My first thought is - wow you must have been REALLY moving to wind out 4th...lol
I really don't like the sound of "quite a lot of fluid sprayed".....:(
It sounds like you've blown-up 5th gear and its possibly cracked its housing/case and leaked out some fluid.
I wouldn't drive it if you don't HAVE to either.
At least now you can whack a Quaife in it. :)

Sorry to hear that man.
I've had an E153 just fail out of the blue about 8 years ago. Something just shat itself inside and left it all crunchy and not engaging gears properly.
A used LSD e153 solved all my problems and was a big improvement shifting wise (Extra synchros or whateva its got) 

MRTurbo
My first thought is - wow you must have been REALLY moving to wind out 4th...lol
I really don't like the sound of "quite a lot of fluid sprayed".....:(
It sounds like you've blown-up 5th gear and its possibly cracked its housing/case and leaked out some fluid.
I wouldn't drive it if you don't HAVE to either.
At least now you can whack a Quaife in it. :)

I didn't wind out 4th, I upshifted quite early to 5th.
Yeah the sprayed fluid is very worrying. I'm very puzzled as to how that would relate to 1 or 2 of the gears not working, and the remaining 4 gears working fine.
It could quite possibly be a cracked gearbox casing. I just don't know how that ties in with the symptoms.
I was thinking of getting a Quaife haha, and I may do that, but I'll have to decide if I'm willing to part with the additional funds.
 

Mrskylighter
Sorry to hear that man.
I've had an E153 just fail out of the blue about 8 years ago. Something just shat itself inside and left it all crunchy and not engaging gears properly.
A used LSD e153 solved all my problems and was a big improvement shifting wise (Extra synchros or whateva its got) 

Will the gen 3 e153 box bolt straight up to my gen 2 engine? Regardless of whether it has an LSD?

robk
 Yeah the sprayed fluid is very worrying. I'm very puzzled as to how that would relate to 1 or 2 of the gears not working, and the remaining 4 gears working fine.
It could quite possibly be a cracked gearbox casing. I just don't know how that ties in with the symptoms.
I was thinking of getting a Quaife haha, and I may do that, but I'll have to decide if I'm willing to part with the additional funds.
 

Don't quote me on this but 5th and reverse gears (I think) are 'seperate' to the rest of the main gears, housed in a case bolted on to the 'main' section.
So that might explain why 1st to 4th still works but 2 gears (reverse and 5th) do not.
 
eg. 

Ohhhh, that's very useful info thanks!!
I think you may be correct, as that would explain the symptoms.
I'm guessing that the 5th/reverse part of the casing (removed in the above photo if I understand) has probably cracked, and the main casing may be OK. The selector fork and/or 5th gear are probably damaged within that end part of the casing.

Yep the late model E153 gearbox will bolt up no worries. The only difference is that your passenger side axle stub won't fit. The spline section either needs to be machined down or you buy the correct stub. If the diff was changed to something else (TRD, quaife etc) than your stock axles might be okay.
If you have a mechanical speedo you just swap the sender over to the new box (Which has a an elec sender standard)
 

robk

MRTurbo
My first thought is - wow you must have been REALLY moving to wind out 4th...lol
I really don't like the sound of "quite a lot of fluid sprayed".....:(
It sounds like you've blown-up 5th gear and its possibly cracked its housing/case and leaked out some fluid.
I wouldn't drive it if you don't HAVE to either.
At least now you can whack a Quaife in it. :)

I didn't wind out 4th, I upshifted quite early to 5th.
Yeah the sprayed fluid is very worrying. I'm very puzzled as to how that would relate to 1 or 2 of the gears not working, and the remaining 4 gears working fine.
It could quite possibly be a cracked gearbox casing. I just don't know how that ties in with the symptoms.
I was thinking of getting a Quaife haha, and I may do that, but I'll have to decide if I'm willing to part with the additional funds.

Mrskylighter
Sorry to hear that man.
I've had an E153 just fail out of the blue about 8 years ago. Something just shat itself inside and left it all crunchy and not engaging gears properly.
A used LSD e153 solved all my problems and was a big improvement shifting wise (Extra synchros or whateva its got) 

Will the gen 3 e153 box bolt straight up to my gen 2 engine? Regardless of whether it has an LSD?

Mrskylighter
Yep the late model E153 gearbox will bolt up no worries. The only difference is that your passenger side axle stub won't fit. The spline section either needs to be machined down or you buy the correct stub. If the diff was changed to something else (TRD, quaife etc) than your stock axles might be okay.
If you have a mechanical speedo you just swap the sender over to the new box (Which has a an elec sender standard)

Thanks Nick!
I didn't think of the speedo. I do have a mechanical speedo, and I have no intention of converting to electronic.
So, are you saying that the mechanical speedo sender can fit straight into the same spot as the electronic sender on a gen 3 gearbox?
I'm not sure how much of this will be relevant in the end, but if I plan ahead now I will hopefully prevent unnecessary delays.

Yep the speedo sender is a direct swap. Done it myself on my last car and my current AW11 has it done also. 

The picture that was posted was of 5th gear.  5th gear is housed in the top section of the gearbox.  I can almost guarantee that the 5th gear selector fork (that alumiumin sort of Y shape thing) has broken.  You can easily check this by removing that end part of the housing (very simple, should be able to even get it off with the box in the gear). 
 
Reverse is deeper in the box, however, is controlled by the same gear shift 'shaft' (steel rod that shift fork is bolted to, goes all the way down through the transmission).   If the 5th gear fork has broken it may be fouling the operation of reverse gear.

Thanks Totenkopf, more great info!
It sounds like my existing gearbox may be repairable, but I've talked to Dylan and he has an LSD e153 gearbox if I need it. He has offered a decent price, so there is a good chance I'll buy it. That way I'll have an LSD instead of an open diff (and not have to spend extra for a Quaife), and I guess it will have the revised synchros too. Apparently the box only has about 80,000km on it too, which is great if it's legit.

Does anyone have a spare 'left stub axle' that you need when changing from a non-LSD to an LSD transmission?