200TDi diff lock stuck on !!!!

Hi , thanks to the member who suggested my diff lock might be on , I think it is !!!! how can I get it off as far as I can see the transfer box is in 'H' unlocked but the diff lock light is on !! Anyone got a remedy to get it out of diff lock ?? thank you .

If you can, into first (normal), let the clutch out and when it starts to bite, move the HI-Low stick back to the left, which should lock the diff, keep rolling forward a little then move the stick back to the un-locked position. Stop, select reverse and move backwards whilst turning slightly, left to right. This ought to free it. If it's gummed up then the lever'll feel like it's moving through treacle. Repeat a couple of times ... )

If this doesn't work, all off, handbrake on, get someone in the drivers seat and show them how to move the difflock lever. Then get underneath, directly under the drivers door, look up between the gearboxes and chassis and you should see the levers. Then, as the person inside moves it left to right and back again, check the levers are moving .. There's one long lever that connects to a rod that goes into the 'box .. this rod needs to move to lock or unlock the diff. If the lever isn't connected then try and do it manually with pliers, mole grips, whatever can reach.

A more awkward way to do it is from inside, taking the console out and removing the geartop and spraying ****-loads of WD40/lubricant of choice to 'clean' the mechanism.

Have fun ...

Try reversing a long way.

and snake as you reverse lots of peeps reverse in straight line but it doesn't jolt the difflock. or reverse on full lock if you've got the space.

If you've had the gearbox out you may well have got something wrong putting it back. Get under there and manually move the diff lock linkage at the transfer box. If the light doesn't go out quickly try the reversing stuff as suggested. If you've been driving it foe a while with the diff lock on it might take a fair bit of tooing and froeing to get it to unlock.

Thank you all for your helpful responses , I will try all of these in the morning and post the outcome ( hopefully positive ) cheers .

I went under my Landy today to check out the operating mechanism before trying the reversing technique . I had my father move the transfer box lever from right to left while I observed from underneath , yes the short selection arm does move slightly but not far enough ! I helped the lever towards the drivers side with a screwdriver as leverage and the diff lock light went out straight away . I took it for a short trip and all is fine, it is now out of diff lock with no clonks on full lock . I will obviously need to get it up on ramps when the weather gets better as it looks like I will need to adjust the short connection bar that links the arm to the downward lever .This mechanism looks a bit hit or miss to adjust with what I can see as the short bar or rod looks loose so I will need to address this problem . Has anyone a tip for the best way to adjust this or is it ' adjust it a bit at a time and see ' ?
Many thanks to all who kindly put me in the right direction to solveing this problem , cheers .

stick it in reverse and unwind it till the light goes off

Nice one tonkatruck problem solved with no expense. Dunno about adjusting the linkage but would have thought try a bit at a time until it works as it should.

Nice one Tonka ...

On my mates I can't recall any actual adjustment, but where the lever connects to the rod the fabricated part was bent, so the clevis pin was only on one end properly and as the lever was operated it bent so it would only go so far .. similarly when trying to get out of difflock it didn't have enough bite to pull it out, sometimes it did, sometimes it didn't.

If the actual connectors and pins look OK then it could also have not been used for a while, and have crud around and about the linkages stopping it from working quite right, so try to spray some lube (WD40 etc) on it and use it a lot for a day or two. Find somewhere slippy to drop it in and out of difflock a few times and drive with it making it go in and out .. this might free it up. Took mine a while to free up as it'd never been used from new ... 's fine now, thobut ...

Paul D said:

Nice one Tonka ...

On my mates I can't recall any actual adjustment, but where the lever connects to the rod the fabricated part was bent, so the clevis pin was only on one end properly and as the lever was operated it bent so it would only go so far .. similarly when trying to get out of difflock it didn't have enough bite to pull it out, sometimes it did, sometimes it didn't.

If the actual connectors and pins look OK then it could also have not been used for a while, and have crud around and about the linkages stopping it from working quite right, so try to spray some lube (WD40 etc) on it and use it a lot for a day or two. Find somewhere slippy to drop it in and out of difflock a few times and drive with it making it go in and out .. this might free it up. Took mine a while to free up as it'd never been used from new ... 's fine now, thobut ...

Click to expand...

i had the same problem, the clip thing opended up and wasnt allowing me enough pressure to put in lock. took it off had it welded up and have never looked back !