URGENT!! trans question

["Lisa & Rick" <hugacub@whidbey.net>]

OK....I have a question that hopefully someone can answer.  I need an 
answer ASAP as my car is sitting on the rack at the VW dealer and I'm 
unsure how long they'll accomodate me.  I need to decide how to 
proceed immediately.

I had the dealer put in the clutch, rear engine seal, tranny seals 
and motor mounts (except right side) when my clutch finally blew 
during a blizzard just before new years.  I was gonna do it myself, 
but the weather prevented that.  I got the car back new years eve and 
the clutch worked great.  Oh yeah, someone had put a 200mm clutch and 
flywheeel, so I had to get a 210 flywheel to match my new 210 clutch.
I had to convince them that it would fit, they thought it wouldn't 
work.  This made me uneasy as to their competence, but it was allayed 
when I got the car back and it worked perfectly.  It lasted about 
1,000 miles till disaster.

9 days later (last Thur) on the way home the clutch started slipping 
and I smelled gear oil.  I took it back to the dealer that nite with 
a note asking them to check the seals they installed for me.  I got a 
call Friday from Jerry (serv manager) saying "yes we screwed up the 
seal, we'll replace it along with the disc and give you a loaner 
car."  I was pleased as punch.  

Today Jerry calls back and says it wasn't the seal, it was the 
flywheel rubbing the trans and the trans is shot.  He said it (the 
210) was the wrong flywheel, as he originally thought when they were 
doing the clutch.  I told him that since no noise was evident, I 
found that tough to believe.

Jerry said he would stay late tonight and let me look at it to see 
what happened to it.  When I got there, it was the old "self 
machining" problem.  The shaft in the differential wore a hole in the 
case, causing the leak.  The seal appeared to be installed properly.
Jerry apologetically explained that he has only 5 years VW experience 
and had never seen this before, therefore he didn't know what it was 
till he called another dealer for advise.

We didn't discuss any labor charges or such, I left him with, I'll 
get back to you tomorrow and decide how to go from here.  He got 
prices on trannies (@ twice as high as Mark Davison) and told me that 
it was the slow time for them for repairs and I could have a bit of 
time to get a trans.  He also said he wasn't hurting for the loaner 
and I could use it.

My BIG question is, when they installed the clutch (9 days, 1,000 
miles earlier), should they have been able to spot any signs of the 
"self machining"?  Or is this something that is totally impossible to 
see before it happens?  

I need to know so I can pressure them to at least give me free labor.
My opinion is that it's not their fault that the trans went bad, it 
was gonna happen anyway.  But if they were negligent and missed some 
tell-tale signs it was about to happen, then I could have gotten a 
trans at that time and had them replace it at no additional labor 
cost.  If that's the case, then I should get the labor for free.  I'd 
love to find a way to blame them for the trans going bad, and get a 
free trans, but I don't believe that to be true.  But with the things 
I've heard, I'm thinking that their inexperience may have allowed 
them to overlook something that should have been told to me when the 
trans was out for the clutch.

Sorry for the long post, but I want to be thorough so I get good 
feedback.  One other quick question.  Should I get a close ratio 
(what I have now) again, or go to a wider ratio trans?  I don't race 
my Rock, it's my daily commuter.  I travel 130 miles a day at least 
and most of it is cruising on freeways.

Thanks for any advice you can give me on this.





Rick    hugacub@whidbey.net
85 Scirocco 8V  Wolfsburg
Oak Harbor, WA
(On Whidbey Island in the Puget Sound)
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