Maruti WagonR AMT failure: Repair costs 83,000 rupees

As my service advisor was inspecting the engine bay, I noticed black oil on top of the gearbox where the AMT unit is placed.

Jaideep Singh recently shared this with other enthusiasts via this Team BHP share page.

Hello car enthusiast,

I will be highlighting some very important information regarding service/maintenance costs associated with Maruti’s AMT system. My purpose is only to educate people as AMT is a fairly new technology in the Indian market and a lot of cars must now be out of warranty. I do not want to bash any manufacturer but to make the people aware of the ownership of an AMT car.

My background:

I am a young marketing professional, I started my corporate career in 2014 and was travelling to Gurgaon from Delhi daily during peak hours (people of NCR must be knowing how bad was the traffic back in 2014-15). Initially, I used to travel by my bike Yamaha FZ, but due to the long commute time and some back pain, I decided to buy my first car.

In 2015 I purchased Wagon R VXI AMT, I got a pretty good deal as I purchased it in December and took the delivery on 31st December 2015 (On-Road < 5lakhs with extended warranty). The car was Oct 2015 manufactured.

The issue:

I was the sole user of the car, never experienced any issues with the gearbox or the clutch that most of the AMT users were experiencing, one of the reasons for this was that there was no load on the car, just 1 person (me). The car performed well till the lockdown happened in March 2020. Till then I have covered 52K KM all in NCR traffic

During the lockdown, like most others, I was doing WFH and the car was sparingly used. I started travelling to work in February 2022 and from here on the problem started.

When I resumed work I experienced a sudden increase in the gear shifting noise, I took it as normal wear and tear of the clutch and assumed that the car requires a new clutch and ignored it for a couple of days. In one or two instances the car refused to shift when starting early morning but a little warm-up is enough to engage it in Drive mode. But as the days proceeded it was becoming obvious to me that time has come to replace the clutch as the car just turns itself into Neutral when driving moreover transmission light also comes and goes on in the instrument cluster. It was a serious safety concern. I took the car to Maruti service station Naraina as this is owned directly by Maruti and not by any dealer.

The shock:

As my service advisor was inspecting the engine bay I noticed black oil on top of the gearbox where the AMT unit is placed. After seeing that my service advisor told me that the AMT unit has gone bad and needs to be replaced, he also told me that this is a common occurrence in AMT, especially with 1.0 L K series engine. As the car is now in its 7th year it was out of extended warranty as well.

He initially gave me an estimate of 6K for Piston Set Clutch Actuator Kit + Labour, this is a workaround, if changed, some AMT units get a second chance at life, but unfortunately, mine was not the one. The cost of a new AMT unit is Rs. 72K including labour. I had no other option but to get it replaced as the car was not usable and was only a pile of junk at this time.

The total cost includes the AMT unit and clutch parts etc. Cost me a whopping Rs 83K (bill attached).

I also inquired outside to see what was the cost difference but I was not able to get hold of any FNG who has replaced/repaired the AMT unit, I just got one quotation from a transmission repair shop that deals in luxury cars of 50K but he was not able to answer me from where he will source a new AMT unit.

Converting to manual:

A lot of people suggested I convert it into manual as the gearbox and other components are the same and I also believed that this is something that can be done. I started researching and what I found out was really shocking, though the gearbox is the same as the manual there are some significant differences in how the gear engagement works and also the linkages are totally different. So the gearbox is not identical though they are similar. Moreover, you need to get a new/reused manual gearbox along with an ABC petal set along with a good scanner that can bypass the ECU to convert it to fully manual.

Conclusion:

The car is back with me and is performing as good as it was new, but the dilemma is still there in my mind, should I keep it or sell it off. This experience has taught me a lot about how an AMT unit works and trust me once there is an issue in the AMT unit the only other option is to get a new one. Also, the AMT is not made for Indian traffic conditions.

What I would suggest the manufacturer is to reduce the price of AMT units/give the option to the customers to at least convert to manual. It does not justify investing such a huge amount on a new AMT unit in an out of warranty car.

I really hope that this information will help the people visiting this forum to make a sound decision in selecting if they want to go with an AMT equipped car or a conventional automatic.

Here's what GTO had to say on the matter:

The lamest transmission to ever be sold in India. It's jerky, slow, offers poor performance, overheats on inclines, has way too many issues (see the list of complaints here) and costs a bomb in long-term repairs. We have this 83 grand bill for a Maruti owner, while a Tata Nexon owner ended up with a 71,000 quote.

For your peace-of-the-mind, smoothness, performance & reliability, please pay the Rs 50,000 extra at the time of car purchasing and buy a proper torque-converter or CVT gearbox.

The only two benefits of AMT are the low cost to entry (but clearly not low cost in the long term) and FE. However, owners pay too high a cost for that, which is simply not worth it. If it was just about the money, we'd all sell our cars and roam around in public transport.

Seriously, buy a proper automatic! 88% of BHPians said they'd happily pay more for a proper AT over the dumb AMT. In another poll, merely 4% of BHPians voted for the AMT.

Here's what BHPian sunikkat had to say on the matter:

The AMT gearbox in a humble WagonR cost 84k for replacement. And all the blame is only taken by poor DSG.

On a serious note feel bad for the owner, that is almost 20% of the cost of a new WagonR.

Here's what BHPian abhishek46 had to say on the matter:

My advice would be to use it for now. That is, for at least another 30-40K Kms, and then sell it, before the replacement AMT also goes kaput.

Here's what BHPian jinojohnt had to say on the matter:

The main issue seems to be the lack of expertise/willingness to replace individual parts in a gearbox. If it is a manual gearbox, nobody will ask you to replace the full gear box as they know that you will get the work done outside by replacing just the needed components at a fraction of the cost. If it is AMT or even the torque converter, I know some authorized service centers who insist on replacing the whole gearbox rather than merely replacing the clutch bands.

Check out BHPian comments for more insights and information.