Help Required : 200Tdi Defender is 'Juddering'

Hi to all,

I'm new to the forum any already asking for help for my Freelander and Defender.
I drive a 1992 200Tdi Defender 90, it passed it's MOT last month with no issues, after paying the mechanic £450 I was hoping there wouldn't be! Last week it developed a severe 'judder' which caused shaking throughout the Defender when I was accelerating in 4th gear. It now does this at random intervals around the 40-55mph range and in varying road surfaces. Would anyone know what would be causing this? I could be driving for 20mins without it happening, it didn't even happen at all on the journey home last night but kicked off again this morning as soon as I got above 35mph!

I'd be grateful of any suggestions you might have.

- David

it could be tyres, wheel bearings or propshafts or worse case scenario gearbox problems. But I suggest checking for play in the wheel bearing and for play in the propshaft. if these seem ok then have you're Wheels balanced. & tracking checked. Before worrying about the gearbox. What work did you have done by the mechanic.

I was hoping it was the wheels but I got them balanced on Monday and we're still doing the 'judder'. The mechanic had to do welding to the chassis, new brakes to the rear and about 20 other things that I've forgotten, the list was pretty long. He's been working exclusively on Land Rovers for about 20 years and is excellent to deal with, I was hoping I would be able to sort this out myself but I think I'll be making a call to get him to look at it again.

If he's worked on the brakes it could be something warped or even caught up between the disc and the dust plate. that's causing the problem. My advice is get a torch and crawl underneath and have a good look and poke around to see if anything is obviously out of place or loose.

Does a 1992 have discs at the rear, or drums? Its rare, but I know of someone who had the lining come off the rear shoe, and it caused this sort of intermittent juddering, but it wasnt traced until they took the drum off. You could try jacking up the back wheels and spinning them by hand, and try to feel for some resistance perhaps?

Hi,

Thanks for all your advice. The rear breaks are drum, I'll get a look at them this evening to see if they're the source. When/if I find out what the cause was I'll write a post incase anyone ever experiences something similar.

- David

Check your wheel bearings too. Your mechanic may have adjusted or replaced them for the mot and they may have now bedded in or he may have used the original lock tabs. Also check your wheel nuts are tight.

Why ant anyone sed UJs yet or have I missed summat.

GRUNT said:

Why ant anyone sed UJs yet or have I missed summat.

Click to expand...

werent it just about the third word in pikey's fred?(ok so he sed propshafts but thass wot e ment!)

Oh aye propshafts, it does it sez propshafts.

Handbrake adjusted too tight? But this normally only causes juddering on the overrun. Worth a look though.

Hi all,
You were correct, the UJ at the propshaft had gone, it was fixed and the Defender is working perfectly again. However, when I went up yesterday to pay him he let me have a drive in a 300Tdi 90 CSW, needless to say I've bought it, I used my recently repaired 200Tdi 90 Hardtop and the Freelander as a trade-in, I pick the CSW up this afternoon!

I had really bad juddering on my 110 200tdi '92. Only when not under drive - so in neutral or in between gears. Limped it home.

A fair bit of searching on here later and I had it sorted.

Symptoms:
juddering in neutral and in between gears
sound seemed to come from the drivetrain (eek! sounds expensive!)
Lots of resistance to driving sometimes...
Transmission brake drum hot to the touch...........
Slack in handbrake operating handle............ hmmm...

Cause: handbrake stuck on. Due to expander stuck open.

Solution: Dead easy (although a bit of a pain to do in the rain with a headtorch). Clean expander.

This was not a hard job at all.

Take rear propshaft off rear of handbrake drum (4 nuts. Jack up a rear wheel to kick, to move the propshaft around to get to each nut. 9/16 spanner. Easier to get to some nuts when they are on the top - sounds odd, but there is more access around the UJ that way. Propshaft shortens by sliding into itself a tad. this gets it off.) Wear some old safety specs to stop the rust getting in yer eyes.

Remove screws fixing drum on. I didn't have any of these. But the holes were there. Probably flathead driver.

Remove drum. Yeah right. Hammer. Screwdriver. Jemmy. anything you can get your hands on. It's coming off, though. More tips on this bit elsewhere on the forum.

Mark up the brake shoes so they go back where they were - I scratched 1 2 3 4 into the side of the shoes top left - top right - etc. Your choice.

Use some mole grips to grab a brake shoe. This makes it dead easy. Take the shoe off. No more spring tension. Take the other shoe off.

Undo the handbrake linkage on the back of the handbrake - joins the handbrake cable via some linky bits to the expander. A split pin on mine.

Whip off the two interlocking clip thingys on the back of the expander. Remember which way they go.

Expander then falls out.

Take it to the table. Pull it apart. Clean everything with WD40 and that old tea towel.
Work out how it works. Very very simple. Anyone can do this.

Two things that push the brake shoes apart.

One thing that pushes the two things above.

Two little cylinders of steel that go between the stuff above.

Scared? Don't be.

If you get it wrong you can tell easily.

the things that push the shoes apart have a groove in them. This is on a slope. It needs to be the right way around.

If it is right, when you push the single thing in, the two shoe pushing things will move apart pleasingly. If it is not right, they won't.

Simple as.

I whacked in a bit of grease to reassemble it. Was this the right thing to do?

Reassembly was easy, but do put a bit of strong thread around the pushy things to hold them in while you put it back into the vehicle.

Also, use some bent nails to hold the springs in the brake shoes while you put them on - stops them falling out all the time.

Hope this helps a bit. Couldn't find anything linking these symptoms to this solution.

Vulch