hey guys i was thinking about this recently.. i was driving a 13 speed at work the other week and those you dont have to use the clutch to shift. i know i know they are comp different trannies and stuff i understand that. but i was thinking if it could be the same with these trucks. ive tried to shift with no clutch with my truck and have no problems doing it... does this hurt the tranny or is it bad or what? whats your guys input or thoughts?

 

youll kill the syncros

 

13 speeds have no synchros. Your truck does. If you attempt to put it in gear and it doesn't slide right in, you're wearing out the sychro. I generally don't use the clutch and after 60k miles the synchors are alright. I don't mind pulling the tranny either though.

 

does it? i figured there was something that would get messed up but wasnt sure

yea i tired it and it went right in but didnt want to do it to much cuz i didnt want to hurt anything. i know about the syncros and stuff just didnt know what it would hurt if anythng

 

Yeah. Your syncro's will go out pretty quick and you'll wear on your gears. Best to use your clutch.

 

You won't wear on the gears...maybe the sliders, but thats about it.

 

Well if you grind the gears while shifting then it would.

 

Read how manual transmission works and get back to me on that. The only thing that will grind is the sliders/syncros

 

Dude I know how manual trannys work. I've rebuilt many.

What happens when the syncros go out?

 

The gears are in constant mesh with each other. The gears themselves do not grind...The synchros/sliders do. Just because you rebuilt it, doesn't mean you understand it fully.

 

Ok. I was thinking about a manual transmission out of a lawn mower.
Your right as far as cars/trucks go. Sorry about that.

 

Unless you shift at exactly the right rpm/speed, you'll wear the synchros out as the previous folks mentioned.

It also depends greatly on how much of a mismatch there is between the rpm/speed for that gear when you do shift... the more the synchro works to match the speeds, the more wear on said synchro.

Speaking of bad synchros, the M5OD in my Ranger could use a second gear synchro... it crunches every now and then when I shift into second out of first. Probably from the PO ----ing up the clutch and then driving for a long time on said bad clutch.

 

No problem...Gotta keep an open mind while working on various things I've rebuilt several ZF's with broken sychros, totally ground off sliders and perfect gears (had to polish up the synchro mating portion of the gear due to the broken sychro damaging it, usually you don't break sychros)

 

Ford tech manuals tell you to make 3 to 4 hard shifts on the affected synchro in an attempt to break up the glazing and rough it up a bit.

 

Alright, I'll try playing 'race truck driver' the next time I take it out on the road.

 

Hydrostatic?

 

No. manual.

 

'eff Hydro stats. I hate fixing mine when they brake. Warranty ftw!

NASCAR does the same, FWIW, on road courses they don't need to clutch because they have shift points set and they shift at the exact points.
at least thats how it used to be, i knew a guy who worked at a race shop way back when.

 

It's not hard to do, you're going from 3rd to 4th...ease off the throttle and pull it out of 3rd and depending on how fast your RPM's drop down, slide it into 4th. You do it too fast and you must wait for the RPM to come down...too slow and you have to blip the throttle to gain RPM. That's rough on sychros though.

Heavy trucks are easy because the gears are close. You just grab the next gear, if you're too slow just blip the throttle and it slides right in. No sychros mean you can really do some super grinding if you have no idea what you're doing.

I like when hydros go...as long as they're not mine. They get expensive in a hurry.

 

I drove like that for about a month when my slave cylinder went (No clutch, period). At the time, it was my only ride so I didnt have a choice until I had the time to replace it. Starting and stopping was, lets say adventurous. Had to coast into the stop sign in nuetral, kill the engine, find first, then take off. Can only get away w/ doing so many rolls through a stop sign. Its actually really easy to do, but then again, I work on class 8 trucks for a living, so floating the gears is almost 2nd nature at this point. Wouldnt recommend it, very easy to ruin your tranny in a hurry, but it can be done.

 

Haven't had a single problem with the hydrostatic transaxles on the JD 317's. Knock on wood.

Just change the fluid and filter every ten years, lol.

 

its so easy, i can do it!
but doing it right is another question....
best learn how so when your clutch gives on you after 100k, you know how on the road

 

I tried this with mine and for some reason it comes out of gear fine but going into gear was like the electronic lock out for 1st or R. It wouldn't let me shift into gear.

 

you need the clutch to get into 1st and R

 

I know, it felt like it was an electronic lockout in the 2-5 selections.