulls (speaking of which, Egan's car had about 1000... On the dyno alone. His car was a test mule for Vishnu.)

So, fact: No WRX that any SECCS member knows through direct personal contact has experienced a transmission failure without being asked to do far more than it was ever intended to do.

Finally, since your '03 is so bad, why haven't you broken it? On top of that, have you experienced Tyson's? He may have the best factory 5 speed ever to come from subaru.

[cody]

Originally Posted by sybir

Totally agreed. Most trannies we end up replacing are due to serious abuse (that's kids with too little power trying to clutch-drop, people trying to powershift without knowing how, way too much power in lower gears).
We've had exactly 2 transmissions that I can think of that failed on a normally driven, mildly modified car, and it was on the same car; he blew the tranny up bad. We replaced the tranny with one out of a drivetrain swap we had, he drove it for ~200 miles and it blew up again; the rear diff was tweaked somehow and abusing the output shaft and center diff. We replaced the tranny and rear end, no more problems.


On an unrelated note, we had a guy come in and request an Exedy multiplate (read, way more agressive than a hyper single) in his otherwise stock STi. We told him it was way too stiff, he wouldn't listen. Gave him the car back Tuesday, he went out and was doing 6k clutch drops with DCCD locked to rear, and "broke something."
Towed it in, and it had snapped one of the rear axles clean in half.

In half.

Tranny was perfectly fine, rear end was perfectly fine.

That's a strong damn transmission.

Yep, the STI tranny is capable of holding 450whp + abuse. I've never heard of a failure. The axels to break from abuse, as you pointed out, though. I wish this was true of WRX's...much cheaper repairs.

[Kevin M]

Originally Posted by cody

Actually it's anecdotal. For instance, I don't personally know anybody with cancer or AIDS, but those diseases are prevelant.

Please stop putting words in my mouth (a popular practice on this board I'm learning). I never said my 03 tranny was bad. I actually said "I don't expect any premature failure" from it since I don't abuse it or have much more than 300 CHP going through it.

There's nothing wrong with pointing out the fact that the transmission is the weakest link in the drivetrain. If I point out Subaru paint chips to no end, am I going to get to hear about that too?

Fact: I personally know 2 people who have had transmission failures. All others, that I've known, are still working fine. Anecdote: You know that other people with WRXs have, in the past, broken their gearboxes. Never did I "put words into your mouth." All I did was point out that your perception of the "weak" WRX gearbox comes from internet anecdotal posts. We have attempted to counter your expressed, anecdotal views with our own personal knowledge and first-hand experience.

If you say "I heard the paint chips easy" that's anecdotal. When we say "yeah, my paint chipped bad" or "actually, mine's still fine" we're not being anecdotal.

[cody]

Originally Posted by BAN SUVS

Fact: I personally know 2 people who have had transmission failures. All others, that I've known, are still working fine. Anecdote: You know that other people with WRXs have, in the past, broken their gearboxes. Never did I "put words into your mouth." All I did was point out that your perception of the "weak" WRX gearbox comes from internet anecdotal posts. We have attempted to counter your expressed, anecdotal views with our own personal knowledge and first-hand experience.

If you say "I heard the paint chips easy" that's anecdotal. When we say "yeah, my paint chipped bad" or "actually, mine's still fine" we're not being anecdotal.

Way to keep misunderstanding my posts.

[doubleurx]

Well my '03 wrx tranny sucked and was toast at 18,000 miles. Bent shaft, mis alignment of gears, blown synchros and destroyed rear diff. Granted I believe something was amiss (maybe my shifting?); and certainly I pushed the power but not nearly to the limit. At any rate, compared to all other manual transmissions I have had the wrx tranny was 2nd to last in my book and that is only because I owned a 1990 Eagle Talon TSI!

Looking back, I liked my 83 GTI, '87 GLI, 87 5000S, 89 Mazda mx-6GT and my current cars transmissions much more than my '03 wrx's. From the start it fellt weak. Perhaps it was just a fluke. To be honest it was the only wrx I ever drove. The STI is by far my favorite second to the C4. The C4 has huge throws but is so smooth. Hell you can down shift into first at 30 mph.

[cody]

Originally Posted by doubleurx

Well my '03 wrx tranny sucked and was toast at 18,000 miles. Bent shaft, mis alignment of gears, blown synchros and destroyed rear diff. Granted I believe something was amiss (maybe my shifting?); and certainly I pushed the power but not nearly to the limit. At any rate, compared to all other manual transmissions I have had the wrx tranny was 2nd to last in my book and that is only because I owned a 1990 Eagle Talon TSI!

