Howdy All. I live near Mt Barker SA and recently my 2000 Verada KJ transmission died. It has not shown any signs of failure, however it suddenly lost all drive, gears wouldn't engage at all and I had to get towed.

A garage mechanic said he has seen this happen once and it was the oil pump inside the transmission itself and it was easier and just as cost effective to replace the who transmission box. He suggested I pull off one of the oil hoses from the transmission to see if its pumping which I did and found it is not pumping at all. His off the top estimate for repair is $2000K for a new transmission + $500 for the labour. I'm obviously not too thrilled with this since the car probably isn't worth considerably more than that.

I managed to contact one wrecker that can supply "a fully rebuilt" transmission for $1250. Now I'm not particularly mechanical but I do have a currently 'between' work friend who is so I'm considering paying him to fit it for me which might be a win/win situation.

I guess what I'm looking for is to hear people's advice on this whole situation and how I should handle it to best look after my wallet and the car.

Many thanks

I think your best of after a reco box as most of them come with some type of warranty I believe. I'd PM Madmagna as he should be able to tell you what happened just on the symptoms etc.

How many KM's does your car have?

How many KM's does your car have?
Thanks. I can't recall off the top of my head its KM's, around 160K I think, I'll check tomorrow when its warmer. :)

@Bedlore..... It definately sounds like the "wave spring" syndrome. Search forums for the term "wave spring" for previous threads, and I will post a link to a US article which discusses the issue and has some pics.
The wave spring sits in the Low/Reverse clutch pack, deep in the gearbox..... some model magna/verada have a three-layer wave-spring which spirals around on itself into three thicknesses..... it seems to be prone to breaking smaller pieces of the spring off, and these pieces flow with the oil in the transmission and can cause damage if they lodge in moving parts elsewhere in the transmission. The major problem is the transmission oil pump - it has a stator around the outside and a rotor (cog like thing) which is driven by the input shaft from the engine.... if pieces of broken wave-spring get caught in the oil pump, the rotor jams against the stator and engine-power shatters the rotors.... the small pieces can flush elsewhere and cause damage in the dying stages of oil-flow.
Getting the transmission out is lots of labour. Then transmission needs to be stripped-down looking for debris and damage to other components, replacing bits as necessary. A wave-spring made of a single-layer thicker metal is available (and as far as anyone knows, this type hasn't failed). Refitting the transmission is also a lot of effort/labour (have done it in home garage with car raised at front on axle stands at front jacking points and transmission wheeled under and raised on a trolley-jack).
A wrecker or reco transmission can be cheaper than rebuilding your damaged transmission - how to avoid getting a box with the troublesome wave-spring is not so easy to advise. I "think" there have been folks who popped a wave-spring, then got wrecker box only to pop wave-spring in that one as well.
Not sure if anyone knows which models are affected - although TJ and KJ definately are affected, our family have had two failures in KJ (57K kms) and TJ (180K kms).

Here's the link about transmission and wave-spring - same gearbox in US models : http://www.transmissiondigest.com/tech/TD200508/200508ShiftPointers/200508ShiftPointers.htm

Cheers

I would say is your oil pump if you are not getting any pressure HOWEVER having said this, the reason your oil pump may have gone may be due to metal passing through it from a wave spring collapse. If is a 4sp auto, is less likely to be a wave spring

Now, a reco trans for $1200 sounds dodgy to me in every way poss, these are very expensive trans to rebuild properly.

I have several secondhand ones here, both 5speed and 4speed auto's and freight is not that bad to SA either.

Feel free to either give me a call (details in mits fix section) or PM me if you need more info