6 Speed trans whine and replacement MASTER thread

[Chevrolet Customer Care]

boydnhere,
It is nice to hear that your dealer was able to assist you as well. Let us know if any other questions or concerns arise.

Tricia, Chevrolet Customer Service (Assisting Vanessa).

 

[simple2me]

6spd tranny whine

I've had this whine in 5th and 6th gear for a couple of weeks now and thought it might have been my tires causing the humming noise since they're to the wear marks so I put a new set of tires on. The noise isn't that noticable when traveling 55-60mph in 5th but when you stretch out 5th gear (70-100+mph), it's constant humming and loud, shift to 6th and it has a wobble effect to the humming. I stopped at the dealership today to see if the Service Manager would take a ride with me and we went on a 10 miles trip and I warned him that the noise wasn't as noticable at slower speeds as much and that i drive all interstate. We hit the interstate in 4th doing about 65 and then I shifted to 5th and the noise started, shifted to 6th around 85mph. I pushed the clutch in and out to so he could hear the noise stop, let off the accelerator so he could hear the difference between the coast and accelerate humming, threw it in neutral and no noise. We stopped and he drove back to the dealership to see how the tranny felt. He's leaning towards either some bearings inside the tranny or something in the final drive. He definitely agrees that there is a problem. Next problem is he doesn't have a tranny mechanic at the dealership any more and he sends all his transmission work out. He said it would probably take a couple of weeks to repair at his shop. What to do, what to do???? trade it in or let it get fixed. this is the very first GM car I've owned that ever had to be returned for warranty work. I've owned a lot of GM cars and have been driving 160-250 miles daily, sometimes 6-7 days a week to and from work for 20yrs. I guess I can't complain too much but I don't like that my car will be down that long.

 

[$ub$onic]

Really sounds like a isolated Incident. Could be that something was not seated right when built. Or something along that line

 

[theenico]

Hi all, I've been lurking but refraining.

The 5th 6th whine is well documented overseas. It happens in 2nd also if you are in a really smooth parking lot and paying attention. The noise is from the bearing for the 2, 5, and 6 output shaft in the tail housing.

The US dealers can only replace the tranny for this issue. They have no access to the tools or the parts to replace just the bearing. This dealer is blowing smoke up your a$$ by saying he farms out tranny problems.

Mine's had a pretty discernible whine since June. I've just been holding off on taking it in since I know what it is. Once it gets really loud, I'll take it in and get my free tranny.

 

[Preloader]

Nico resurfaces. :banana:

I've been wanting to pick your brain about my MZ0's 3rd gear grind. It happens way too often. Anytime I shift into third under peak power it grinds like a SOB.

When I start cranking up the heat with the bigger turbo, WTH am I suppose to do if the grind gets worse? Any ideas?

 

[$ub$onic]

Or I am totally wrong and its a know problem

 

[simple2me]

Hi all, I've been lurking but refraining.

The 5th 6th whine is well documented overseas. It happens in 2nd also if you are in a really smooth parking lot and paying attention. The noise is from the bearing for the 2, 5, and 6 output shaft in the tail housing.

The US dealers can only replace the tranny for this issue. They have no access to the tools or the parts to replace just the bearing. This dealer is blowing smoke up your a$$ by saying he farms out tranny problems.

Mine's had a pretty discernible whine since June. I've just been holding off on taking it in since I know what it is. Once it gets really loud, I'll take it in and get my free tranny.

Mine is pretty loud and yeah, i just read the post a little bit ago about whining transmission replaced at 30k. I read the whole thread and saw all of your post. The service manager swears up and down that they will pull the tranny apart and figure out the root cause and write up a parts list and if the replacement parts total up to 80% value of the tranny they'll just replace the transmission. Either way he doesn't have anyone there that works on transmissions so I have to take it to another dealer but at least he confirmed the whining noise.

 

[theenico]

Mine is pretty loud and yeah, i just read the post a little bit ago about whining transmission replaced at 30k. I read the whole thread and saw all of your post. The service manager swears up and down that they will pull the tranny apart and figure out the root cause and write up a parts list and if the replacement parts total up to 80% value of the tranny they'll just replace the transmission. Either way he doesn't have anyone there that works on transmissions so I have to take it to another dealer but at least he confirmed the whining noise.

I used to work for GM. The dealer is not going to take apart the tranny unless something has changed since I left. If they keep feeding you these lines of BS, just call customer service and/or go somewhere else.

 

[theenico]

Nico resurfaces. :banana:

I've been wanting to pick your brain about my MZ0's 3rd gear grind. It happens way too often. Anytime I shift into third under peak power it grinds like a SOB.

When I start cranking up the heat with the bigger turbo, WTH am I suppose to do if the grind gets worse? Any ideas?

You have my email etc....

 

[simple2me]

just went to another dealer near my office and it seems no one really wants to mess with it. they scheduled me in for next wednesday. I told them the service manager at Granger Chevrolet confirmed the noise but didn't have a transmission guy available and was outsourcing all his transmission work. They said they are busy also and it might be awhile before they could actually do the work. I might have to take it back to Houston. I dont have time to play around with these people.

 

[ChrisJ]

My tranny has had a high pitched whine in 4th since the day I bought it but no other gears that I've ever noticed at least not yet in 18K miles.

I originally thought the 4th gear whine was the turbo until I realized when it was happening and only in that gear. It is only when the trans is under load from the engine not when coasting.

 

[sx sonic]

Hi all, I've been lurking but refraining.

The 5th 6th whine is well documented overseas. It happens in 2nd also if you are in a really smooth parking lot and paying attention. The noise is from the bearing for the 2, 5, and 6 output shaft in the tail housing.