Looking back, I liked my 83 GTI, '87 GLI, 87 5000S, 89 Mazda mx-6GT and my current cars transmissions much more than my '03 wrx's. From the start it fellt weak. Perhaps it was just a fluke. To be honest it was the only wrx I ever drove. The STI is by far my favorite second to the C4. The C4 has huge throws but is so smooth. Hell you can down shift into first at 30 mph.

I hear that a lot. My personal belief is that Subaru has a QC (quality control) issue. I think the cars are designed very well, but in production, tolerances are too great (or other consistency issues) and QC suffers. Some WRX’s have inferior components and fail while most seem very well made (like mine, *knock on wood*).

Ed of Equilibrium Tuning supported my theory when he mentioned that some WRX’s just won’t make as much power as others. This is comparing several stock WRX's to eachother or equally modded ones.

Some people do modify their WRX to 300WHP and drive the piss out of it with no issues. Others lightly mod the car and drive it with love and compassion in their wrists and they still develop the notorious grinding gears which then usually develops into full failure at some point.

It wouldn’t be such a big issue, but as I understand it, SOA commonly compares the blown tranny to a picture of an abused transmission, inspects the tires, and says, “sorry, you abused it.” Of course this is another situation where we can do nothing but speculate if SOA is justified or not. It’s like the legal system; some people are unfairly punished while others get away with murder.

I personally would never make a claim after modding the engine or abusing the transmission, but the horror stories did convince me to wait to the 30K mile mark before I added power. I’m pretty confident my transmission is one of the good ones at this point, but I still won’t launch.

[sperry]

If I'm reading this thread correctly, Nick, you *did not break a gear* in your WRX, you broke a syncho, etc. I was under the impression that Mike Egan was in the same boat. So I stand by my *factual* statement that:

Originally Posted by sperry

not a single person I know has broken a gear on an '02-'05 WRX tranny. Now, if you want to talk about blown synchros... that's a bit of a different story... but as far as I know, nobody I know personally from SECCS, I-Club or NASIOC have actually broken a gear.

When I made the statement Mike Egan, Nick and MikeK were in mind, hence the qualification about synchros. If Egan's car really did break a *gear* then I will be willing to modify my statement to "one" instead of zero, but when I originally made the statement, I was under the impression that the tranny still worked, just poorly, hence his ability to trade it in.

As far as putting words into your mouth cody, here's exactly what you said:

Originally Posted by cody

there have been several cases where people say they didn't mod or abuse and they still wrecked a gear or two.

Don't get all up in arms when the rest of us bring up specific examples of people's cars that we've seen 1st hand, and our own personal experience, while you're the one spouting anecdotal evidence. You clearly repeated hearsay about WRX trannys that echos the popular opinion that the WRX is garbage, and we clearly mentioned instances that we've directly experienced of cars that seem to work fine. I understand that not personally knowing of broken trannies doesn't prove they don't break (your cancer and AIDS example), but it does prove that in my experience the negative hype about how weak the WRX tranny is supposed to be seems somewhat blown out of proportion, which is exactly the argument I expressed in my 1st post on the subject.

[cody]

LOL, I'm only "up in arms" because you guys continue to twist my words to make me look wrong. I never said that your experience (or lack there of) is not factual. We are all spouting anecdotal evidence. Anecdotal does not equal non-factual. It seems you guys are confused by this word and think it means that your accounts are fictitious. This is simply not the case. What anecdotal means is that your experience isn't conclusive to the question at hand...end of story.

And who said the WRX is garbage? Like any car it has strengths and weaknesses. All I wanted to do was point out the weaknesses. This was relevent to the OP question. It seems like anything I post here gets slammed.

I have no issue with your assertion that the WRX tranny issues are blown out of proportion and I've made every attempt to make that very clear. If you read what I say, I'm very clear, but all you hear is, "the wrx is garbage".

What the hell is wrong with you people?

[tysonK]

My tranny pretty much owns. When I bought my little black car it was one of the last 2 on the lot at Lithia. I deduce my car must have been an end of the production line vechicle. All the robots and mechanics were looking at my car to be the shining example of the ultimate stock 2003 WRX, and it shows bitches!

