|
|
|
I was pulling out of a parking lot in my 98 S70 today (manual transmission) when I realized that something is wrong with the tranny. The shift quality has been very good since I got it in May, but now it's nearly impossible to get it into 2nd, 3rd, or 4th gear. The problem seems to have happend all at once, because it was fine when I drove into the parking lot 20 minutes earlier. Trying to shift normally requires a ridiculous amount of effort to get it into gear. Double clutching seems to help, though. I don't think it's the clutch of the linkage because I can row right through all gears with the car running at a standstill. I drove it straight home once I noticed the problem (about 20 minutes on secondary roads) and I'm not willing to drive it anywhere but to the mechanic in this condition.
So the question is this: has this happened to anyone else? Another stupid and expensive FWD problem? Any idea how to fix it? I'm going to call the mechanic in the morning to see what he thinks but I'd love to hear any input from you all. Thanks in advance for any and all advice.
Tim
P.S.- On the bright side, we still have the old 740 that I used to drive. 18 years and one accident old and it's still an absolute tank. Not exactly refined, but it's had fewer problems than any other car my family has ever owned.
--
Tim Smith 98 S70, 74k mi.
|
|
-
posted by
someone claiming to be Ray N
on
Thu Jul 31 06:09 CST 2003 [ RELATED]
|
|
There are two TSBs on the clucth for 98. One replaces the clutch
spring to make shifting a bit easier. The other is a campaign
for hard shifting (which means the delaer may do it for free -- mine
offered to). See this post with more:
http://www.brickboard.com/AWD/?id=570427
|
|
-
|
|
|
Ray beat me to it, regarding the "decrease in clutch efficiency" TSB. I consider that to be a prime suspect, as the description of the problem and fix in All-Data seems to match your issue pretty well.
(BTW, I have that revised auxilliary spring in my car. It was pretty much useless for improving clutch pedal feel. Don't bother.)
Two other thoughts come to mind, which people have already touched upon:
Bad Slave Cylinder or clutch hydraulics: certainly, check the fluid level. If your slave cylinder IS failing, then I'm fairly certain that it can be replaced without doing a full clutch job. I believe that it's only the 99+ slave cylinders that are integrated with the throw-out bearing. Those later models require replacing the slave cylinder / throw-out bearing from the inside. $$$$
Tranny Fluid leak: not likely, if you didn't see a huge puddle of oil under or around the car. These trannies only take a couple of quarts, but that tends to spread out pretty quickly when you dump it out in a parking spot. Still, it's easy enough to check the level. If you choose to drain the fluid to inspect it for metal filings / bearing bits / etc, I replaced mine with Redline Oil 75W90NS and experienced a slight improvement in shift quality over the stock Volvo synthetic fluid. See http://www.redlineoil.com/products.htm for more info.
Hope that helps. Good luck.
--
Jim Rothe, '99 S70 T5M,
http://www.jimrothe.com/volvo/index.html
|
|
-
|
|
|
Knowing about the TSB is definitely useful. A "loss in clutch efficiency" seems to be exactly the problem. I'll give the dealer a buzz in the morning. I checked out the procedure on alldata and it doesn't seem to be all that bad. (When compared to a full clutch job.) Luckily it's a 98 and not a 99, which apparently isolates the hydraulic components from the clutch itself.
Tim
--
Tim Smith 98 S70, 74k mi.
|
|
-
|
|
|
I just took it around the block and paid more attention to what was happening.
At very low speed it shifted from first to second gear with no problem, (10mph). A more normal acceleration out of first gear resulted in a very hard shift into second gear. Third was the same as I got up to 30MPH. I cruised at 30-35 on the back roads around my house shifting between 2nd and 3rd gears. Double clutching on the way down worked, but the shift into 3rd was always hard. Every time I had to make an attempt that didn't work, wait a second, then put it into gear. By the time it went into gear the engine revs had descended significantly. (Possibly related.)
On a slightly faster road I was changing between 3rd and 4th, this time shifting more slowly than normal. I found that upshifting went smoothly if I waited 2-4 seconds after depressing the clutch to shift gears. I noticed that this is about the same amount of time that it takes for the engine revs to descend to the appropriate speed. (The engine always hovers for a bit after I take my foot off the gas before the revs start to fall off.)
My current thinking is that this is, in fact, a clutch problem. Perhaps the clutch isn't disengaging completely which causes the input shaft of the transmission to continue to spin at the wrong speed. (The synchros don't seem to be working because they physically can't.) The engine has to slow down to the next gear's speed before I can shift. The theory fits the symptoms almost perfectly, as I see it.
I'm glad you guys pushed the possibility of a clutch problem because it's making more and more sense to me.
Tim
--
Tim Smith 98 S70, 74k mi.
|
|
-
posted by
someone claiming to be Punxsutawney Phil
on
Thu Jul 31 00:05 CST 2003 [ RELATED]
|
|
IF you do wind up replacing the clutch, also consider having the engine main seal replaced. This is something else that invariably fails, it's only a few bucks more when everything is apart.
I've NEVER fried a clutch plate myself, all my clutch failures have been stuff like: clutch rubber center (Porsche), pilot bearing (Saab), clutch slave cylinder (Porsche, again).
Costs just as much as if I had worn out the clutch....
-Punxsutawney Phil
|
|
-
|
|
|
Thanks for the tip. Right now the challenge is finding someone who can look at it. My usual mechanic can take care of it...in September. If only I had a lift and a garage full of special tools.
