MY VIBE HAS FAILED ME. (MAN TRANS SHOT AFTER 70K)

[nkaltso]

Ladies and Gentelmen my vibe love affair is over.I just came from the Toyota dealer were I was informed that what I thought was the clutch was not. It is my worst fear the Transmission is shot and needs to be replaced with only 70,000 miles on it.This whole ordeal will cost me around $3,500, oh by the way the trans is on back order and no one knows when one will be avalible.They had the clutch out and I inspected it. It looked good for another 20,000 miles the problem is somewhere in the trans evident by the metal shavings found in the trans gear oil.I babied that car its whole life, NEVER shifted without using the clutch. Now it has turned on me.I PURCHASED THIS CAR BASED ON THE TOYOTA QUALITY HISTORY WHO WOULD OF THOUGHT IT WOULD COME DOWN TO THIS.ILL NEVER RECOMMEND THIS CAR OR A TOYOTA TO ANYONE AGAINNICK

[drunkenmaxx]

do a search for posts by colonel panic. he will show you the light concerning toyota reliablity.

[xssiv1]

Cant always blame the manufacturer. Things break stuff happens.Over all the quality is better than a focus!

[goodvibe]

Sounds like this is exactly the kind of thing that you blame the manufacturer for. I may not be common but it shouldn't happen. Sorry to here it. What oil was in there?

[joatmon]

I know how you feel, my first 5 speed lasted until 75K miles. I have no data to know what kind of failure rates are typical for manual transmissions, but there are a increasing number rof us here at genvibe that have had their rock solid Toyota trannies fail. I do not pay attention to the matrix forums, or the general Toyota forums, but it would interesting to find out if Matrixes and Corollas which use the same tranny are having any notable failures.If the number of Vibe failures is abnormal for a manual tranny, and the same is happening for Matrixes and Corollas, then I'd say there may be a tranny problem. If the Vibe failure rate is abnormally high but the Toyota vehicles are not having hte problem, then I'd wonder if it was a NUMMI problem.Mine was an 03. I wonder if it's an 03 issue, or if it;s just that no later year genvibers have gotten up that far in miles.But it could be that stuff breaks, and we hear about the few that break and think there is a serious reliability issue. Whatever the cause though, it sure does suck to buy a car thinking it will be ultra reliable and then have such a major component fail. I know my recommendation about extended warranties has changed, I used to think that theyre not worth the money, now I realize that one would have saved me some serious cash.Anyway, when mine first failed I also took it to a Toyota dealer and they offered to put a used one in for me. In the end that would have been cheaper than what I eventually did, but I still got away with under 2K. Now I have a 04 corolla tranny in there, it had 4K miles, and I've put another 30K on it since then.At the time I was pretty pissed. Coming on a year later, and I've calmed down. The car is paid for and is still economically feasible to repair, but I think if this tranny goes out I will get rid of it and find something else, probably not a Toyota. I don;t hate Toyota, I just resent their seemingly undeserved reputation for ultimate reliability. Would suck to have to move on from the Vibe, it's the most fun vehicle I've had in years.So you might consider asking them to get you a used tranny, the issue would be you'd get less of a warranty on it. My used one was warrantied for 100 days, which came in handy.

[northvibe]

yea dealers are a crap ton expensive! this happens to all cars, just sucks it had to be you gl on the new tranny, again try a tranny shop, i bet they could prolly rebuild it for only 1500 or so

[GMJAP]

(BTW 1 crap ton = 1.3 Metric tons)All the reliability data I've seen on Corolla/Matrix/Vibe trannys has been very good. (Of course, the majority of that's gonna be autos.)However......You guys are scaring me!

[joatmon]

Quote, originally posted by silverawd26 »Savoy has 110,000 miles on his vehicle form last time I heard and nothing was wrong with this... But is has been a long time since I seen him around.I looked and could not find a definitive post by Savoy, but in http://forums.genvibe.com/zero...74673 he said:Quote, originally posted by Savoy »Actually...my Vibe's "Previous Owner" was Enterprise.I bought my vibe with just under 7,000 miles on it.-Savoy-It has been my experience that rental car companies almost never have manual tranny cars, so I would assume that Savoy's Vibe is an automatic tranny

[nkaltso]

joatmonwhat symptoms did you notice before your trans went out.I wonder what simularities are there for this problem.I will check on the used trans but due to the fact no Trans are avalible. I may have to have it rebuild.

[joatmon]

my troubles are in http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=15551 , and then continued into http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=16794FLABARBARA had a 5 speed problem, http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=18673 and continued into http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=19054Then there was rock_hopper, and silver_vibe, and merv100 in http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=17599and burkeyro in http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=11765and average_joe_vibe in http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=17980 and into http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=18014 but no final word on if it was tranny or throwout bearingin 12/05, there was a viber on car talk http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id=20343 but the audio segment referenced in that thread is no longer available on the car talk web page

[nkaltso]

My Trans made the same noises right at 60,000 milesSo this problem is not meI just get to pay for it.I have to issues a one month cooling down period becuase Im ready to sell it once its fixed.NIck

[nkaltso]

Mine did the exact same thing.So it was not meI just get to pay for it.NIck

[03frostygt]

In regards to the comment about the Focus quality... I traded my Focus with 68,000 miles on it (for the Vibe and its Toytoa quality) because the transmission was going. Yikes.

[goodvibe]

I hate to say it but I never understood why pontiac can't offer the same 60/60 powertrain warranty on this vehicle as Toyota does. If you complained before it was up , you would have been covered and companies sometimes show consideration when you're just out. It was the only aspect of the Vibe that almost had me buy a Toyota.

