Along with the other stuff I did (new control arms, an attempt at tie rods, and new headlight bulbs), I changed the gearbox fluid, which has a recommended replacement interval of 120k (mine is 135k). The old fluid was nasty black and looked almost like old engine oil I filled it up with the required 1,5 liters of 75W80 GL4+ and at least the gears change nicely in a quick back and forth test (past midnight here).


A quick search says it could be a sign of almost-gone gearbox, but those seemed to be all about automatic transmission - and Fiat recommends the 120k, which is close enough to 135k.

That's odd. I can only think of a couple causes:
- The oil inside the box could have been burnt (pulling a caravan up a mountain in extreme heat)
- a dodgy mechanic could have used old motor oil to fill the gearbox (from a diesel engine)
- a hole on top of the gearbox could have contaminated the gearbox oil (missing gear shifter shaft seal?)

None of these are very likely though.

Tornio - are you 1st car owner? If not, somebody putted there wrong oil before - original is red Tutela 75W-90 as I remember....

Rado77 said:

Tornio - are you 1st car owner? If not, somebody putted there wrong oil before - original is red Tutela 75W-90 as I remember....

Click to expand...

Yep, 1st owner (well, my mother originally, but now it's in my use). I don't think it has been to any dodgy services either. It did receive very little attention while it wasn't in my use :yum: But she's not the thrashing-the-gear type of driver. Quite aggressive though.

I've been driving it now for a while after I changed the gearbox fluid, and no issues so far. Shifts firmly and no oddities, so it could just be the age of the original fluid (11,5 years).

ANY lubricant gets oxydised/contaminated with time and turning red to black is one of the result of this aging. The different additive also tend to lose their efficiency as you could notice after the oil have been replaced with fresh one. The good thing is that gearbox oil is not exposed to combustion residues and very high temperature as the engine oil is !

BRs, Bernie.