Gearbox oil argument!

what i am asking is is there any other oil to use
and the service interval of a discovery 2 r380 is 24K but i have changed mine twice with atf and once with mtf but soon changed it for atf again

note Edit to my original post(39)

Having read up on oils over the years I couldn't see any point in putting ATF in a manual transmission due to the fact that the demands of the manual are very differnent from those of an automatic transmission .
And whether true or false I also read that LR put ATF in the R380 as ordinary gear oil made gearchange difficult - in other words the synchromesh was being defeated by the EP oil . ATF allowed them to work better but at the cost of less protection .
It made sense to me - and while I generally feel the manufacturer knows best in this instance I felt it was a LR 'solution' to a LR problem .
I have a 2001 Td5 with 214 K on the clock . Last September the box began to get noisy - and from experience over the years I felt it was the front bearing on the way out .
I drained the box ( what came out was watery looking with resddish colour ) and filled it with the Difflock product .
No change for a few days and then the noise disappeared - and the the box has been fine since . So I have to give credit where its due . As regards price I don't mind spending a bit extra on oil if its going to help prolong the life of an expensive item like an engine or gearbox .

Dooroy did you use Evo1 or Evo2?

I used Evo 1 as recommended by Difflock .
I had enough Evo 1 and Evo 2 from previous orders to change gbox/trans fer box and diffs .
In Sept I was making enquiries about a SH box as I felt it wouldn't last much longer - when it occurred to me to try the oil change .
The interesting part to my mind was that it took a few days for the improvement to happen - but it has been silent since .

Just to add my twopennorth.. I just changed my gearbox and transfer box oils for Evo 1 and 2. I bought it a few years ago with the intention of using it in an earlier 200tdi, but neve got round to it.
Did it make a difference? Yes. Car has done 75000, so I wouldnt expect any real wear yet, but, the transfer box H/L change is much slicker now ( I use it a lot) and the main gearbox seems quieter and changes are easier.
Yes, its expensive, but I had it anyway ( sort of!)
I also had a driveway full of old atf! Why do they put such a huge drain plug directly above that crossmember!

Allan

its stuck said:

Just to add my twopennorth.. I just changed my gearbox and transfer box oils for Evo 1 and 2. I bought it a few years ago with the intention of using it in an earlier 200tdi, but neve got round to it.
Did it make a difference? Yes. Car has done 75000, so I wouldnt expect any real wear yet, but, the transfer box H/L change is much slicker now ( I use it a lot) and the main gearbox seems quieter and changes are easier.
Yes, its expensive, but I had it anyway ( sort of!)
I also had a driveway full of old atf! Why do they put such a huge drain plug directly above that crossmember!

Allan

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When you say it made a difference, is that compared to the old oil that was in the gearbox? Or better than fresh MTF94?

I have the R380 gearbox in the MG Rover RV8 (with 30K km up) and the shift into 2nd gear is really stiff when the gearbox is cold. All other shifts are fine. When the oil warms up the shift into 2nd is fine. I have tried 100% synthetic oil (Nulon 75W-90 Performance Smooth Shift) for the last 5K km but it has made no difference. Someone suggested running engine oil, someone else auto transmission oil to get easier shifting from cold. Perhaps time to use the recommended MTF-94 oil but I'm not sure if this will help with cold shifts.
Any thoughts?

would it not have been better to try the recommended oil in the first place

Good point! I only just picked up on the MTF-94 recommendation when I joined the forum.

Hello,
I just put yesterday evening the Evo 1 in my manual R380 Discovery 2(arround 125kmiles).
Since I bought it, 35kmiles ago, I had a lot of shifting problems; I was changing the clutch kit, slave cylinder, trying a special oil-Redline Shock Proof-no special results.
I tried the MTF94 (local price 16 pounds/liter) and the improvement was present,but already 25kmiles since.

From the price point of view for the Evo 1... only the shipment from UK was 40 pounds more, but, hey, I love my Disco!

I will drive today some hundreds miles and will update the results!

Just changed my gear box oil to MDF 94 What a differance the change from 1st to second is, so much better and all changes are smoother can not believe it would make so much differance, Cheers Edge

martinhollings said:

i have always used atf because we have loads at work and the boss is quite happy for me to have a little every now and then but this year i saw mtf94 in the auto factors so i changed the atf for mtf 94 but soon changed back gear changes were lots better with atf and mtf made the box realy stiff when cold the only problem with atf is not as good at preventing ware like the mtf stuff the othe thing to rember is the r380 and the lt77 have a pump inside to pump oil around the box gear oil is just to thick for thr pump to work propley

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SAME HERE Thought that the special mtf94 was going to be the dogs B****cks so changed from the old ATF..........Fine when hot but next morning when she was cold she was crunching 2nd gear on every change unless I changes very very slowly....................Quickly changed back to ATF and believe it or not next day still a slight crunch into 2nd................ran it for 20 miles untill hot and drained it out again and refilled with more ATF........It's OK now and back to normal............My mate who builds boxes says it seems to depend what oil is in the box from day 1 and dispite what landrover say the R380 box was originally designed to run ATF............Don't put it in the transfer box though stick to EP80/90 or EP75/90 that is a bit thinner and will do the same job unless you are in the desert then I would probably use EP 80/90
Sppppluttter

Anyone tried Slick 50'ing their gearbox, with either ATF or MTF? Is it worth it?

kernowdragon said:

Anyone tried Slick 50'ing their gearbox, with either ATF or MTF? Is it worth it?

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Dupoint do not recommend teflon based products in engines and gear boxes and all additive manufacturers have been sued as snake oil.

A dash of molly slip treatment is all I would try, but note that lt77 pumped gearboxes and LT85 Don't like it

fanatic said:

Dupoint do not recommend teflon based products in engines and gear boxes and all additive manufacturers have been sued as snake oil.

A dash of molly slip treatment is all I would try, but note that lt77 pumped gearboxes and LT85 Don't like it

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Interestingly although some stores are still selling it, Slick 50 no-longer have a manual gearbox treatment listed as a product, so presumably it was discontinued/withdrawn??

If its ATF use Molyslip Muliglide-You can use it in the power steering as well

As the cold weather creeps back in and if you notice that gear changes are 'stiff' in the morning, change to a thinner oil

either atf and mtf ,ive stripped built alot and mtf doesnt lubricate better than atf certainley insides gears brgs look same using both ,its just changing regulary to remove contaminents out that makes difference although gear change can be better on some not all with mtf with either lubrication issues only arise with shortage and leaving in to long,the rest depends on poor baulk ring design in r380s and driving style

finite said:

So gearbox oil... it (like most fluid arguments) seems to be an emotive one! So as my local old-boy farmer likes to run all his landrovers' gearboxes, transfer boxes and diffs on a mix of "liquid grease and EP90... just use more liquid grease if you got leaks" I thought I'd start a poll! This has only till the end of tonight to run as I need to fill up my gearbox and transfer box on Monday!

Discover 1 300 TDI, R380 gearbox requires filling (the one with the 32mm drain plug)... options are:

1. MTF94 (landrover recommended right?)
2. ATF (good old reliable)
3. EP90 (err)
4. "liquid grease" and EP90 mix (err... but all the farm 'rovers keep on going!)

Open to options although i do have a 5 litre tub of ATF

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What kind of liquid grease can you mix with ep in the transfer box? Does this help when you have leeks?

just fix the leaks