This wouldn't be the bearing that had like 8+ pages dedicated to it on a vauxhall or astra forum would it? opcorn:

I recall they were simply getting tranny replacements over there aswell. BUT there was 1 chap that was independently replacing bearings for folks that were out of warranty. I think he decided that heat and limited oil on the bearing was a large proponent for the cause of death.

 

[Chevrolet Customer Care]

simple2me,

I am sorry you are having this concern with your transmission. I would like to look into your situation a little further. If you would like us to assist you with the dealership, please let us know. You can private message us your name, VIN, address, phone number, and the name of your GM dealership. We look forward to hearing from you.

Erica Tiffany
Chevrolet Customer Care

 

[theenico]

This wouldn't be the bearing that had like 8+ pages dedicated to it on a vauxhall or astra forum would it? opcorn:

I recall they were simply getting tranny replacements over there aswell. BUT there was 1 chap that was independently replacing bearings for folks that were out of warranty. I think he decided that heat and limited oil on the bearing was a large proponent for the cause of death.

Yeppers. You are correct, even the UK dealers are just swapping out the whole transmission if it's under warranty.

Mine is very noticeable and I can also get the shifter to rock back and forth by playing with the throttle in 6th. I'll take it in here in a couple of weeks.

In the meantime, I'll continue to enjoy the awesome straight cut rally car gear noises.

 

[laborsmith]

GM doesn't stock replacement parts so clearly doesn't pay to get a trans rebuilt. Found this out when putting the Wavetrac in. The parts to rebuild are out there, just don't expect a Chevy dealer to be able to do the rebuild. I know you can NOT get internal parts for the trans thru the dealer.

Why replace the whole tranny? Cost effective consideration. GM has plenty on hand, and probably believes repairing might get the problem fixed or might not and replacing is easier and a more certain fix in the long run.

In this case, I agree with GM.


Laborsmith

 

[ChrisJ]

You know what I don't get.
I remember seeing a white paper from GM a few years back maybe 04 or 05 bragging about building a manual trans that used planetary gears and that even though it was more expensive it allowed a stronger more compact design.

Ours doesn't does it. So what happened to that design?

 

[sx sonic]

You know what I don't get.
I remember seeing a white paper from GM a few years back maybe 04 or 05 bragging about building a manual trans that used planetary gears and that even though it was more expensive it allowed a stronger more compact design.

Ours doesn't does it. So what happened to that design?

Maybe it's just me but the bulk of O.E.M.s seem to save the latest and greatest until a generation before (4-6 years) their competitors come out with something on similar footing. This trend appears to be supported by body styles, trans selection (DCT), engine control (Cyl shut down), fuel economy (mostly gov't pressure), and other such factors. Of course there's a few exceptions which seemingly go undocumented to the general public (lithium Ion batteries for the 90's EV-1 all electric GM car, BMW's Valvetronic, etc)

Now as to a planetary manual my dad's 1980 John Deere 4850 has a 15 speed and 4 reverse manual trans........ Clutch and all. I think it's around 200hp and god knows how much torque (apparently HP numbers are more important in a tractor the TQ ).
It's really cool because after putting it in gear ( be it 1st or 6th) you can shift WOT, under load, and no clutch and it's much like a sequential, just push the lever forward a notch for the next gear.


Then again some things fail to reach production because of cost, quality concerns, inability to mass produce, or maybe it just really sucked after being tested.

 

[simple2me]

Well they are keeping my car. Dropped it off this morning and finally heard back at 4pm. They gave me a rental but I still don't know what they are going to do yet. While I was waiting on the rental I checked out a 2013 Cruze LTZ RS with all options. They were trying to bend me over on trade-in (9500.00) for mine but I figured they would since it's in the shop for tranny problems. They wouldn't give me the bottom dollar price on the Cruze though, they have it listed online for 24,930.00 including rebates and the drivers door has damage to it. I told them to leave it as is and give me the bottom dollar and they came back with 25962.00 bottom dollar. I have a couple of weeks to wheel-n-deal with them since they'll probably have my car that long.

 

[ChrisJ]

Well they are keeping my car. Dropped it off this morning and finally heard back at 4pm. They gave me a rental but I still don't know what they are going to do yet. While I was waiting on the rental I checked out a 2013 Cruze LTZ RS with all options. They were trying to bend me over on trade-in (9500.00) for mine but I figured they would since it's in the shop for tranny problems. They wouldn't give me the bottom dollar price on the Cruze though, they have it listed online for 24,930.00 including rebates and the drivers door has damage to it. I told them to leave it as is and give me the bottom dollar and they came back with 25962.00 bottom dollar. I have a couple of weeks to wheel-n-deal with them since they'll probably have my car that long.

Holy cow $25K for a Cruze? I guess its an LTZ? I think our LT was $19K.

 

[theenico]

So I went by the local dealer yesterday and let the service writer drive my car. He agreed that it was excessively noisy in 2nd, 5th, and 6th.

Today I dropped it off at 2pm for the tech to look at it. At 3pm they called to say that a new transaxle had been ordered and that I could pick up my car. I'll drop my car back off when the new transaxle shows up in 3-4 days.

Here's the funny part. The tech took my car out to confirm the noise for himself. He hears it and comes back to the dealer. He goes to look up the diag/repair procedures for the transaxle and there aren't any in SI. He then calls TAC, and they tell him that my car couldn't be an LT and have the 1.4t/6M. After some debate between TAC and the tech, TAC tells him to go ahead and order the transaxle because they are not serviceable.

So props definitely go out to Molle MC of Pittsburg, KS for being super easy to deal with. When I picked my car up this afternoon, we stood around and had a laugh about the whole TAC interaction. I also asked if they'd order a MZ0 instead of the MZ4. No dice, but I thought I'd give it a try.