I was wanting to chang my ATF, but not like this!

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The_Eric

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I had been noticing my Hyundai Elantra's transmission "binding" in reverse off and on for a couple of months now. Was wondering what was up. Well, yesterday I had some shop errands to run and was out of town, then back and made a trip to the country to do some service work on a log splitter. Well, as I was pulling into their driveway, I felt a jolt and heard a "pop" noise and a moment later, I smelled ATF. Right then, I knew something bad was up. As it turns out, my trans decided to play the mechanical equivalent of 52 card pickup. I shut the engine down and got out to find all or most of my Amsoil ATF pouring out onto the customer's drive... Looks like the diff pin was working it's way out and binding on the trans case at random intervals, until finally it caught and tried unsuccessfully to stop the car.

When my friend came to bail me out, we wanted to drag the car backwards, but it would only roll about 2' in either direction. He tried dragging it with his 4wd, but the tires just skidded along the drive. Frustrated, I got in the car, threw it in gear and hammered the gas! It banged and crunched, and then turned free. We were then able to load it up to the car trailer with a come-a-long.

I wished I had money for a re-man, but it's not in the budget with home repairs, farm ground rent and being short on money with the new shop, so I found used unit with less than half the mileage for 500.00. We're going to head to the yard tomorrow to pick it up...

Here are some of the pieces that I recovered from the customer's drive. I wished I had thought of taking a pic of the ATF on the ground, but oh well.

20131005_193047_zps54ec1775.jpg


I'll update with more pics when I get the used unit and tear into it.
 
Ouch! That has to be a one-off fluke. I've heard of diff pins walking in 4T60's before after the 3800 in front of it got modded and raced. Never a stock Elantra, though!
 
Sorry to hear about this unfortunate event. How many miles were on the unit? my 06 sonata has 177k on the original trans no problems what so ever.
 
Originally Posted By: jdmstr22
Sorry to hear about this unfortunate event. How many miles were on the unit? my 06 sonata has 177k on the original trans no problems what so ever.


It's hard to say for sure as the odo isn't working, but there's about 100,00 to 110,000 miles on the car. We've had it since 36k. The first drain and fill (There were receipts of trans service prior to our owning), the ATF was NASTY dark brown/black looking and had lots of metal in it. I eventually installed a Magnefine and after 20k ish miles, I took it apart and found a fair bit of ferrous metal and trash in it. I always figured that it would die from a clutch or valving issue....
 
Probably should have got it checked out when the issues first started. What exactly do you mean when you say it was "binding" in reverse?
 
Originally Posted By: gregk24
Probably should have got it checked out when the issues first started. What exactly do you mean when you say it was "binding" in reverse?


By "binding", I mean that it would engage reverse, start to roll an inch or two, then stop. Small amounts of throttle wouldn't overcome it. Switching to forward gear would move me ahead, effectively "freeing" it so I could engage reverse and move.

Checking it out probably wouldn't have done anything, especially since it wasn't really a repeatable thing. Even if I would have looked into it, it would have involved delving into it and I didn't have the money or time to do it. Too busy working on other people's machines.

No, I chose to roll the dice and gamble on it. Obviously I lost.



Originally Posted By: JimPghPA
Take some tape measurements of the original to the yard to verify that it is the correct size.


The donor car is the same thing as mine and Hyundai only had some small differences on the production run, but it's split with a production date break. The donor is within the same date range, but none the less, I'll double check it.
 
It could have been a lot worse. Sometimes when a rear end goes bad the axle along with the wheel leaves the vehicle. Or it could have grenaded while you were going down the highway, or locked up while you were going fast.
 
Originally Posted By: JimPghPA
It could have been a lot worse. Sometimes when a rear end goes bad the axle along with the wheel leaves the vehicle. Or it could have grenaded while you were going down the highway, or locked up while you were going fast.


It could have tried to lock up while I was moving, but the rolling force of the car (turning the axles) would have simply munched the case till everything was clear. Evidenced by the fact that when it went in the driveway, it popped and broke the case, then kept moving. In fact, I came to a stop with the aid of the brakes. It was only after I came to a stop that it wouldn't move. It was then that judicious use of the gas pedal broke things up well enough that we could pull it up on the trailer.

Still, you're definitely right, it could have happened on the highway. What an bugger that would have been!
 
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