[drunkenmaxx]

-OTjoat, you have an 03, how come your outside temp guage is isn't red like mine?

[03VibeGT6Spd]

Nick, I tried to buy one from GM, and they told me they dont stock them in the USA.But I found hundreds of them on an online.at http://www.car-parts.comJust make sure you read the remarksI one I bought was somewhere in detroit Call L.C.Q. or L.R.Q. something like that. they gave me a 1 years parts and labor on my transmission, But I installed it myself.If you can turn a wrench and need help, let me know.

[joatmon]

Quote, originally posted by drunkenvibe »-OTjoat, you have an 03, how come your outside temp guage is isn't red like mine?ot back at you - http://forums.genvibe.com/zerothread?id ... -=-=-=-=-A used one with a good warranty will save some money. A tranny shop by me said they could have replaced the bearings , but the Toyota dealerr didn;t want to bother, said it was too much trouble

[Petrucci914]

Did you ever have your tranny flushed prior to this problem?

[nkaltso]

Thank you for the offer.I have been known to turn wrenches in my time. I have a car lift in my grage and I just finished a Caddilac Northstar rebuild, so a job like this would be no problem.But, I have been working on the caddillac so long and just finished it 2 weeks ago. my wife has not seen me for a while, and has been complaining that nothing is getting done around the house. Thats why I had it sent to the Toyota dealer to fix the clutch unfortunatly it blew up to this, but hind site is 20/20I am getting the Trans back and plan to do an tear down of it to see what went wrong. One theory is the dealer pointed out that the shift linkage bearing has siezed for the line that slides the gears side to side across the gears. Thats the first place I will look to try to confrim that if that is the issue. If not I plan on reporting out to everyone what happened so others can save money in the future and not fall in the same trap I did.

[goodvibe]

Can you tell us the fluid and change interval that you used? If the dealer right about what happened, it wouldn't make a difference but it's still good info with a failure.

[burkeyro]

Just read about your Tranny Issue - I'll be the first to say - don't try to rebuild - I got mine back from a "Simple" Final Drive bearing install and the thing is FUBAR, a little while after I got it back I couldn't down shift into second gear above 20mph, somehow they managed to "F" up the Syncro's or whatever these new fangled things have in them. I would try to find a Low milage used one and swap it in. I know my clutch is almost gone, and, well I drive like I stole it every Day and beat the absolute (removed) out of my cars - I'm up to 71K on the tranny now and it still works, and got 400 miles out of my last tank of gas. basically, IMO a Rebuild is going to be more trouble than it's worth - just drop in a "New" used one and call it a day - then sell it if you want - IMO I think that there was just a bad batch of tranny's made and we are just finding out now. seeing that someone that sees the REV Limiter every time he get's in the car (ME), to those that just Drive normal and go A to B - and we are all having similar problems. Makes ya wonder what would happen if we all got to and launched a Formal complaint to Toyota, as they supplied the Drivetrain. I think it would be usless to go through GM, as I'm fairly certian they don't care, cause they already got our money so why bother helping, (At least that has been and will remain my opinion on GM products across the board)Sorry for the Rant, I just love my Vibe and GM has really pissed me off for years.

[nkaltso]

Well the vibe is back in the fold.2 weeks and $3,825 later. and she is running fine.I actually missed it for the time it was gone. The service manager mentioned that the car is in good condition and he knew someone that may want to buy it.Im sure the car is in really good condition after I replaced the following-- Transmission asm. --Friction plate -- the old one still had 20k on it but sience it was apart it was a good time to repalce it.-- Pressure plate-- Throw out bearing.-- shift linkage. -- the bushing was seized this may have lead to part of the problem, Ill found out soon.I have all the old parts inclding the trans. Ill be taking apart in the next couple of weeks for an engineering analysis, and letting everyone know what went worng so they dont have this same situation.ALl i can say is if your car has 60k+ on it and the manual trans is making alot of niose that goes away when you push in the clutch.Good luck

[ColonelPanic]

Congrats on getting it back... I guess... That's quite a hefty bill to have to pay for something you're gonna turn around and dump, that stinks. Hate to hear about your luck. Had my Vibe's automatic die a few thousand before your manual did, it sure did suck. I lucked out, I was under warranty and they covered all $4,000+ for it... I don't wish this sort of thing upon anybody!Hope you find something you enjoy... It isn't worth keeping a car that you can't trust and that makes you miserable. Hang in there and good luck to you! There is life after Vibe.

[TRDman]

I know how you feel. My old Toyota Sienna with 68,000 miles... transmission (auto, but still) gone totally.

[goodvibe]

Quote, originally posted by nkaltso »Well the vibe is back in the fold.2 weeks and $3,825 later. and she is running fine.I actually missed it for the time it was gone. The service manager mentioned that the car is in good condition and he knew someone that may want to buy it.Im sure the car is in really good condition after I replaced the following-- Transmission asm. --Friction plate -- the old one still had 20k on it but sience it was apart it was a good time to repalce it.-- Pressure plate-- Throw out bearing.-- shift linkage. -- the bushing was seized this may have lead to part of the problem, Ill found out soon.I have all the old parts inclding the trans. Ill be taking apart in the next couple of weeks for an engineering analysis, and letting everyone know what went worng so they dont have this same situation.ALl i can say is if your car has 60k+ on it and the manual trans is making alot of niose that goes away when you push in the clutch.Good luck That noise may have just been the throw out bearing, I just don't want everbody freaking out. Good to see up and running.