3rd gear crunch when downshifting, not every time
03-24-2017, 05:43 PM
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3rd gear crunch when downshifting, not every time
Just started driving my RX-8 again after storing it for the winter.
When driving the car quickly on a curvy road, so frequent shifts, I experienced a crunch when downshifting into 3rd. Even going slow with the shift it still crunched.
Later, when downshifting into 3rd during casual driving, just to check for the crunch, it was gone. No matter how quickly I shifted I could not replicate. I figured that maybe the floormat had gotten under the pedal and prevented me from depressing it fully, so there was no actual problem.
But the next day, when driving a curvy road again, the crunch was back.
Also have a bit of the same sometimes when downshifting into fifth. Never with 2nd or 4th.
Gear oil was changed within the past 10,000 miles. Just basic gear oil, whatever Mazda recommends, nothing fancy. After that fluid change shift effort went down quite a bit.
So, any thoughts as to the intermittent nature of the problem? Possibly fluid? Bad synchros? Out of adjustment shift or clutch mechanism? Motor mounts? Something else?
Above possibilities from searching other threads here. But the intermittent nature of the problem in my car seems unusual. What is happening when the transmission is shifted often that might cause the problem to appear? (Heat seems the obvious culprit, but why, affecting what part, and probably fixes?)
When driving the car quickly on a curvy road, so frequent shifts, I experienced a crunch when downshifting into 3rd. Even going slow with the shift it still crunched.
Later, when downshifting into 3rd during casual driving, just to check for the crunch, it was gone. No matter how quickly I shifted I could not replicate. I figured that maybe the floormat had gotten under the pedal and prevented me from depressing it fully, so there was no actual problem.
But the next day, when driving a curvy road again, the crunch was back.
Also have a bit of the same sometimes when downshifting into fifth. Never with 2nd or 4th.
Gear oil was changed within the past 10,000 miles. Just basic gear oil, whatever Mazda recommends, nothing fancy. After that fluid change shift effort went down quite a bit.
So, any thoughts as to the intermittent nature of the problem? Possibly fluid? Bad synchros? Out of adjustment shift or clutch mechanism? Motor mounts? Something else?
Above possibilities from searching other threads here. But the intermittent nature of the problem in my car seems unusual. What is happening when the transmission is shifted often that might cause the problem to appear? (Heat seems the obvious culprit, but why, affecting what part, and probably fixes?)
03-24-2017, 11:40 PM
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Same issue
I too have the same issue but in addition 2nd gear some times too. After a mountain run, parking up car idling the car will sometimes not even go into any gear? General driving of the car no issues.