I can see supervisors yelling at the guys in the transmission installation segment making sure the highest of productions standards were met. My 5 speed can from a sacred place not very many WRX trannys know of. I wouldn’t doubt it if Peter Solberg himself was walking through the factory that day and kissed my car good luck before it was rolled out to be sold. I put in the Shockproof in about 5 months ago. That crazy blue liquid did help my tranny between shifts but actual engagement is still OEM feeling. MikeK drove my car and almost punched me in the side of the head for having such a great tranny. That’s about all the technical knowledge I have about my tranny.

I’d like to give a shout out to SOA for getting one right!

Oh and anecdotal, anecdotal, anecdotal, anecdotal…..I don’t know why but that’s the only word I saw reading most of the posts.

[tysonK]

Originally Posted by cody

What the hell is wrong with you people?

From top to bottom I don't see this thread twisting your words, more like terrorizing your word choice.

Alert level is at orange.

[sperry]

Originally Posted by cody

LOL, I'm only "up in arms" because you guys continue to twist my words to make me look wrong. I never said that your experience (or lack there of) is not factual. We are all spouting anecdotal evidence. Anecdotal does not equal non-factual. It seems you guys are confused by this word and think it means that your accounts are fictitious. This is simply not the case. What anecdotal means is that your experience isn't conclusive to the question at hand...end of story.

The issue here isn't one of factual vs. non-factual. I believe you have facually heard "people say they didn't mod or abuse and they still wrecked a gear or two" since I've heard the same thing. However, you have not directly encountered a car with said failed gears, right? Your evidence is hearsay, whereas mine is based on my own direct observations. Anecdotal or not, I don't see evidence that the WRX tranny is as bad as it's reputation. That doesn't prove the WRX tranny is bulletproof... its reputation had to come from somewhere... but I'm suggesting that if you take care of it, and don't run an unreasonable amount of torque through it, it'll be fine. Hell, at stock power levels, if one breaks, I'm apt to agree with Subaru's party-line that is was probably abused.

Originally Posted by cody

And who said the WRX is garbage? Like any car it has strengths and weaknesses. All I wanted to do was point out the weaknesses. This was relevent to the OP question. It seems like anything I post here gets slammed.

I have no issue with your assertion that the WRX tranny issues are blown out of proportion and I've made every attempt to make that very clear. If you read what I say, I'm very clear, but all you hear is, "the wrx is garbage".

What the hell is wrong with you people?

Go ahead and quote where I said you think "the wrx is garbage". I totally agree that the WRX tranny is the weakpoint in the driveline... hell I spent nearly $8000 to pre-emptively replace mine with a 6MT so I could step up to a bigger turbo w/o risking it. I just don't think it's something that should stop someone from buying a WRX, which is directly relavent to nightwalker's question.

So, to get away from the semantics and back to the original topic of WRX vs. STi vs. EVO... With regards to the tranny, IMO the WRX's tranny is fine as long as you're not looking to make huge power. If you'd buy a WRX with plans to go to a larger turbo, you might want to think about the STi or EVO instead, but it's been my experience that the WRX tranny will take all a stock turbo/block can throw at it as long as you know how to drive & shift smoothly.

[sperry]

Originally Posted by tysonK

From top to bottom I don't see this thread twisting your words, more like terrorizing your word choice.

Alert level is at orange.

I just don't like the word "anecdotal" because it's hard to spell, and if you look at it long enough it stops looking like a word.

Plus I'm pissed of that I'm still at work (w00t, hour 13! )

[tysonK]

Well at least they are worth $200.

http://www.i-club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=105257

[Dean]

OK, I retract all my comments about Subaru, and Mitsubishi, and I going with good old American Iron...

Get a SRT4. Front wheel drive is good enough for winter, and it will get you the babes, especially with a load BOV!

[Kevin M]

I thought Nick broke 3rd gear too, so I guess that SECCS collectively knows of 1 broken WRX gear.

Somebody buy Cody a beer for me if he ever goes to a meet. And then tell me an anecdote about it.

[AtomicLabMonkey]

Originally Posted by cody

What the hell is wrong with you people?

Dude, you need to relax. And when I'm the one saying that, you have a problem...

They're simply stating their 1st-hand knowledge of tranny failure modes (as in, not something they just read on the internet), and I haven't seen you do the same yet.

[cody]

You have missed my point as well.

[MikeK]

I had an 04 WRX for a year and a half, and I can honestly say the tranny was the thing I hated most about that car. (The brakes were a very close second). Nothing ever actually broke on my tranny, it just sucked hairy balls the whole time I had it (and not in a good way).

