Trans Gear Oil Options

[partwerks]

Is synthetic gear oil ok to be used in the transaxle to make it shift easier or is that a no, no?

[BigD9146gt]

I put top of the line synthetic in my tranny way back when I first got my 914(when I knew nothing about these cars). Stuff came out in less than a week and put in swepco... ever looked back. If I changed my tranny oil the same duration as motor oil, I could understand going cheap. However, 30,40,50 thousand miles before you would need to change it out? Relatively, $60 is not that expensive. I recall Porsche having problems with 935 trannys blowing up under the 24hour mark, and teams trying anything they could to get them to last. Once they switched to swepco, most of the problems went away. not sure how true that story is, i'll ask my friend who was a 935 crew chief at LeMans in the 70's, he might remember.

[0396]

I put top of the line synthetic in my tranny way back when I first got my 914(when I knew nothing about these cars). Stuff came out in less than a week and put in swepco... ever looked back. If I changed my tranny oil the same duration as motor oil, I could understand going cheap. However, 30,40,50 thousand miles before you would need to change it out? Relatively, $60 is not that expensive. I recall Porsche having problems with 935 trannys blowing up under the 24hour mark, and teams trying anything they could to get them to last. Once they switched to swepco, most of the problems went away. not sure how true that story is, i'll ask my friend who was a 935 crew chief at LeMans in the 70's, he might remember.

The above 'story' is what sold me on utilizing Swepco...then I remember Art Zapf and I rebuilt my trans and he mentioned - just put the regular stuff in and change it after every event... in the end it's all up to you. Heck, my daily driver -1983 320i with 135k had shifting hang ups ..I bought Swepco with 'moly'...and it shifts much smoother now.... go figure.