Going back together with my transmission, waiting on parts until Monday. Thought I would share my discoveries. I lost the forward gears suddenly (1st & 2nd that I know of) and the transmission had 225,000 miles on it so I first pulled the pan, valve body, and intermediate plate to inspect the b2 assembly. I discovered that the reaction valve side pin (dogbone) had come out of the reaction valve and stuck on the side of the valve gorging out part of the valve (strange). In order to remove the reaction valve for renewal you have to pull everything from the case so out of the car came the transmission, after I put everything back together. I then disassembled the transmission so here are the things i found. 1st was the reaction valve I already mentioned. 2nd was when I was removing the reverse clutches behind the front pump I noticed that they had been installed backwards ( according to four different manuals I have read dozens of times). This meant it was probably the second time this transmission had been opened up since the car was new. In the same area I noticed two items missing! The damper spring and the little plastic retainer that fits on either side of these reverse clutches. Strange because the transmission had performed flawless the previouse two years I had owned the car. So where I'm at now is going back together with the transmission. I also ordered the rebuild kit from Cobra and I'm very disappointed. The three clutch sets were all wrong, luckily my old ones were still in good shape. The large gasket for the intermediate plate was also wrong. So that's what I'm currently waiting on via Mercedes dealer. I wanted to post my discoveries because this site has been tremendously helpful and to encourage others that these transmissions are great and not that terrifying as I originally thought but my next post could change this. When I'm done and have set the vacuum and pressure cable right and tested pressures and everything I will post my final outcome. Good luck to all and let Mercedes diesel live forever.