Club 80-90 Forums

hi there

i thought that i might have gear linkage issues but the stick travel doesn't amount to knuckle rash on the dashboard, nor does the gearstick touch the driving seat in fourth. i blipped the throttle and the gearbox switched neatly into third when revs were raised a fair few to the right amount.

this made me think that there's no gear linkage issues at all and it may be worn syncromesh. 2nd can be slow plop into gear and you have to sort of maintain a steady pressure and it falls in. first is hard to get into gear and so is reverse, but there is no play in the gear box, but as i said, if i rev the throttle up and then shift, third slips in and you can then change to any gear you want quite easily.

can there be worn synchromesh on certain gears, or some gears being worse than others? what do you think about the above?

Hi , I have had issues in the past with 'Sticky gear changes' that got better with a blip of the throttle, mine turned out to be a bit of clutch drag . I got worse with a hot engine . I changed the slave cylinder, this hadn't failed completly but was on its way out and leaking. The problem was gone. So maybe a bit of food for thought. hope this helps

I actually think you're a genius. I think it is that. did a bit of work on the front calipers and coincided with that!

it gets worse with a hot engine! and doesn't get any worse over time. also I have had trouble with clutch whine and not disengaging totally xhen I dip the clutch!

I always thought, no, it can't be linkage, the gears feel too firm!

is the slave in the engine bay, around the middle at the back?

Yep, the slave's on top of the gearbox, accessible-ish through the lid.

BUT... if it coincided with brake work, it might just need bleeding.

i found it easier to remove the passenger side rear wheel (rhd) to gain access to the slave.

mark

i think my setup is early so the slave's up at the back near the top of the engine, i thought i bled it enough before but obviously not!

last call for someone to help me cure this and teach me something about the linkage before i give up and take her to a garage. lol.

Hi , just caught up with your post again, What engine do you have???

hi it could be the clutch pressure plate because the gear changes are fine on a cold engine. what would it cost for a new pressure plate and rough guide for time it would take?

Hi ,I Still think you need to see if the clutch 'arm' from the slave cylinder moves properly when someone puts their foot on the clutch pedal. Mine had an intermitent problem that was also ok when the engine was cold. I stripped the old slave unit out after i put a new one on to try and work out why it only played up sometimes and the bore inside the unit had a crusty lip on it that if you sat with the clutch down must have let fluid pressure pass the seal as it didn't sit right i'm guessing that the warmth from engine alowed this area to expand slightly and decrease the hydraulic preassure and give gear engagment problems . A slave cylinder is what £30 and a fairly easy thing to ofit , i'd def give it a go before doing clutch plates etc as this is a bigger cost as the gearbox needs to split from the engine to get to it.

mrdp, did the slave arm travel not as far when warm, if re how much less in mm approx? or is it something you can't diagnose by seeing it?

not sure bleeding the clutch with 500ml of dot4 did anything..
now with pedal down the van clutch doesn't disengage...

no loss of fluid though.

also, could it be the master cylinder as well? are there any pointers to work out if the master or the slave is faulty without taking them off, stripping and inspecting them?!

If the master has failed there is usually a wet patch on the cab floor running down the back of the pedal.

Hi, With my problem the piston on the slave had 'Crud' on the inside of the bore and sometimes when the engine /gearbox were hot the oring seal that sits on the piston of the slave cylinder used to get stuck on the crud and prevent 'full' movement and also let the hydraulic pressure drop as the seal wasn't seating properly . I replaced the cylinder which fixed the problem but i couldn't work out why it only had issues when warm , so I stripped out the old unit after if was off the van to see what was up. The only thing wrong was the hard ring of crud which the o-ring had to travel over ( or not sometimes!!) I clean this up and the piston ran smootly in the bore, but by this time i had fitted a new one anyway maybe the hot engine causes the body of the slave cylinder to expand a small amount and with the rubbish seal due to the crusty bit it failed to supply enough pressure . One sympom I had was, say in traffic and hot the clutch would disengage and if you sat with your foot fully down on the pedal, I had had the pressure drop and the van start to judder forward towards the car in front !!with my foot fully on the clutch !!!!not good. I still think its a fairly common thing too replace and fairly cheap mine had internittent problems for ages unit £30 slave unit fitted, problem solved... to fit a slave I removed the rear wheel undid a couple of 3 bolts removed old unit new one in bolts done up bleed fluid and refit wheel, even at my speed it only took 1.5-2 hrs all up.

thanks for that mrdp. i am going to go and see if i can get the old one loosened up/off and i will take a look at this piston bore.

is there a flexible brake fluid pipe going into the slave cylinder. do i need a brake pipe spanner to take this union off, if so what size and will the opening in the brake pipe spanner go over ok or is there another tool that's recommended? also what size are the nuts? i am going to go and see if i can find out now.

update: seems like standard brake pipe and union into the slave cylinder, should be ok. will put elastic band and plastic bag over the end of the union and some blu-tac.