Gear box fitting, the full story
Finally got a little time so thought I would do a fuller write up on the gear box install.
After one of our members (OwenLCR) offered his dad's ramp up and offered to
help me the gear box fit was brought forward. CSD_19 had offered to
help with this ages ago when I was looking to change the box due to the corrosion, that was almost 2 years ago.
Since the corrosion I had always been keeping my eye out for a box, there were plenty of these refurbed but i had no trust in the refurbing of these and they were £750. There were other boxes which would also need reconditioned but these were £350-£400
Eventually I picked up one for £220
)) with 27,000 miles. This was in Ayr Scotland. So jumped in my Audi and with 6 hours of driving and £30 of fuel the gear box was back home. This is a FZQ box out of a MK4 Golf GTI anniversary.
As I've already said, an LSD has always been a Holey Grail for me.
Alot of our members are into pure power, but as most of you will know its all about handling for me. Having the rest of the handling pretty well set up and apart from a cage the last thing to do is the LSD.
So on my search for an LSD I was made aware of the Autotec Wavetrac differential. Its a sort of hybrid diff. It's similar to the Quaife and Peloquin diffs but with a pre load that can pass some traction to the other wheel in a single wheel no traction situation. Unlike the other diffs which only multiply the traction and send it to the other wheel, 100 x 0 is still 0 so if you have not traction then theres nothing to send.
So I finally bought this one from PSI tuning. I had various good offers from other companies but due to me wanting to use Stealth Racing to do the gear box and diff work it was best for me to do buy this and send it on to Stealth.
Both of these units were sent down to Stealth racing with the 02M fitting kit.
I bought a OEM LCR fitting kit off of SereMotors (of course) this was almost half the price of the APR kit and after speaking to Vince, he was equally happy to fit this with either fitting kit.
Vince was asked to check the box and see what he thought.
His initial thoughts were the box was a genuine 27,000 miler so all good.
On closer inspection there was a little doubt on one of the bearings and the 5th gear cog.
These were both changed out as there was no point in having any doubts about this box as its going to get a hard life, lol
The only other things that were changed out on this box was the shifter mechanism, as the LCR one had a slightly shorter throw, the differential bearings and the speedo sensor. The one on the newer box had a damaged connector, but the LCR one was fine so these were swapped over.
So with the car on the ramp the upper offending pieces were removed to expose the gear box mounting points. The engine was supported, only on the drivers side lifting bracket. This would allow the engine to be lowered with the drivers side mount still in place to give more space for the gear box to be slipped off the clutch/flywheel.
So with the gear box supported from below by hand/s the final bolts were removed and the gear box was
lower to the deck. What we hadn't done was to slacken off or remove the sub frame. This made it a little more difficult, but with a bit of persuasion it was out.
I've not had any issues with the clutch so there was no pint in changing out what seems to be a healthy enough stage 1 SPEC clutch with steel SMF.
The new box with diff was greased up and checked over.
We decided to remove the sub frame mounting points and drop this down and back to give us more space.
On showing up the new box there was an issue with the drive shaft mounts being further apart on the new box than the OEM one. This was a little bit of a head scratcher but all we did was remove the wish bone nuts on the drivers side and pulled the wheel back out of the way which took the drive shaft with it.
On showing up the box again we had the space this time and after a bit of fiddling about and some gear box bench pressing the splines on the box were engaged with the clutch/flywheel, PHEW!!!
The box isn't that heavy about 60 Kgs but after 5/10/15 mins it does get more so.
So the drive shaft washers and bolts were replaced with new items and were torqued x 2.
All mounting bolts were re fitted and the box was filled with OEM transmission oil.
I do plan to use Millers stuff but as the GB was getting fitted sooner than expected I hadn't got this yet.
All the rest of the removed pieces were replaced, checked and double checked.
As with all my jobs I've done on my car I cannot
help getting a bit nervous about starting the car up.
With the battery fitted the car was started.............no nasty clunks...........no rattles.........nothing flying off...........PHEW all good.
After this everything was cleared up and we headed off up the road.
All felt well up the road, I didn't want to push it initially because if something was going to go I'd rather it went at a low speed or low revs than screaming the nuts off of it.
With loads of bags, tools, a passenger and the old gear box in the back it was a bit dodgy.
With Craig dropped off I was on a road I drive pretty much every day, it was approx 01.00 and it would have been rude not to test out the traction........just a little bit
Coming off the first round about in the dry with winter tyres on I gunned it in second, this is a very tight 'S' bend and usually i have to back off a little to allow the car to gain composure before I accelerate out the last bit of the 'S'. This time, manned up lol, I went for it and I couldn't
help but crack a little smile. There was deffinately a difference.
Where you'd usually have to either back off the accelerator mid corner to save on the nose pushing forward a little it was just traction all the way round the corner.
Also where the wheel's were pointed was where the car went.
This was a bit like when the ARB's and
coilovers were fitted, you don't realise how much you had taken into account that the car didn't quite go where you pointed it.......but not this very very accurate and FUN.
After a few more corners and a few more smiles the cost and hastle of fitting the diff all seems worth it. This is only on mild (ish) driving on the road. I hope this set up with truely show its worth on the track with the R888's fitted and warmed.
Down to the nitty gritty.
Is it a must have mod?
Should I have fitted this sooner?
Should everyone get one?
TBH, YES.
As I said, I've always been handling orientated and this is the must have mod for handling fanatics. I do think that to get the best out of it you have to have the other handling pieces sorted out first, but as the icing to a pretty well set up handling car, its perfect.
Is this diff better than the Peloquins and Quaifes TBH I don't know. I've never had a diff before or been in a FWD car with a diff (apart from DJHoraces one, very recently) to compare the handling to.
I've got a track day on the 6th of May and there is a caged, stripped and VERY well set up EP3 Civic going to be there too so I'll see how I get on against him.
There you have it, the full story so far.
I'll get pictures attached to this post when I get them from Craig, this might take a few weeks as I'm away working just now.
I'll let you all know when the pictures are up, I know how much easier it is to understand whats going on when theres pictures too.
. You have a well sorted LCR there, you must be glued to the track now.
![[B)]](/forums/styles/seatcupra/oldforumsmileys/shades.gif "Cool [B)]")
if it were me on the track.
