As the title explains my 8.1/ZF truck is raking very badly going into 3 rd gear,pretty sure the syncho is damaged. I'm off to the dealer tomorrow to see what they have to say. Has anyone else had any tranny problems this soon? I thought it would last forever behind that "little" 8.1.:D

`BILL,

Sorry to hear of your ZF troubles. To answer your "?" directly, this is the first I've seen of any sinchro problem on this tranny. I would submit, however, that it is possible that the gear shift adjustments may be out of alignment, which could engage the 3rd gear prematurely (before the synchro spins down the tranny), therefore giving you the "raking". This is an easy fix/adjustment, so let's hope that it is as simple as that.

Good luck at the $tealer.

RF

2nd and 3rd are suppose to have double synchros or some gizmo that syncs the gears better than all the other gears.

what is raking?

grinding

Thanks for the replies. It goes into the stealer next Wednesday. I'll keep everyone posted on the findings.

grinding


Censored mine has done that a little sense new.

Mine does it a little going into 4th, nothing you can hear, but I feel a little catch and "Kinda" a grinding feel. Took it to the dealer and they said everything was normal. I figure I've got 2 yrs and 8 months for it to go out.

Mine is doing it very bad,so loud that people along the street look at you funny when you drive by. I'm sure they all think I can't drive a stick.:)

Let us know what you find out. I know when mine was brand new, it was VERY hard to get into 3rd. It loosened up after awhile. Every now and then, I still get it only half in and don't realize it, then it pops out, I let out the clutch, and the grinding begins. I'd say I'll have mine back to the dealer in the future.

I had to put a new tranny in because 4th syncronizer was shot. Don't ask how it happened

I find mine also grinds a bit into 4th. I just slapped on the old double clutchin' boots and double clutch it and alls good. Most of the time I dont clutch it at all after it comes up to temp unless im stopping or downshifting to slow on a grade.

this is the hardest truck to shift without the clutch that I have ever had, clunks into 4th 5th and 6th almost every time I try.

It is like driving a rockwell trans. The rpms need to be as close as possible to get to fall in the hole.

Drive a old 2 pole triplex Mack trans if you want rough.

Gearhead, after some more miles and wear, it will fall into place

Call me crazy but I want this to be a question and not a statement. The ZF-06 is synchronized so it would make sense that not using the clutch would wear out synchronizers. Unlike Big trucks their transmissions are not synchronized so use of clutch is not needed to shift gears?

That is correct, it will wear them out faster.

That's interesting to know. I never knew. I wasn't clutching either but I just may start again. As for the grinding, right from new mine didn't like 4th, but now it's 5th. She's got 60K KM's on now.

Well we're going into week three with the truck still at the stealer.They have all the parts to fix it except third gear itself,it's on national back order. The dealer called GM last week to see about a whole tranny with no response yet. I'm starting to get a little pissed. They haven't even offered me something to drive yet,not that I need it,but I'm still out a truck I pay $700 a month for.