Gearbox Rebuild - Can you uprate ?

[vdubit]

The box is identical (bar the ratio's) to that fitted to every petrol 5 speed polo from mk2 to mk5 (not sure about mk1 and mk6etc). If you can get a heavy duty diff for a g40 then yes, this will fit. The main weak spot as mentioned is the fifth gear bearing. This is indeed made of plastic. Because the 5th gear is in a 'bowl' on the end of the box, if your oil gets low the 5th gear is starved, thus the plastic bearing melts. When mine went i looked in to replacing the plastic bearing with a metal one, but didnt have enough time to look into it enough (i needed the car back on the road!). All of the other bearing are made by timkin, which is pretty much the best make you can get for bearings.

The best way to prolong the gearbox life is to regularly (every 10k or so) change the box oil. Running it with slick 50 should help too. I'm gonna do mine at every engine oil change (every 6k) just to make sure its ok. Always use a quality synthetic 75w80 oil.

[ticki]

Ooooo 72000 not long till I hit the dredded 80000 mark. Still on original box. no noises.

[Mouse_GTI]

A plastic bearing...VW must be joking right?

[sorted]

Can you get a metal bearing ?

Does the box need to come out to replace the bearing on fith gear ?

[neilw]

A plastic bearing...VW must be joking right?

I hear they also have chocolate teapots in their head office

[tegwin]

Plastic bearings are actually suprisingly common in boxes etc...there are several good reasons to use one....

BUT...

When I am not playing with my GTI I am an engineer of sorts...and I am still on the hunt for a GTI gearbox that I can disect and try and imrpove...

The aim would be to find a solution to all of the problems people have been having and then recomend parts that you can have fitted when you have a recon done...