5th gear part needed, 2007 Cobalt SS F35 transmission

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Chubbs

Well-Known Member
I'm at the end of my rope here trying to find parts, so I'm appealing to the Goblin gods and anyone that might have spare parts laying around.

5th gear on my goblin is toast. It keeps popping out while cruising down the highway (i have already disassembled to verify). I ordered part 9117777 from esaabparts.com, along with the "sleeve ring" (90511264). The sleeve ring is perfect, (as are the synchros, retaining ring, little spring clips, etc...all the same) but the 5th gear itself has 53 teeth, and is ever-so-slightly larger in diameter than the 54 tooth gear that came out of the transmission. I assumed all F35 saab transmissions would have the same 5th gear.... a bad assumption on my part.


So, I'm looking for part 90541200, which is a GM part number. I cannot find it in stock anywhere though. Further, I have no way to verify if it has the 54 teeth I need.

Does anyone know where I can find 90541200? Or, do any of you have a spare F35 5th gear laying around they can sell?
 
G

Gtstorey

Goblin Guru
You might check with DF. I gave them the guts to my broken trans when I picked up my kit. But that has been several years.
 
Dale E

Dale E

Well-Known Member
GM 90541200 Gear,5Th
2000-2010 GM

GM 90541200 Gear,5Th

  • Part Description
    GEAR,Fourth & Fifth Gear
  • Manufacturer
    General Motors
  • Manufacturer's Notes
    This part is discontinued.
 
Markm

Markm

Well-Known Member
I’ve had good luck getting oddball manual trans parts from High gear transmission in Memphis. Not saying they’ll have it but worth a try if no one else does
 
A

ah.b.normal

Goblin Guru
Dang! all that time in Galveston and I only spent one day on a yard and that was 6 months ago. The F35's are out there, but parts sounds like a crap shoot.
The F35's I saw in El Paso(last June) are prolly long gone. If you have a friend in El Paso the yard was RG Pick a Part 915-886-2886, I saw 3 there. One in an HHR and one in a big Saturn sedan?? I ran into a F60(?) the 6 speed, in a Saab in south Little Rock, about 3 weeks ago. Pick-N Pull, Baseline Rd. You could prolly get the Turbo Engine w/ Trans for a song. That car was unmolested had been on the yard for months IIRC?
Have you contacted DF? Maybe Adam has a "donor/cracked" F35 that they can part with?
I'm headed on 3 month vacation, I return ~ Christmas, so no more spotting between now and then. Best of Luck!
 
Robinjo

Robinjo

Goblin Guru
Chubbs said:
Kansas city.

I checked some of the local salvage yards (online), but didn't find an SS. I'll reach out to the guys at DF. Hopefully they have a spare laying around.
Click to expand...
Have you checked The Facebook Ecotec and Cobalt groups. People sell blown F35's on there for just a couple hundred dollars.
 
C

Chubbs

Well-Known Member
Robinjo said:
Have you checked The Facebook Ecotec and Cobalt groups. People sell blown F35's on there for just a couple hundred dollars.
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I just applied to be a member of a group, we'll see where that goes. My age is showing a bit, and I hate Facebook.

To elaborate a bit on what the problem actually was, and maybe to help someone else having trouble....Here's a few photos of the disassembly, and what went wrong.

As you can see, 5th gear is just under a cover on the left side of the transmission. It can be accessed just by removing the left rear wheel. Recommended to jack up the left side of the vehicle, otherwise you'll lose all your trans fluid. After lifting the left side, I probably lost a pint or two of fluid.
48474



A few bolts and it pops right off, exposing 5th gear on the ends of the input and output shafts.

48475



I don't have a photo of it, but the shift fork needs to come off next. It's held on with a roll pin, but I didn't have much trouble punching it out with a proper roll pin punch (get the right tool....we aren't going to use a screwdriver on a transmission). after that the "sleeve" slips off easily. The end gear hub is press fit onto the splined shaft, and requires a puller to get it off. There are 3 small flexible pieces of metal under there that act as springs. They are supposed to be secured by a metal ring, but when removing the hub, chances are all 3 of them will go flying. Try to keep track of them.
48476


The hub removed, exposing splined shaft. The synchro is the next to come off, it just slips off.
48477


5th gear synchro. In my case, it looks great and is undamaged. It doesn't even seem to be worn.
48478


Here's the whole assembly, reassembled on the bench. That ring around the whole assembly (looks like two rings) is the "sleeve", though I've also heard it called a "dog". The shift fork rides in that groove and slides it back and forth, engaging the internal teeth of the sleeve and the gear. It all makes perfect sense in real life when you can play with it, though I understand photos and words probably are hard to picture what's happening.
48479


Here's the problem. A closeup of the sleeve teeth:

48480


And here's a closeup of the teeth they engage on the gear

48481
48482


As you can see, both are pretty chewed up. Both are supposed to have little indentations in them, or valleys in the teeth, so that once engaged they wont' disengage without effort. My "valleys" are all gone at this point. So the gears just slide apart without constant effort from the shift fork to keep them engaged (not good, it'll wear out the shift fork).

I can only speculate as to why this happened, as 5th gear isn't a high-load application at all. Nor have I beat on it. However, the donor car was rolled into a ditch. I'm guessing it was in 5th gear when that happened, and the shock loads associated with rolling the car chewed up the teeth. I don't know how else to explain it.

So, that's what's going on, and how you disassemble 5th. I'm sure it's not the greatest writeup ever, but maybe it'll help someone. There isn't a lot of info on these transmissions because they are somewhat rare, and nobody ever has a problem with 5th.
 
C

Chubbs

Well-Known Member
Transmission is fixed! Thanks Scott for the donor transmission!

I made a quick video on how to do it, though I didn't actually film the repair itself. There might be some tips in there if someone wants to tackle this job on their own.

If you wanted new parts, I have the part numbers at the very end of the video from Esaabparts.com. Note I didn't actually follow this route, as i sourced a donor transmission instead. The Swedish parts aren't just a direct replacement for our transmissions, so you'll need the gear from both the input and the output shaft so they mesh correctly.

 
Robinjo

Robinjo

Goblin Guru
My buddy rebuilt mine that had a 2nd gear synchro issue. He said it was super easy except getting the case apart. I did all the running around for parts and had to get a couple from esaabparts as well. One of the large nut I had to special order from a site that made them special.
 
S

Scott #321

Well-Known Member
Chubbs said:
Transmission is fixed! Thanks Scott for the donor transmission!

I made a quick video on how to do it, though I didn't actually film the repair itself. There might be some tips in there if someone wants to tackle this job on their own.

If you wanted new parts, I have the part numbers at the very end of the video from Esaabparts.com. Note I didn't actually follow this route, as i sourced a donor transmission instead. The Swedish parts aren't just a direct replacement for our transmissions, so you'll need the gear from both the input and the output shaft so they mesh correctly.

Click to expand...
Awsome, I was hoping that you were able to salvage everything you needed. Was nice to meet you and glad I could help.
 
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