Proper amount of tranny fluid

[8v-of-fury]

So I know it is 2.0L of syn 75w90 in ideal conditions when one cant get the drain and fill plugs out.  However when i had the trans out I could only dump it out the speed hole... So I proceeded to sit the trans as if it were sitting in the car.. same level and rotation. gauged where it would spill out the side plug on a ziptie.. and filled to that point through the speedo gear. Are we safe to say that if it doesnt pop out of 5th gear I have enough oil in my trans? 

[R.O.R-2.0]

it wont pop out of 5th gear till there is ALOT of damage..

on cases like that, i use the speedo gear as a dip stick..

why could you not get the plugs out? they are HUGE, and hard to strip..

ive had to put a 3ft cheater pipe on my drain plug tool once upon a time to get a stubborn drain plug out..

[Powered by Spearco]

You could pop out the green end cover and completly drain it that way. The green cover is cheap to replace.

[8v-of-fury]

didnt have the tool to take em out, and i sheared the head off a 5.5 metric bolt trying to get it out. Needed it in the car this weekend. So I drained what I could and it took about a Liter to get it back up to where it was reading on my home made dipstick.

Kev when you use the speedo gear, car on level ground what how far up the gear does it come?

[R.O.R-2.0]

i *think* right about the base of the gear teeth, but not positive..

txt me here in a while and tell me to go look at my car to make sure..

and its better to make drain plug tools out of grade 12.9 ring gear bolts and lug nuts.. least thats how i did, and mine works great, even with a cheater pipe..

and, if you are careful, you can get the green cap out, and even re-use it..

[rabbitman]

and, if you are careful, you can get the green cap out, and even re-use it..

I've done so twice with the same cap. I used a dab of black RTV both times and no leaks.

[fatmobile]

Half way up the speedo gear teeth.
Check to see if I'm right but am pretty sure on this.
 
Someone made a dipstick:
1.8 inches from the lip.

[8v-of-fury]

1.8 inches from the machined surface where the speedo cable mounts? Nifty. Ty very much.

[R.O.R-2.0]

Half way up the speedo gear teeth.
Check to see if I'm right but am pretty sure on this.
 
Someone made a dipstick:
1.8 inches from the lip.

i told him 1/3 way up the gear teeth yesterday..

i pulled the gear out of my ACN in my 86 golf. it has the proper amount of oil in it, and it was somewhere around 1/3, to 1/2 way up the teeth..

good to see others have similar answers to mine..

[damac]

Watch your fluid.  I am the dummy who got my car back on the road and within 5000 miles ran my perfectly working transmission low on oil, it started popping out of fifth and the person kept driving it like that(wasn't me).  When I got the car back it was whining a bit in general when I went to start up the car.  Drove it around a bit after putting some other oil in but I believe the damage was done.  Did it again a few drives later but this time that tranny howled like hell all the time.  I can shift through gears but something at idle is very loud and if you hit the pedal you can hear it grinding so I parked it.

I had switched to redline mtl oil blindly after I did the external seals on my setup and did not catch this seeping where the gaskets were on the case.  It was weeping on the case and getting splashed onto the tire, although not enough to leave a puddle.

I learned a hard lesson on that one, I want to make my own dipstick of sorts when I get back on the road again, and will check it during every oil change.

[8v-of-fury]

damac apparently the speedo gear can be used as a dipstick. Bout 1/2 way up the teeth lol

[rabbitman]

Just to make sure all the early mk2 owners know, you can't check the oil using the check plug in the side of the tranny. The engine/tranny in mk2's lean towards the drivers side so the oil will come out the hole even when there's less than 2 liters. VW fixed the problem in '87(?) by moving the check plug higher on the case.

If your tranny isn't original you can look and the "bump" that the check plug screws into, if the plug is centered you have an old tranny, if the plug is higher than the bump it's the later tranny and you can check the lever using the plug.

The last two pictures here http://www.brokevw.com/020oil.html show this really good.

[fatmobile]

Not much difference between 1/3 and half way up the speedo gear,.. so we have the general area.

The 1.8" was from the machined edge.

Yeah, they set the hole to check the trany on a perfectly vertical engine,.. didn't think that ours are slanted back a little.
'87 and later is the cover to swap on eh?

[rabbitman]

You can tell if it's slanted left by looking across the core support at the vc, rabbits are level and mk2's have a very obvious slant.

[R.O.R-2.0]

You can tell if it's slanted left by looking across the core support at the vc, rabbits are level and mk2's have a very obvious slant.

on all my mk2s (even my wrecked one) the engines are still plumb.. they are perfectly perpendicular to the ground..

the only difference between the mk2 and mk1 trannies, is actually the way the engine is mounted (how much it leans back)

the mk1 is leaned back like 15* or something.. and the mk2 is leaned back a little further, like 22* or something..

being that the engine is rotated farther back, that is the need for the higher fill/check hole..

ive never heard the one that the engine is in there crooked tho..