After a quick call to our sponsors I'm having deja-vu...
A 100k mile 5HP19, so only 2/3rds of what the current one has on it. It was a very sensible price too, on the basis that no one (else) is daft enough to go to the trouble of swapping the gearbox in a 2.8 A8 these days
I'll service and re-seal this before it goes back in of course. It had never been opened since new.
Very clean inside:
When the filter is removed with the gearbox in the car, the oil drops out of the oil pump pickup. This means that when it is refilled and started up the pump briefly sucks in air before it can pick up any oil. While it is expected behavior given the design of the gearbox, these things are so fragile they need all the help they can get so while its upside down I will prime the oil pickup and the filter with fresh oil.
As Prestige no longer had the converter which came with this gearbox I sent BR's original off to JP Automatic Transmissions in Bristol. They reported back that the lockup clutch piston seals had perished and the clutch friction material was badly glazed so that has been refurbished and is on its way back.
So, there was never anything wrong with the actual gearbox in the end. But, since it had to come out of the car to get to the broken F125, and be removed from the engine to get to the worn out torque converter, I'll take reducing the mileage on the gearbox by 1/3rd for what the replacement cost.
An oil change 3 years ago may or may not have averted the converter seal failure - its impossible to know. On thing is for sure - D2s do not like sitting about. They need to be used or they will go wrong out of sheer boredom!
Well, maybe two things are sure. 'It ain't broke so don't fix it' does not apply to 5HP gearboxes. It ain't broke
yet so fix it before it does break.
