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POW! Trans is dead (CSVT MTX75)

S

sav0320

CEG'er
Joined
Jun 16, 2008
Messages
201
Location
Detroit, Michigan USA!
I was supposed to drive my dad's T-Red SVT across Michigan Thursday after his shifter repair - the result of a failure mode that apparently leaves a chunk of a bolt in the trans case. The repair shop said the chunk would be caught by the drainplug magnet. I had serious worries about driving 75-80 mph (OK, 143 mph :cool:) in the car. (I also spent 6.5 years as a transmission engineer...) Sure enough, with my wife behind me in the Grand Caravan, I take the car up past the secondaries in first, and about halfway up through second, I hear this pop pop pop, BANG!

Getting off the throttle, engine braking in gear, I kept hearing a pop pop pop at irregular beats. Limped it back to my house. Tonight I rolled the car back and found the ATF bloodstains in the driveway. Confirmed a major tear/crack around the ring gear/trans case. I thought the bolt chunk got stuck between the ring and pinion. Thought wrong. Check out the pics.

What are our options? Ford does not reman manual transmission from what I understand, so are we stuck with some third party that buys the cores to do reman? Stuck with a new trans? Is there some super MTX-75 build-up shop? The G5M (Mazda) manual in my Fission blew up (extra dowel pin in the bellhousing) and that was a $3500 repair with parts and labor.

trans1.jpg


trans2.jpg


trans3.jpg


Thanks. :eek:
 
Do a search for Terry Haines. He likely can supply a core as well as rebuild it for you in a manner that this will never happen again. It sounds like you had the shirt tower bolt break and did not retrieve the head of the bolt. That was a "must do", even if you needed to pull the trans to get it.

You can also read various posts about repairing the MTX75 model transmission and determine if you want to handle it in some other manner. Check the classifieds and see if someone has a trans for sale.
 
Big Jim said:
Do a search for Terry Haines. He likely can supply a core as well as rebuild it for you in a manner that this will never happen again. It sounds like you had the shirt tower bolt break and did not retrieve the head of the bolt. That was a "must do", even if you needed to pull the trans to get it.

You can also read various posts about repairing the MTX75 model transmission and determine if you want to handle it in some other manner. Check the classifieds and see if someone has a trans for sale.
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Like Jim said. Sounds like you had a shifter tower bolt failure and then continued to drive it. :blackeye: Then said bolt piece caught a gear set and fractured the case in the process. A new MTX with LSD is the best course of action here. Only ~25% more expensive then the bare minimum fix! Terry is the man for CDW-27 tranny work. Could not tell you if any other place like BAT still sells full MTX's.
 
DemonSVT said:
Like Jim said. Sounds like you had a shifter tower bolt failure and then continued to drive it. :blackeye: Then said bolt piece caught a gear set and fractured the case in the process. A new MTX with LSD is the best course of action here. Only ~25% more expensive then the bare minimum fix! Terry is the man for CDW-27 tranny work. Could not tell you if any other place like BAT still sells full MTX's.
Click to expand...

The shop my dad took it to for the repair is a joke, but he has been going there for 28 years...blah blah blah. When he told me they were leaving a chunk of metal in the trans, I thought they were completely full of crap. Then I saw some postings on here about it and mentioned it...

He is gonna get a quote from an SVT dealer that has probably seen this stuff before. He is even mentioning dumping the car if the repair $$ is too high. Told him the car will not be leaving the family, so I might have a trans swap/repair to do in my garage. :cool: 67k miles! This is why I lease our two daily drivers, no out of warranty BS.

Thanks for the replies. Oh yeah, when I type "MTX-75" in Google, an old message board with some Terry Haines posts comes up in the top five.
 
Thanks everyone, looks like the problem is solved...and I get a free weekend trip to South Haven (including beer & pizza) from Detroit. Just ordered a new desktop to build through NewEgg, should be fun transporting the car and building up the new computer.

Apparently FCSD only sells parts, not whole trans units. Surprised this fits into the federal service parts regulations, which I thought were 10 years after job LAST.

Thanks again.
 
I can't tell you how many times I've seen that violated. I have even seen customers attempt to sue to force Ford to provide a part for a less than ten year old car without any success. The same seems to be true for other car companies I've been around.
 
I have pursued Ford automatic trans parts in their dealership parts database only to find the parts "no longer available". This 6 years later after model of car. They want you to buy a new car, not parts.
 
Bill Jenkins told me that they are supposed to keep parts available until this longest warranty for the last year expires, or about 7 years. I thought that it was 10 years too. Hence why I was pissed that I couldn't get tail light gaskets from anywhere.
 
I just bought one from here:
http://usedautoparts.everdrive.com/SearchParts.aspx?gclid=COn67eKiqZQCFR4sagode1J2tQ

I bought the 1998 2.5L MTX-75 model. I bought the $599 one labeled "exc. SVT". It's the only kind in stock, and everyone here has assured me so far that, despite that the site has it labeled as "exc. SVT", there is no difference between that and the one that is labeled for the SVT. It should be here in a couple of days and we'll find out.

These trannies are used and that makes tham sort of a grab-bag as far as quality, but they all have a 3-year warranty garauntee, so I'm covered if the thing is a POS.

The other major popular option here is to ship your tranny to Terry Haines, who is a complete expert in the reconditioning and rebuilding of MTX-75 transmissions of all variations. He has it down to an exact science, and can give you everthing from a basic stock-level rebuild to an advanced and radical overhaul with strong aftermarket performance-oriented internals that render your transmission virtually impervious to your abuse. These rebuilds range in price (from what I've gathered) from around $1,800 to nearly $3,000, depending on how much of a beast you want. I'll eventually be shipping my old tranny to him for one of these if all goes well.
 
The SVT dealer in South Haven, MI tried ordering a new trans case from Ford, and they were told the case has an obsolete part number!! This is starting to get ridiculous. Sent e-mail to a bunch of my Ford contacts, hopefully I can get some info. from FCSD, if anyone still works in that dept :). Everyone I worked with in FCSD took buyouts!
 
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