360 vrsurgeon was right the entire time.

Brian, I agree but it's easy enough to check it before removal of bearbox

 

Thanks to the shared info on this forum I have managed to fix the problem. Normally yes you always try another mechanic although with only 2 official Ferrari service and 1 specialist in the country it is not always easy.
My problem always came after about 15 minutes of driving. Making it impossible to really drive the car

To fix te problem I first made a small heat shield cover for the outer control unit then I was able to drive the car without the stress of being able to shift.
After that I proceeded to remove the outer control unit and lightly sand the moving parts as Icy friend and I came to the conclusion that with heat caused some sticking issues.

Now my F430 shifts with ease. This worked for me and was FREE I hope this helps someone else

Not sure if put the images correctly?

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ayYMGaTb8Iw




https://ibb.co/pJ8gYQz
https://ibb.co/ws32jjW

 

Removal? No need.
Exactly why I suggest finding someone who knows them.

The fork bushing are easily diagnosed and repaired without removal. I have no doubt Michaels guy did not remove it on a fishing expedition. No one should.

 

Sure maybe your right. But then again things can always be better just look at Ferrari's cars over the years.

The same problem is on other brand cars gearbox control units with similar fixes done.


Time will tell and fingers crossed it is long term cheap fix

 

So do you have pics of what it looked like before you cleaned it up?

 

Lorenzo, I don't know what last mechanic did last time exactly. He replaced and adjusted broken shift cables. He claims he took apart and cleaned everything shift related up to gearbox including "that part on side of transmission like in the photo you showed me" . He said everything was fine. Left his shop, shifted like a dream for 10 minutes or so, then worse than ever.


New mechanic owns a high mileage manual 360 and is actually doing a F1 to manual swap on a 430 right now. He has a shop full of exotics. I requested gearbox swap based on advice from another Ferrari-only mechanic of 40 years. . He wants to do a few less costly things before we go that route. I applaud him for that. He showed me the shifter mechanism he would be using for the conversion and explained how it worked. He mentioned he may take unit off his 360 and put on my 430 and see how that works. He showed me Hills bleeder block, said stock was prone for failure.

At least this one explains what he's doing and why. He replaced leaking master cylinder, is waiting on a hills engineering bleeder block. He thinks internal pressure from air in system may be causing hydraulic problem. He ordered a 1-2 shift fork (?) or something along that line. Don't shoot the messenger if description or nomenclature is wrong.

Brian. Your explanation of shifter bushing problem makes the most sense to me. I'm not sure if that's what mechanic's thinking right now or not. Also feel free to recommend someone in south Florida to me. I would appreciate it. David in Sarasota doesn't have time for the project.

I'm waiting to here from him. Messaged him 2 days ago. He said he would check on eta of parts and call me. I will get some specifics then.

I appreciate everyone's input. Thank you.

 

You say David doesn't have time. Neither do I. Earliest date in my appointments is some month sometime next year. David is probably the same.

You know why? We fix cars.

You want a big bill next week or do you want your car fixed?


Good doctors, good restaurants, good plumbers, good contractors, whatever. Next week is out of the question. Good people are retiring, its only going to get worse. Get used to it.

 

@Rifledriver Interesting discussion. I find it amazing people at the shop I go to expect them to drop everything and work on their car right away and get it done in an hour. I saw it happen and concluded the customer was an *****. The cheap sob, who boasted to me that he had just bought a tofu machine for a million bucks for his business, kept pushing the mechanic. I finally said "Hey if you pay him $50,000, he will drop everything and work on your car". My mechanic said "No, this is a 4hr job and I have other cars ahead of you. I will try to get it done by tomorrow".

 

Every single day.

This is going to get a lot more expensive. Everyone I know who is any good has a 6 month or more backlog. And those guys are retiring. I have literally had people have a tow truck drop the car in front of the shop because they cannot get an appointment soon enough to please them. Or lie about what it needs, spring a long list on me after its here. And no one with any knowledge is getting into the business.

 

And here we go once more. Brian . How many years of this? I've been here since 2007. You're helpful one moment and then going off on someone who's merely asking for help the next. I am finished with you. The more respectful I get to you, which is totally unjustified given your track record of condescending remarks, the worse you get to me. That all ends here.

David didn't say he was too busy and I would have to wait. I got that . I understand. He did not want the project. The end.

Perhaps you should seek clarification before spouting off.

Listen to me very carefully Brian. Piss off!! And do not ever address anything directly involving me on this site again.I don't want your input. I am sick and tired of your snarkiness.

Ask yourself why are you even on this site.....

