Well I was out tonight and as I turned the car to make a turn and completed the turn at about 22mph I felt a "pop" in the tranny. I was still able to get the car up to at least 50mph, as high as I brought it, but it decelerates steadily. When I pulled into my driveway I had to rev the car to about 2800-3200 rpm to get the car to start moving, and now it doesn't reverse either. Does anyone possibly have any experince of this happening to them? Was it your tranny or possibly the hardened output shaft snapping? (which I know happens more often than not to a couple of guys). Also I was just running street tires, I don't use slicks on the car.

PLEASE GIVE ME ANY ADVICE AT ALL!!!!

Thanks guys and gals

 

It sounds like your transmission is toast, I had one go out in a different car and it did the same thing that yours does in the forward gears ...I had to keep the revs way up in order for it to move, this is the clutch pack slipping.

My transmission went out in my 03 and I lost reverse, I took the car out and everything was fine then when I got home I went to back into the garage and reverse was gone

 

it is now just taking about 1000 rpm to get the car moving foward, but the reverse is still gone as of 1200 am CST, keeping my fingers crossed that maybe its just a freak thing that happened but I'm looking at trannys that are avaliable. Rebuild kits available for the tranny?

 

 

That has happened to me 3 times, and each time the tranny had 3/4 clutch packs burned up.
An extremely competent tranny specialist is needed to get you back on the road, with better parts. Since you're gonna have to get it rebuilt, make sure you get a heavy duty, high performance, level 5 tranny this time around.
I've been through this three times now, and I can tell you that I will never again let anyone rebuild mine again, except:

Century Transmissions, Finish Line Performance, or Rossler.

I didn't look to see where you were at, but if in DFW, there is a shop that has met my expectations here.
I was in a position where I did not want to ship off my tranny...wanted a quick but quality rebuild with (8) 3/4 clutches. They have a one year warranty, and I expected to be back before then (due to all my other bad experiences), but it has now been a full year, and there are still no problems. This in spite of some grueling punishment with the mods in my sig...and reaching tranny temps, at times, of up to 264 degrees (reached that temp tonight unfortunately after having it out with what I believe was a Ferrari F430, judging by my research on the web later). I was really afraid I went too far this time, because the dic warning *HIGH TRANS TEMP* came on.
The other driver got cold feet for some reason at around 130+ and started to back off. Just got scared I guess, (I have heard these cars will eat you up on the top-end) because I think he was starting to gain a little on me after I was forced to shift into 4th finally after reaching 6600 rpm in third(rev limiter's set at 6750).
Anyways, I slowed down to 55/60mph to let the temps drop. Slowly they came down to around 210 degrees after about 20 minutes of driving at that speed, and stayed there the rest of the night.
Later I kept waiting for something to happen which would indicate a tranny problem...but nothing ever did. Breathed a sigh of relief, and promised myself to change out the tranny fluid ASAP, as I'm sure it's probably wasted after that incident!
So I guess that local shop did a good job after all!

BTW, you're problem isn't going to just go away. Sounds like the tranny's already toast, and you won't be getting too far if you try and drive it somewhere. Good luck!

 

Thanks a bunch guys! I really appreciate all the info and help you guys offered. Guess I will have to get a new tranny. Didn't realize that my car had enough to kill a trans, but lesson learned and time for a new one.

 

Most of the cases of dead A4s I have seen described here, there was around 375 ft/lbs of RWTQ or more, and about 350-400 RWHP or more. I am figuring you for around, what, 330 RWHP and 340 ft/lbs of rear wheel torque??? Is that about right?

And with that Vararam, which makes a decent amount of extra horsepower once you get to speed, (it increased my trap speeds by 3 tenths of a second indicating about a 25hp gain) I can see how you busted it if you were beating on it or if you tend to beat on it.

But I have seen a couple people describe a shot A4 transmission with considerably less than that.

Looking at your mods it would appear, depending on how it is tuned, that you have just enough to kill a 4L60E transmission. Especially if torque management has been removed, or line pressures have been played with. Also if transmission temps have crept up, and you have been beating on it it won't last long either.

You might want to go with stronger parts for the rebuild and perhaps a bigger transmission cooler depending on what tranny temps you had been getting. Good luck

 

I left a voice mail on my speed shops answering machine today, and one of the owners came around and called me asap. Now thats real service, especially on a Sunday. Anyway he is gonna get me in around midweek and pull the tranny out to see what the hell had happened.

They have the equivalent of the FLP Level 4 tranny (same parts and equipment, cheaper overall price), built by a racing trans company that I know about 12 people have had installed. They have it built to support 425 rwhp, more than I will need.

Back to the tranny temp, I never saw it exceed 170 degrees when I had checked it, but not when it had snapped, crackled, and popped. The speed shop said that it was one of the strongest pullers they had ever driven, but sometimes freak accidents happen. I got over 55k miles on the stock tranny with almost all those mods on there from day 1. I never got a 1/4 mile time, but I have done my fair share of street duty. The only thing I can think of is your torque figures probably did it, since I had done a great job with the original 2.73's on street duty.

Adding the new t/c and gear, and removing the torque management probably didn't help. Now I have to live and learn from my mistake.

Thanks again guys