Foretravel Owners' Forum

Hi All,
Thought I would talk about the recent repair we had to do on our 98 U295. There are some threads on the forum about vibration coming from a failing P3 bearing and I have some advice for those that have an issue in the future.
My coach has about 50K miles on it and we took a trip from Cape Cod to North Carolina a short time ago. On the first overnight I noticed a stain on the driveway under the transmission, looked like the size of a coffee cup lid in two spots. Was not a huge leak which would be puddles...just sort of a stain, so it was not leaking allot, just enough for a concern. The next morning it was a little bigger but still not alarming. We went to a shop that worked on Allison transmissions but they were not able to get to us very quickly so they sent us 1.5 hours down the road to another place to get it looked at right away. Had it looked at and they said we needed a rebuilt transmission, so that would be about 5K for the transmission and another fee for the uninstall and reinstall of a rebuilt transmission, I'm guessing it would be about 8K if I went that route.
Here is where the advice comes in, There is a difference in a shop that can replace a transmission and a certified to repair Allison transmission facility. The difference is a certified place can actually repair instead of only swap out. we drove to our destination for our vacation and made an appointment at such a facility just after we left. We dropped it off and I got a call about 8:30 that night and the guy said we had about $83 dollars in parts so far and did I want the transmission serviced also. I said Hell Ya how much will the bill be? He said $570 for the service and the bill total would be $1800. It pays to go to a certified to repair facility.
The issue with the P3 bearing is it is prone to failure and if you feel vibration at high speeds it is wearing out, what happened in my case was the vibration eventually wore out the rear main seal and started to leak. With my coach I would notice vibration at about 60 MPH so I would stay about that speed, and all seemed good but that is only temporary, once it starts to leak it is time for a repair. After the repair the difference was amazing 70 MPH and smooth as glass with no vibration.

Yup, there are other posts on this forum from about a year ago covering this.

I talked to the place in Texas that does a lot of these on FT's. Takes special tools. I looked up the only Alison dealer here in Spokane, and they took care of it.

I had it inspected, and they said it was fine, but for $500.00 they would pull the drive line, and inspect deeper, which they did. They replaced the seal, my trans already had been serviced.

They stuck to the price. It's sad, that places can only replace parts today, and not FIX stuff.

Chris

Had mine done last year at the Alison shop in downtown Memphis,great shop,great people,we had a slight vibration,no leak,I
check the shaft where it comes out of the trans with a prybar and got slight 1/16 to 1/8 inch play.The repair cost $1000,they disassembled the driveshaft and checked the bearing,the race and bearing were good but the bearing did need to be tightened,we caught it in time,would advise everyone to check theirs for play ,can be done easily.

The exact same thing happened to our 1998 U295.  The culprit, it turns out, is inadequate torqueing of the retainer nut on the P3 tapered roller bearing.  At one point, Allison issued a service bulletin to that effect.  We had ours retorqued when a mechanic noticed slop in the drive line.  Unfortunately, that is only a temporary fix because the nut can't be locked into place (castle nut) and will eventually come loose again.  Ours came loose a second time, with disasterous results.

For those situated in the SW United States, there is a RAAMCO shop in Yuma, AZ.  He knows more about the 3060 & 3060R tranny than most Allison service centers.  The owner's name is Flash.

Another great shop is Tucson Transmission and Auto Repair.  His name is Richard.  He has a great YouTube video of him rebuilding an Allison transmission.  His product knowledge puts Allison to shame.

These guys are rebuilders - not replacers, which is a great thing because the standard 3060 case can NOT replace the 3060R case

Larry.

Agree with John.  Checking drive play is a MUST whenever you service the coach or have someone do it.  Note: this does not apply to the 4060R transmission,

Larry

A bit of history. You might want to go to page 2. Its my experience with my Allison replacement. Mark