PM if this grinds on you and we can talk about it. .

 

"LorenzoR".
No I dont have any pictures before I cleaned the part. Helped by heat It seems that a small layer of gearbox oil accumulates over time on the part that may effect heat dispersal.

My previous owner had done yearly changes so maybe it could be the change was done when gearbox oil cold which created more buildup or the wrong spec gear oil that allowed the quicker buildup.

 

Dude, if the car were closer I’d take my old shift control unit… manual actuator if you will.. and we’d put it on the car to test. It would take an ****ing hour to do and you’d know.

That is again what this entire thread is partly about. When the problem was posted.. who made what recommendation. Brian did not (IIRC) post and suggest that the manual actuator be replaced. So many others recommended shift forks, oil, bleeder blocks, etc. None of the professional mechanics posted on the solution to the problem. There is a long history of snide commentary with no actual useful information with the Rifle. I used to have more respect but that's gone. On the issue of cost.. I recall a mechanic charging a 360 owner $15,000 to put new catalytic convertors on the car. I'll leave it at that.

 

Curt, well said about one hour to remove it. And that's exactly why I suggested checking that 1st And if that's not the problem at least you eliminated it and Cleaned it up. Easy enough

 

Hi all. After opening my old control unit you can see there is a large build up of crap where main gear pin connects with roller.

This looks like the reason why gear 1-2 seems to get the most stuck. with some Mac gyver style 400 grit sandpaper on a long bolt you can use a drill to clean while being very careful not to mess with the nylon seal.


The ball that meets the gear pin was not rotating properly and was fine after clean

https://ibb.co/5R5W5rZ

https://ibb.co/1KTJ4tF

https://ibb.co/zsRmsJs

My goal is to make something to reattach hat to test next week the difference on the part that was deemed not usable.

 

Thank you Mike. Thank you Curt.

 

Great job and good on your @vrsurgeon

 

On my lift, I remove the diffuser and you are staring straight at it.

 

great, so how did you get the main gear pin out of there? some sort of a puller?

 

24000rpm, the top hat has to be removed with force as it is pressed in. Do not damage bearing sleeve inside that is connected to hat when prying apart. Check earlier pics. I lightly sanded pin and any parts in my current unit in car. You can also soak unit in something to try and remove although I think it is pointless as the buildup occurs under heat and is not easily removed without light sanding.
I would be curious how anyone has properly rebuilt one of these units in the past.


next week I reattach hat and put some pics and details

Only after cleaning pin pivot point under hat is 1-2 going to be like a knife through butter.
There is such a large buildup in that area.
When you see how much buildup is normally in you gearbox filter it makes sense
Now car higher gears 3-6 are 100% easy 1-2 is 75%. I have driven 250km since fix now. Earlier I could only drive maybe 30.

 

I've had a similar problem. I might have missed it but would you mind sharing the $$$ he charged for the part minus core? My car is apart atm so it would be a quick deal to get the part out and if it's worth replacing to help my shifting I'd be all for it.

 

Just thought the problems here could be the ablative extreme pressure additives that GL-5 gear oil coats onto the gears. It's good for the gears and gets sheared off and constantly re-coated. It might however over time coat/clog and stiffen up the shift mechanisms?

 

So glad I finally found this thread with others in my position. My story is that when I bought my car 10 years ago, it was hard to shift when cold but great when hot. I changed the gearbox oil myself about 2 years later, the behaviour was reversed, cold was great but when hot it became harder, most noticeable when on a motorway drive and the car in 6th and then very hard to disengage it when coming to a stop.

Since then it’s got progressively worse. I’ve changed the gearbox oil yearly since and tried different levels of fluid in it. The closer to minimum the better I find it is, but I still only get around 30 mins of driving now before gear shifts are problematic, some gears will refuse to be selected until I put it into another gear and then go back to my original selection where it works fine.

Most tellingly with my issue is that regularly when hot and I put the car in to neutral, the shifter is almost fixed in the upright position, I can’t move it side to side to even attempt to select a gear. I have to actually knock it quite hard with my palm and then it’s fine again to move side to side to choose a gear. Can any of you please confirm this is the same with your cars and we are all sharing the same issue???

If so can someone please advise if an attempt to clean and recondition the box is a possible as a DIY? It looks easy to get to, as my undertray is currently off, will I need to drain the gearbox to remove it and is there a risk of screwing up the linkages going to the shifter if I’m attempting it for the first time. I’m in the UK so using the firm mentioned previously doesn’t look like an option for me. I’d certainly be happy removing it myself and cleaning, sanding and trying to recondition it myself before looking at other options.

Thanks all