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Transmission rebuild cost?

seanyb505

NAXJA Forum User
Location
Simpsonville, SC
Let me start out by saying Im a retard. When I changed the speedo gear I lost a lot of fluid and never got around to replacing it. Retarded mistake, I know. Now Im getting ready to pay for it. Im starting to hear sounds from the trans, much like when i heard when bearings were going back. No grinding, everything just sounds rough. My question. Would it be better to buy a junkyard ax-15 and rebuild it myself paying only for parts, or should I just take it to a transmission place. I had it done last year just because it was taking a lot of abuse and it was old, and it cost about 1250 from a guy "giving me a deal." Did i get a deal with him, or could I expect that from most repair shops? I know I am intelligent enough to read and figure out how to rebuild one(but not enough to fill the fluid back up, lol). If I take that route does anyone know about how much Im looking at for parts assuming the absolute worse?
Thanks in advance
 
is yours 2wd. the speedo gear is in the tranfercase not tranny, atleast on a 4wd.

best thing to do is drain all the fluid and replace and see if that helps with gl-3.
 
Yeah sorry its a 97 2wd, the gear is at the end of the trans. I thought they were supposed to be filled with gl-5, is gl-3 thicker or better for the situation? Its still early on, but I know from last year what it can get to be. Its gone about 2500 miles since being low.
 
Have you filled it back up yet? If not I wold start there. Also Did you get any kind of warrenty with what you did to it last year. If you did call em on it. Cause for a manual Tranny $1250 seems very high for a rebuild.
 
That sounds pretty cheap to me. And maybe he's too honest to try and
get someone else to warrenty something he did himself. That"s the kind of
thing that makes trans prices go UP.
 
It was a it was the Dad of a friend of my friends dad. And he was crazy. He put new brake pads on that ended up in me having to replace pads and rotors, left one of the transmission mount nuts off and a bunch of other stuff I still cringe when i think about. I mean I cant imagine even a remanufactured AX-15 costing more than 1500. It was done in his shop where he would work until 3 in the morning and I didnt see my jeep for 2 months cause he had other things to do. If I ever go back there its going to be for illegal reasons:explosion
 
The tranny in my YJ made noises and I had to double clutch second gear for around 30-35,000 miles, until I finally ran it into the rear end of a Gelande Wagen and bent the frame.
Run it until it gets really bad.
Gl 3 has fewer detergents in it than does GL 5, GL 5 can corrode the synchronizers some. Or so it's said, mine was getting kind of rough there towards the end, but had lasted almost 200,000 miles running mostly GL 5.
Clutch piston went out all the time. I filled the last one up with synthetic oil and it lasted twice as long as any of the others, I've been also told this was a terrible no no.
But seriously IMO the recommended fluids are likely the best choice.
 
$1250 for a rebuild? Holy cow! The rebuild kit is $180 and the unit can be rebuilt in an afternoon if you have a bearing press. I did mine with a gear puller which was a pain. It's not hard, but having the FSM in front of you makes it pretty easy.

Even if the guy paid $250 for the rebuild kit, he's dinging you $1000 in labor. AT $65/hr thats 15 hours. Remanufactured AX15s sell for $700 on eBay.

The proper fluid is a GL3 as GL5 has sulfurs which attack the brass synchros. The best fluid is a quality synthetic manual transmission oil (not a multipurpose gear oil) such as RedLine MTL90. It's expensive, but you will notice a huge improvement in shifting.
 
lawsoncl said:
$1250 for a rebuild? Holy cow! The rebuild kit is $180 and the unit can be rebuilt in an afternoon if you have a bearing press. I did mine with a gear puller which was a pain. It's not hard, but having the FSM in front of you makes it pretty easy.

Even if the guy paid $250 for the rebuild kit, he's dinging you $1000 in labor. AT $65/hr thats 15 hours. Remanufactured AX15s sell for $700 on eBay.

The proper fluid is a GL3 as GL5 has sulfurs which attack the brass synchros. The best fluid is a quality synthetic manual transmission oil (not a multipurpose gear oil) such as RedLine MTL90. It's expensive, but you will notice a huge improvement in shifting.
Yeah he didnt get it right the first time, or the second time, or the thrid time. He had to pull it all apart 3 times before he got it good(according to him). I dont have problems shifting, it just makes a noise similar to the reverse sound, although nowhere near as bad. So right now my options are
- Have my friendly neighborhood transmission shop fix the noises
- buy a reman trans and put it in myself
- buy a junkyard trans and rebuild so i have something to replace my current one with when it disintegrates.
I know which one would be cheapest and which one would cost the most. The question now is is it worth it to build it yourself or would I be safer in buying a reman?
 
JXPEEJ said:
Sometimes there is more to a rebuild than just the rebuild kit. Hard parts
can add up quick. How much is your time worth?

True, but quite often you know that ahead of time by the symptoms. Either way you have to pull the tranny and it really only takes 15 minutes to seperate the case and get an idea of the condition of the gears themselves and the shift forks. Personally, I'd probably pull the tranny and have a quick look before I ordered parts.

The whining noise may be a bearing. My rebuild held up and shifted great for 35k miles before I started hearing a whining which got worse and I started having what seemed to be clutch problems. Turned out the pilot bearing nuked and gaulled the end of the input shaft. The whining was the input bearing that didn't like the added stress and develoepd about 1/8" of play.
 
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