Transmission rebuilders T5 Brisbane

[Ivo]

Interesting question...are VW monitoring this forum? Who knows, quite possibly. What I do know is that they ought to be. Word of mouth goes a LONG way. I love my van, and if any one asks about I'm happy to tell them about it. There are two families at my sons school who are both interested in getting Multivans. I rave about how versatile a vehicle it is, how good it drives etc but then I have to tell them about VW's crappy sealed for life transmission. They give me the strangest look of "WTF?" Yep I know, great car but due to their (VW's) service requirements the end user is stuck with a repair bill for thousands of $. What have both these families decided to do? Ones a Vet and is looking at the Mercedes options and the other is a well payed coal miner and he is looking at the Hyundais now. Basically VW has lost 2 sales due to word of mouth. Yeah I know, DSG in the new vans but still there is now a negative reputation they have earn't by shafting existing owners.

[Transporter]

The Mercedes A/T could as bad. We had the 2005 Jeep Cherokee 2.8CRD that had MB 5 speed auto and it was the reason while we stopped driving it the day the 3years warranty run out and were sharing one car between 2 family members for a months untill the Touareg was delivered. Just about every brand that used that MB a/t had the problems with it and it wasn't filled with the oil for life.

[BrianJ]

My daughter just traded in a 4 year old Merc 200B because the auto started to bunny hop as she called it and the dealers wanted $1800 to service it before they could say what was wrong and if it would cost more to repair. My 2002 RAV4 had a sealed for life auto as well, luckily it did not fail while I owned it but I believe there was a class action against Toyota in the US due to massive amount of failures.

I don't think people should single out VW over this, it is a sign of the times and is happening to all makers because they all source their autos from just a few manufacturers.

My 2006 kombi beach auto has done 140,000km and still functions as the day it was bought, so they are not all failing prematurely. Hopefully it will do a lot more km yet.

For the original poster of this thread, I know that the owner of German Autos at Geebung in Brisbane has repaired a transporter that he owns by resleeving the actuator cylinder for one of the gears in his auto. It could be worth giving him a call to see what he thinks.

Brian

[Sunny43.5]

I spent this morning doing some investigation into the rebuild situation , one place knew about the T5 triptronic problem with out prompting . Resleeving was one of the options he suggested along with new valve bodies from the US , unfortunatley as is the case he warned me off another repairer as he claimed they sent the boxes to Vic and the repair done there was dodgy "his words" . Now I have booked the van into a VW dealer for assesment and report which will be sent to VW for their consideration . As a matter of interest this guy was fairly knowlegble but his approx quote of between $14000 and $16000 plus labour stopped me dead the van is probably not worth that anymore , as my wife pointed out a repair was nearly half what the van was worth when new .Stay Tuned

[gtghwrites]

I spent this morning doing some investigation into the rebuild situation , one place knew about the T5 triptronic problem with out prompting . Resleeving was one of the options he suggested along with new valve bodies from the US , unfortunatley as is the case he warned me off another repairer as he claimed they sent the boxes to Vic and the repair done there was dodgy "his words" . Now I have booked the van into a VW dealer for assesment and report which will be sent to VW for their consideration . As a matter of interest this guy was fairly knowlegble but his approx quote of between $14000 and $16000 plus labour stopped me dead the van is probably not worth that anymore , as my wife pointed out a repair was nearly half what the van was worth when new .Stay Tuned

Hi Sunny, what was the outcome for this - do you have any specialists you can recommend. I have a Multivan that is doing rough changes after the engine is hot and occasionally sticking in gear (usually 3rd). It's done about 170,000kms.

[Sunny43.5]

Amazing I thought this thread was dead and buried ! I never posted back to this particular thread on what the outcome was but here goes as it may help you . First the dealer who did the service only removed a single bolt from the sump pan -then refilled it via another bolt hole at the top with new fluid at $68 a litre around 7 litres from memory , the auto from that day onwards was doomed you would stop at lights and when you took off there was no drive .
After a month or two and being told by first the dealer and then VWA that they would not help I sort of gave up , then I found a place at Loganholme that did know about the T5 transmission so I got them to do a rebuild . I went to the workshop the next day to inspect the dismantled box and got a shock , turned out that the dealer had not removed the sump pan so inside the box was the filter for the fluid . This was almost completely blocked because VW had not replaced it , now before the service slipping was a very rare occurrence and after the service it was so bloody common it almost caused accidents on a daily basis .
If VW had a service schedule with the auto that was done at say 60.000 kay intervals and also included removing and replacing the filter to this day I believe that our problem and others who have had similar would not had their failures . When that filter starts to block the slippage starts as it starves the clutch packs of the fluid and it kills itself . The same day I got the van back from VW it turns out because our filter was already partially blocking the new fluid that was added cleaned out all the particles around the auto which made the filter even worse , then because they did not remove the sump pan what I could see during the removal was a thick layer of sludge which I could write my initials in this was also watered down by the new fluid the VW dealer added . So when taking off from the lights the pump would then suck up all the crap in the bottom and totally block the filter and then no drive was the result but that would cause the clutches to get burnt . When I shifted to park and restart in those few moments the fluid would drain backwards through the filter and you would get some drive back until the next stop .
Now I spent the next two years battling with VW to no avail even though I had sent photos of the sump and the filter first to Germany and then to VWA . I believe that VW knew that the "sealed for life "was a mistake for the Australian market , several pointers helped me to make a case . In 2010 VW declared Australia a hot climate country {funny about that after selling cars here for the previous 60 odd years } so they then made the service schedule on the then new DSG to be at 60.000 kays PLUS the filter on the DSG is on the OUTSIDE , plus they then told customers they could then get the Triptonic serviced as well via the same stupid method that killed ours . Australia is a hot climate country and there is no way any fluid will maintain its viscosity under those extreme conditions , they should have also fitted external coolers to these as well . After the two year battle I got involved with the ABC TV when they were investigating the Golf problems , I told a reporter what happened to ours even though it was not Golf related but it was a safety problem . He asked if he could forward my story to VW who were in denial of any issues with their cars , they VWA contacted me again and I told my story to a lady at VW customer care , two weeks later I received a call from the same lady who again refused to offer any help . I then asked her if they had a weekly meeting with high up people in VWA to report on their contacts with customers during the previous week . I asked her to ask those responsible if they would accept a nearly $10000 repair to a car with only at the time 120000 kays on the clock because of a design fault . Another week later she rang back and told me they were making a 50% "goodwill payment "to me . Since then I have now found another place that has had a longer experience with these autos over at Slacks Creek Auto Trans Tech 9 Monte St .