'99 Legacy transmission pull...

[hiropro42]

So, for those of you who may not have heard about this issue before, here's a brief recap (car is a '99 Legacy Outback wagon, 5-spd manual):

 

Clutch completely lost pedal and became unresponsive very suddenly, just after starting up one night. Master and slave cylinders have both been replaced recently, and there's no fluid leakage. After pulling the airbox and the clutch lever boot, I saw the pivot had punched through the lever itself. Clutch doesn't slip, and I *can* technically still drive the car through rev-matching, but I'm not very good at it, and the car is high mileage (225,000 or so), so it's been parked for a little under a month.

 

I have the replacement parts and the Haynes manual, plus access to a shop, but here's a list of a couple of questions for any old pros out there:

 

Anyone got any tips about avoiding common mistakes?

 

Given that the transmission itself is a rebuild and is less than 30,000 miles old, do I really need to replace the gaskets/seals/spring pins as stated in the Haynes manual, or is that stuff in there primarily to assure that dealership service departments and garage mechanics aren't liable for damages if they're reused?

 

Is there any real danger in reusing said parts?

 

I'm not worried about other hardware, since I have plenty of that laying around; I just figured if I really do need the gaskets and other assorted stuff they say to replace, I probably should grab it before I start to tackle this thing.

[davebugs]

I always replace those clips. Cheap insurance.

 

I almost always replace the pilot bearing and often throwout bearing.

 

The clutch and PP are up to you.

 

I'd certainly look over the flywheel and atleast buff it up a little bit.

 

And reseal the baffle plate on the rear of the engine while you have access.

[hiropro42]

I always replace those clips. Cheap insurance.

 

You're talking about the spring pins, yes?

 

I almost always replace the pilot bearing and often throwout bearing.

 

Good to know; I'll check them out.

 

The clutch and PP are up to you.

 

PP...? Sorry, I've had a bit of a day, and it's not clicking for me right now.

 

I'd certainly look over the flywheel and atleast buff it up a little bit.

 

Planned to, thanks.

 

And reseal the baffle plate on the rear of the engine while you have access.

 

Any recommendations for what to seal with?

[Suba9792]

might as well replace the fork as well, my 97 broke the fork a while back and I have heard that its a pretty common occurrence.

[hiropro42]

might as well replace the fork as well, my 97 broke the fork a while back and I have heard that its a pretty common occurrence.

 

Uh, that's actually why I'm pulling the tranny in the first place. The pivot wore its way straight through the stamped steel of the fork itself. From what the parts guy at the nearest Soobie dealer said, he sees a half dozen or so of those a year, almost always around the 200,000 or 400,000 mile marks.

[davebugs]

PP = pressure plate.

 

Clean the baffle plate and matching surface with carb/brake clean or similar. Small bead of Ultra Grey to reseal it.

 

Those clips I get at the dealer.

[hiropro42]

PP = pressure plate.

 

Clean the baffle plate and matching surface with carb/brake clean or similar. Small bead of Ultra Grey to reseal it.

 

Those clips I get at the dealer.

 

Awesome, thanks.

[hiropro42]

So.

 

Been doing this project myself. No help. In my driveway. On jackstands. Wheee. Anyway...

 

Pretty much everything went smoothly until I got the car up in the air and started to work on the exhaust. All the heat shield hardware is rusted into unrecognizable lumps. Ok, whatever. Passenger side header came unbolted fairly easily, after a single application of Liquid Wrench and a little help from an impact driver. 3-4 seconds max for each, and they spun right out. Headed over to the driver's side, and the inside nut came right off easily. The other two were pains in the rump roast and stopped me dead last night. Doused them each in Liquid Wrench, let it sit, and hit it early this morning. The rear nut came out with the shaft after about 5-6 seconds. Split three Craftsman 14mm 1/2 sockets on the front one, and eventually watched in horror as the nut rounded badly.

 

I checked out one of the other threads here having to do with cam bolts, and it mentioned something called "bolt-out." Can anyone tell me what that would be? Not something I've heard of before, unless it goes by other names. Am I looking at shearing off the nut and the exposed part of the shaft and somehow extracting it?

 

After deciding to attack it from a different angle, I unbolted the connection between the cats and started to loosen the bolt on the hanger affixed to the tranny itself. Less than a quarter turn and the head ripped right off the bolt, leaving the rest stuck in the hanger. The good news is that the exhaust is off the car. The bad news is that a.) I have two bolts that need to be extracted and b.) the center section has literally been welded to the front section, which I couldn't see without taking the damn thing out. I don't really care about that, personally. It's stupid, and I'll be replacing it within the next year, for sure, but for now, I need to get these two bolts out.

 

Suggestions?

[WoodsWagon]

Get a torch. Heat, and really hot heat like oxy acetalyne, is needed to get rusted to ************ bolts out. Heat it till it glows, shut the torch off, and pound a size smaller 6 point socket up on it. Should come out.

 

The hanger unbolts from the tranny, so you can take that off, get it over to a vice, and drill a hole through the sheared bolt. Then put a bolt and nut on instead of the captured nut on the hanger.

Edited September 15, 2010 by WoodsWagon

[hiropro42]

Get a torch. Heat, and really hot heat like oxy acetalyne, is needed to get rusted to ************ bolts out. Heat it till it glows, shut the torch off, and pound a size smaller 6 point socket up on it. Should come out.

 

Ok, wait. The bolt in question is one of the three holding the driver's side exhaust header on, which means it isn't really a bolt, but a stud and a nut. The nut is gone, by the way; Dremmled off. The stud is still there, but not all of it. Since I was expecting to have to replace them, I wasn't exactly careful about not grinding the stud here and there. Point being that it's like having a bolt where the head has twisted off or something. There's still a little under a half inch of it sticking out of the bottom of the engine.

 

My neighbor (a really nice old guy who knew my dad pretty well before he died and lets me borrow tools) doesn't have an oxy acetylene setup, but he said he used to use a trick where he'd use a propane torch to heat the remaining stud and then jam an ice cube on it right away. His point was that the rapid cooling had a tendency to break any rust-fused bond that had formed, and often worked for him on stuff that impact drivers couldn't touch. I didn't try it yet because he only told me about it over beers after I'd decided to call it quits for the day. Anyone tried this? Any reason to think it wouldn't work?

 

The hanger unbolts from the tranny, so you can take that off, get it over to a vice, and drill a hole through the sheared bolt. Then put a bolt and nut on instead of the captured nut on the hanger.

 

That was exactly what I was thinking, actually. Staring up at it from the creeper, I said, "Wait: this isn't connected to anything else right now, and it's not in the way. Why can't I just take it off and deal with it after the tranny's already out?

[johnceggleston]

The hanger unbolts from the tranny, so you can take that off, get it over to a vice, and drill a hole through the sheared bolt. Then put a bolt and nut on instead of the captured nut on the hanger.

 

or just replace it, there should be lots of them floating.