The General Backstory
We did a gearbox overall and fitted a new clutch on this client's vehicle a few months ago. It's a Audi A3 I'm unsure what year it is but I suppose it's around 2013-2014. Now we recommended that he also get a Mega-tronic overall because they are known to burst and needs to be upgraded with a Kinergo accumulator which has a stronger base strength that bypasses the actual valve body inside the Mega-tronic, so even if it burst it will have no effect on the valve body because it has a separate pressure unit.
As I am writing this I'm thinking to myself a lot of people probably has no clue what I am saying (In general I mean no offense to anybody.) Okay I am not going to show the stripping process of the Mega-tronic today. I am merely going to show how I remove the Mega-tronic from the gearbox. My way has a little bit more effort to it, but doing it this way I have never had to remove the MEG again to re-adjust the pistons on the Mega-tronic. The pistons are very sensitive to touch and when touched they move very easily and then you might miss the gear selectors and end up with a gear selection problem.
Lets get right into it.
Draining the Oil.
Once the car is lifted up or jacked up the first step is to remove the belly plate. Sometimes you are lucky and the previous technician never put it back so yahhh less work hey. This is not the case here.
- This is usually held in place by seven T25 torque bit screws (Only applies to this specific vehicle)
Draining the oil on the gearbox is a must, unless you want to be bathed in glorious lubrication. To me that's not an option.
- A 10mm Hexagon or ellen key should do the trick, most of these DSG gearboxes or Audi and VW gearboxes has a 10mm key.
More than often they stick and don't come loose very easy. That's because of the alimunium casing and the steel drain plug.
- If it struggles I tend to grab the strong bar and simply turn it like you would turn on a water tap.
Once the tension is removed from the drain plug I turn it with the hand, no point in struggling with that big lumpy piece of metal or even a ratchet. If it's loose it's loose.
- I prefer the long one because the oil comes gulping out and then you can slowly turn it sideways and let it pour out slowly without having it spill over your hand.
It's not noticeable in the photo of course but I bring the bucket for the oil as close as possible to the draining hole. It has a very small breathing hole on top of the gearbox so when draining oil it breathes through the drain plug causing the oil to come out in gulps and that causes the oil to splatter in the oil pan, it splashes more the farther it falls.
Apologies for the blurry image, I think I got some oil on the camera 😅 Notice how clean the gearbox oil is, Its because we added fresh oil after the overall on the gearbox. We shall be reusing this oil because there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. Disposing it would be mad matic.
Removing the Boost Pipe.
This is fairly easy. By taking a small flat screwdriver you can un-clip the spring clip on the right hand side, sometimes they stick a little and you have to wedge it a little but it will clip out by itself once you get it moving. getting it back into place can sometimes be the bitchy one.
Once the right hand clip is removed you can use a standard flat screwdriver to unscrew the clamp on the left.
Give it a good grabbing on each side and try to twist it, this will make the rubber pipe come loose from the plastic pipe, they tend to stick because of the heat.
Removing the Water Hose.
Removing the water hose is where this job becomes a little messy and sticky, It's also the least favourite part of this specific job for me. In the image below you can see the water hose is located above the boost pipe and leads from the motor to the radiator.
Remove the temperature sensor plug from the water hose fitting and not the actual temperature sensor itself. Removing the Temperature sensor might cause a water leak later on.
(Why? I don't know I am assuming the O-ring gets damaged.)
After removing the clip that holds the fitting in place. (I couldn't get a proper photo of it so I skipped it.) It looks very similar to the one on the boost pipe only a bit smaller.
Okay this is where the focus starts. Gently wedge, wedge the fitting, be very careful here you don't want to break any plastics that would cost you extra money.
Okay once removed you should already have a bucket at hand to catch the Anti-freeze water. If not I can picture you jumping around like a maniac left to right and right to left again in search of that bucket you thought you had next to you. If this happens stay calm... By the time you get a proper bucket all of it will be spread over the ground already. 😅
Removing the Gearbox Mount and Strapping the Motor.
I am very fond of removing the entire gearbox mounting so that their are no restrictions what so ever
Once I removed the gearbox mounting I re-insert the longest bolt into place where the short bolt needs to be entered and turn it in no more than you would when mounted in place. The reason is if you turn it in too far you can actually start turning it into the clutch system and you'd end up removing the entire gearbox.
I then take a ratchet strap and hook it around the bolt and start strapping it tilting the bottom side of the gearbox and motor to the back, creating enough space at the front for me to safely remove the mega-tronic once I get to that point. (Be wary of how far you strap it.)
Removing Mega-tronic Plug and Inserting Clutch Tool.
Remove the metal piece holding the wiring plugs in place, most of them are held in place by 6mm nuts and 6mm bolts that use a 10mm wrench or socket size to remove.
Another one above the first one, also needs removing otherwise the mega-tronic will not come out of the vehicle
The Main power plug that fits into the mega-tronic itself. Now sometimes removing that plug can be an art, almost all of the vehicles that has had a gearbox overall before coming to us have broken plugs, please don't break that one.
The Clutch tool is very important, especially if you are only removing the mega-tronic and not the actual gearbox, if you forget this little magic wand, well you can simply put your tools down, take a breather, perhaps make a cup of coffee and start revising your plan on how you will be removing the gearbox. Once that clutch slips it has to be reset and refitted. They said it's nice to have a dual clutch system right.
Unbolt Mega-tronic and Remove.
In the picture below you can somewhat see most of the places where I removed parts, the mega-tronic is the big black box.
Remove the T45 torque bit bolts they come out fairly easy, keep in mind you got to feel with the fingers for the hidden ones, they have about 3 hidden bolts.
Remove ONLY the T45 torque bits.
You should end up with seven bolts. Four long bolts and three short bolts.
- The image above you can visibly see three long bolts and one short bolt.
If I have enough time on my hands I generally like to split the mega-tronic from the gearbox and leave it unattended for a while allowing the excess gearbox oil to leak or drip out of the gearbox. Don't worry It wont fall out, unless you electronically put it in neutral or removal mode on your Launch tablet or whatever you might have. You can also do this manually with the right sort of tool. I like to do it the manual way. I will do a run through on that some other time.
The inside of the gearbox is now exposed and the gears as well as the selector forks are now visible from the outside of the gearbox.
Place gently down into a bucket or oil pan for excess oil to leak of.
Notice the black marks on the mega-tronic? Those are the sensors and in this case those where the sensors no longer working properly, so we will need to get a new TCM for the mega-tronic
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