915 What would you do?

[RossR911sc]

When I bought my car a year ago there was a broken bolt-hole on the bell housing and the PO included a used transaxle with the car. I drained the oil and it came out clean (the oil was blue) and the magnet in the drain plug had very fine particles (I'm thinking syncro material).
Here are the options as I see it.
- Install it the way it is
- Open it up and replace gaskets and seals
- Open it up and inspect bearings, syncro rings etc.
Ross
Here is my obligatory picture

[snbush67]

It's normal to have the fine shavings on the Magnetic Drain Bolt. I think that unless you have reasons to believe that the transmission is bad why bother messing with it. If you can rotate through all the gears and it shifts, then put it in the car.

[Mitch Leland]

Ross,

I'm replacing my clutch and since it was so trashed (I bought the car in March) I decided I better have the Porsche mech look at the tranny. I'm glad I did. Someone had put the slider (?) in backwards so the teeth didn't mesh properly. Bits and pieces of first gear fell down on to the 2nd gear so the teeth have to be replaced on both gears. It shifted just fine so I wouldn't take anything for granted, you never know who was in the tranny last. I'm sure it's cheaper now than later...

See ya,

[spuggy]

+1 for "check it out", if your approach is to do things once and you're not planning on dropping the motor and gearbox anytime soon after this round.

Replacing wear items on a 915 isn't that expensive, and you'll know exactly what you have, whereas blowing the 915 up might scrap it completely.

I thought my mag-case 915 was fine and just needed wear items, but it was actually very unhappy inside when torn down. You can't tell much from driving it, and poking at the outside isn't much better.

[snbush67]

Blue indicates Swepco, which is probably a sign that whoever owned it previously probably took care of it.