So if the gear ratio is lower, does that mean the car is going to sit even higher up the rev range when at motorway speed? As it already sit at almost 4k at motorway speeds...

Final drive is 3.875 on both the DXJ and the DKD but the bit that says about overall ratio in top gear is 3.437 on the DXJ (current box) and 2.868 on the DKF?

Have you tried Stevens VW breakers in Essex ??

No, just had a counter offer of £180 +£50 postage on a DXJ though so might just have to bite the bullet and pick that up. At least it's the same box then and will be delivered this week...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/182005868646?_trksid=p2047675.m570.l6346&_trkparms=gh1g%3DI182005868646.N101.S1&autorefresh=true

Lower the number of final drive is a higher top speed Matt so you should have lower revs on a smaller final drive Box

So if you have a ratio of 3.5 it takes 3.5 turns of your drive gear for your driveshaft to turn once or wheel to turn once.

Ah okay, I think that makes sense. I've found a box that's the same as mine so hopefully that will work out okay.

Just saying that I've never paid more than £100 for a replacement box on both my 8v and 16v. That's from scrap yards all over and my local plus pease pottage that I visited religiously. But I guess now that they must be getting rarer and rarer.

I take it these gearboxes are like the golf mk2 where they used a revit type on the diff which often fails , most gearbox specialist upgrade that part with a modified stainless steel nut and bolt to prevent it from happening. Hope you get it sorted

Nimal

£100 was just bring up 1.0 boxes. Could have fitted one of those and it would have pulled like mad, but would have been no fun on those occasions where I do venture up and down the motorway. It's more than I wanted to spend but at least it'll drive exactly the same. There aren't many decent scrappies down here and I know there are no polos in there at the moment. That's always chancing it too because what if the car is in there cos the gearbox is dead? I've just gotta hope the box I've paid too much for is a good one. Not sure what I'll do if another gearbox goes. Probably keep the engine for future use, use the disc setup to revamp my Golf beam and sell what's left. Hopefully it won't come to that. Sure it'll be alright once the gearbox is done but my £800 car that "I won't need to throw money at" is now gonna cost me just over £400 to get back on the road cos the clutch is shot too.

If you got the funds you could get a recon unit with uprated Pinion bearing apprantley used in race cars from http://www.volkswagenspares.com/page.php?page=Gearboxes

pricey at 395 but worth it. Used them years ago for my golf mk2 2y box

Already got another DXJ on the way. Already spending way over what I ever wanted to spend on this car. Whole reason I spent a bit more on the car in the first place.

What lead to the failure Matt? They can go on grumbling for many thousands of miles. You say it also needs a clutch too which I thought was new anyway. Be interested to know what failed just for my own curiosity as I've repaired a fair few of these boxes over the years. You mentioned it pissed oil out, so presume you have a hole in the case somewhere.

We're not entirely sure really. Definitely the diff bearings that have gone, but it only started its high pitch whine about 15 minutes before it blew. I couldn't see a hole in the casing but I was in a car park and couldn't get under it too well. I'll find out if there was a hole in it when the work is done.

I pulled over to check my clutch and see if it working properly in the bay end and cod the car is low and I misjudged the dip in the road I did smack the bottom, so I'm wondering if maybe I caught the housing of something and that's why it pissed its oil. The clutch was new yep, but from the 20 metres it took to move it from where I left it to the ramps yesterday my mate said all he could smell was burning clutch. I drove a few miles on after checking it as we were going out for dinner, and 50 or so metres from where we were going the box got louder and louder and started spitting white smoke out everywhere. After we'd eaten I got it recovered.

Well at least I know where the oil went.

Be really nice to open that box up to see what got ejected. To my kinda trained eye, it looks like a cylindrical bearing roller.

I'm not sure but clearly something loosed itself with some velocity!

Can pick the car up tomorrow evening hopefully.

With the new gearbox I'm getting some whine, but only on the throttle and only in 5th it seems. Is this a bad sign?;it's a sort of high pitched drone :/ not too loud at the moment.

....... only in 5th it seems.

Hi

Is the oil level correct?

It had new oil, we're gonna drain it and refill it again tomorrow. That's the only thing I can really think of.

Oil will probably only delay the issue, if you've got a whine it's possible that it is the box. This is the chance you take with 2nd hand ones.

As long as its only in fifth, the likely cause is the bearing under the fifth gear on the output shaft. Usually ruined by running the box low of oil (previous owner!). Not a difficult job though and can be done with the box in situ.

Unlikely to explode like the previous box though.

It seems to be in most gears now I've had a chance to listen more. It's much quieter than my other box was but it is still there :/

my old polo whined in 5th quietly after I'd accidently ran it low on oil, filled it up with new selector seal and no matter how much I abused it it didnt pop :)

I'm hoping if I flush the oil and replace the drive shaft seals I'll be alright. Selector seal was done with box.

Box died, 5th is gone completely and it's crunchy and whiney.

My next question, is a CWX box cable change? If so I've found one that should be a suitable replacement but can't find a straight answer on part numbers. Came off a 97 16v.