Tim
--
Tim Smith 98 S70, 74k mi.
|
|
-
posted by
someone claiming to be Punxsutawney Phil
on
Wed Jul 30 11:45 CST 2003 [ RELATED]
|
|
All at ONCE?
WOW!
Was it a "park it yourself lot"? Did you leave it in gear, and is there any evidence on your car that someone bashed into it? (I lost a chunk of reverse gear in one of my Saabs this way.)
Clutch master or slave cylinder?
Does it help if you pump the clutch?
If so, I think you need to pull the engine and transmission to get at the slave cylinder and clutch, might as well replace the clutch while you're in there. the labor is much more than the parts. Anyway, a clutch is much cheaper than a transmission, so that's what I'd be praying for!
-Punxsutawney Phil
'98 V70T5M, 123k mi., iPd stabilizer bars, Volvo strut tower brace and skidplate, Valentine-1, Mobil-1 always, e-code headlight lenses, Dunlop SP5000s
|
|
-
|
|
|
Yeah, see? This is probably the most screwed up thing I've ever seen a car do. It was parked in front of a CVS for about 20 minutes. (It might have been there longer since I went around the corner to get a bottle of wine.) There's no evidence that it was hit in any way. (You'd think that due to the painted bumpers one would notice an impact that hard, no?) A clutch problem was my first thought as well since it's all three of those gears but I just don't know. When it's parked I can get it into first gear with no problem at all. The engine did seem to be running a little rougher at idle, though...maybe a sign of a dragging clutch? Computer trying to compensate by opening up the idle control motor? Sounds pretty thin, but who knows.
Also...sudden realization...the clutch pedal did start sqeaking about two days ago. I assumed that some kind of pivot needed to be greased, but it's also easy to forget it's not a cable operated clutch like I'm used to.
So, yeah. I have a feeling I'm going to make Bruce the Volvo Indy very happy again. I'll keep the board updated.
Tim
--
Tim Smith 98 S70, 74k mi.
|
|
-
posted by
someone claiming to be Punxsutawney Phil
on
Wed Jul 30 15:26 CST 2003 [ RELATED]
|
|
There was a post about a similar problem on an 850 in the Brickboard archives, but no responses!
As a long shot I might look at the upper motor mount, aka the "torque arm bushing" (these ALWAYS fail, eventually). Also the "front engine mount". Failure could conceivably cause everything to shift suddenly out of place....
Extremely curious as to what's causing the problem!
-Punxsutawney Phil
|
|
-
|
|
|
Those are some interesting thoughts. I'm as baffled as you are about this. What really gets me is how suddenly it happened! I had zero problems with it just minutes before. I'm just glad I didn't have far to drive it home.
I'll go check the mounts and a few other things.
Tim
--
Tim Smith 98 S70, 74k mi.
|
|
-
|
|
|
my 850 makes a squeak when depressing the clutch. With dead synchro it should be hard to shift into gear without grinding, i dont necessarily think it effects ease of going into gear.
try looking on the web for double clutching, make sure youre doing it properly, try doing rev matching as well were you bring the engine up to speed it should be in the next gear before it goes in, takes some practice but should help.
can you shift it with the car off? Never heard of a car with all the synchros toasted so i think mabye look elsewhere correct me if im wrong but theres a synchro for each gear.
also do you have the habbit of not using the emergencey brake? I notice mechanics tend to leave it in gear with the e brake not on. I allways use ebrake and leave it in gear, if it got pushed without the ebrake on like the other member stated above it can have nasty results.
id check the linkage cable, then the clutch master and slave. make sure you have break fluid and thats aok becuase clutch uses same fluid. If you cant shift the car when its off i would really tend to think linkage, had a ice problem with a old honda, ice got stuck on the linkage from our sump pump emptying onto the driveway, made the car literally impossible to put into reverse (hardest gear to get into).
also before you go out testing it again make sure you got plety of tranny fluid, and the nut diddnt snap off or something, haynes has the process on how to check. Seems like the manual m56 tranny is pretty reliable, so id look for strange flke things like linkage damage or fluid loss.
|
|
-
|
|
|
Thanks for the post. I'll try to address everything in order.
Your comment about the synchro is interesting. The transmission definitely does NOT grind into gear. (I've experienced a small amount of gear clash on rare occasion but I think that's usually the result of letting the clutch back out too early...my own fault.) The symptom is only that it's very difficult to get the shifter into position.
I tried to rev-match once on the way home but the results weren't so good. The match wasn't good enough so all I got was a nasty grind. I think I'm just too new to the car to know well enough where the engine RPMs should be at any given speed/gear. As for double clutching, I learned that back when I was driving my 740. I only ever did it when I was down shifting as I thought it was easier on the transmission. (Get all the rotating assemblies in the transmission going at about the same speed in order to keep the synchros from having to do an excessive amount of work, right? It always seemed to make for a smoother downshift.) I don't know how much good double clutching really did today. It seemed to ease the shift, but now always.
Yes, I can shift perfectly well with the car turned off. For that reason I don't think that it's the linkage.
I always leave the ebrake on with the car in gear when it's parked. Especially if it's on a hill. I figure that if the ebrake were to fail for some reason I'd be better off with the car in gear...less likely to roll. I can see why leaving it in gear if it got hit would be bad, though.
I'll go out and take a look at all the fluids and other components that you mention before I do anything else. I think I have an applicable Haynes manual around here somewhere. I'll try to figure out where the squeak is coming from,too. Again, thanks for the post.
Tim
--
Tim Smith 98 S70, 74k mi.
|
|
|
|
|