It was almost impossible to get that thing into first or reverse, especially in cold weather. Sometimes to back out of the garage, I would have to move the car forward an inch before it would go into reverse. Of course, it wouldn't go into first either, so I had to use second to move the car forward, then reverse to get out of the garage, then MAYBE I could get it into first to drive off. Also, I cannot count the number of times I had to start from second at a traffic light because I couldn't get the fucking POS into first.

I hated that goddamed piece of shit tranny, good riddance to it. The STi tranny is about 18,000! times better. I cannot believe both trannies were made by the same company.

[doubleurx]

Originally Posted by BAN SUVS

I thought Nick broke 3rd gear too, so I guess that SECCS collectively knows of 1 broken WRX gear.

Somebody buy Cody a beer for me if he ever goes to a meet. And then tell me an anecdote about it.

Well my car actually drove and could shift into third so I think Scott is correct that I did not actually bust any gears. The sound was god awful! Just ask Tyson - I passed him on the highway. Considering how messed up the tranny was, the car made it from Fernley to Truckee, Truckee to S2, S2 back to Truckee and then Truckee to Roseville.

I agree with Mike as well. My car was a pain to get into first and reverse was a joke. Half the time I would have to roll forward a few inches to get it in gear.

[sperry]

Originally Posted by MikeK

I had an 04 WRX for a year and a half, and I can honestly say the tranny was the thing I hated most about that car. (The brakes were a very close second). Nothing ever actually broke on my tranny, it just sucked hairy balls the whole time I had it (and not in a good way).

It was almost impossible to get that thing into first or reverse, especially in cold weather. Sometimes to back out of the garage, I would have to move the car forward an inch before it would go into reverse. Of course, it wouldn't go into first either, so I had to use second to move the car forward, then reverse to get out of the garage, then MAYBE I could get it into first to drive off. Also, I cannot count the number of times I had to start from second at a traffic light because I couldn't get the fucking POS into first.

I hated that goddamed piece of shit tranny, good riddance to it. The STi tranny is about 18,000! times better. I cannot believe both trannies were made by the same company.

For those of you with problems getting into reverse here's the deal:

If you try to go into reverse, and it won't go, simply leave the car in neutral, step off the clutch for a second, put the clutch back in, and try reverse again. The car won't engage reverse because the dog-teeth in the shift collar aren't lined up with their slots in the gear. By stepping off the clutch, you spin the input shaft and turn the gear. The next time you try to engage reverse, there's a very good chance everything will be lined up close enough to work. Just don't clutch in and try to shift too quickly or the lay shaft will still be spinning and it will grind a little as you engage reverse, since there are no synchros on reverse.



The same trick works for 1st gear as well, but shouldn't be necessary as often because of the synchros.

There's a great article that details the inner workings of manual transmissions on howstuffworks.com:

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/transmission.htm

Understanding the details is a good way to help you diagnose transmission quirks, and will also help you to understand how to shift the car smoothly and baby those "weak" transmissions.

[AtomicLabMonkey]

Originally Posted by cody

You have missed my point as well.

This is like talking to a wall.

From what you wrote, your original point about people breaking tranny gears was based on fuzzy, vague 2nd-hand knowledge. Scott, Dean & others are trying to refute that based on 1st hand, directly witnessed facts. What exactly is so difficult for you to understand about the difference between the two?

If you can bring some actual facts to the table, then it's a different story. Until then, you have very little credibility.

[cody]

Originally Posted by MikeK

I had an 04 WRX for a year and a half, and I can honestly say the tranny was the thing I hated most about that car. (The brakes were a very close second). Nothing ever actually broke on my tranny, it just sucked hairy balls the whole time I had it (and not in a good way).

It was almost impossible to get that thing into first or reverse, especially in cold weather. Sometimes to back out of the garage, I would have to move the car forward an inch before it would go into reverse. Of course, it wouldn't go into first either, so I had to use second to move the car forward, then reverse to get out of the garage, then MAYBE I could get it into first to drive off. Also, I cannot count the number of times I had to start from second at a traffic light because I couldn't get the fucking POS into first.

I hated that goddamed piece of shit tranny, good riddance to it. The STi tranny is about 18,000! times better. I cannot believe both trannies were made by the same company.

What gear oil were you running if you know? I have to double clutch to get into Reverse, but 1st is nice and smooth. If you still had teh car, I'd suggest Redline Shockproof HD or maybe LD since the winters are cold here.