TD4 Auto gear box problem?

Hi Fella's,

Really hope someone can help. Bought a 2002 TD4 Auto a couple of months ago, 1 owner from new, FSH (main dealer), real mint example for a bargain price. Have had no issues until yesterday. after a short journey to shop parked up, returned after a couple of minutes, and found no reverse gear. I feel the very slight usual jolt when selected, but no drive, and also when selecting the forward gears, it does drive, but feels just like you've left the hand brake on, ie the gearbox moves thgrough the gears perfectly, but the whole drive just feels laboured, someone has suggested it may well be gear box, and that I need to check/top up the gear box oil. What do you all think.? HELP..!!

Dan

For an internal failure of the gearbox you would expect to see the F+4 warning lights on the display. Not sure about the oil level theory, why would it suddenly alter assuming there are no leaks. It's worth looking at the big round multiplug connectors on the gearbox loom, they are known to suffer from water ingress/corrosion.

Chaser said:

For an internal failure of the gearbox you would expect to see the F+4 warning lights on the display. Not sure about the oil level theory, why would it suddenly alter assuming there are no leaks. It's worth looking at the big round multiplug connectors on the gearbox loom, they are known to suffer from water ingress/corrosion.

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Chaser.

Thanks for the reply, and yes I agree, that it has gone from perfect to faulty in the blink of an eye, so doubtful its oil level. I have just been chatting to some guys at "Dingocroft" who have said similar to you that it could be electrical related.

Where is the multiblock located?

D

Big round plugs, twist together, lots of wires to them, going down to gearbox looking down at battery end of engine bay

Chaser said:

Big round plugs, twist together, lots of wires to them, going down to gearbox looking down at battery end of engine bay

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Nice one. Found it. Connection seems good. Dry. Re made it just in case. Unfortunately, made no difference. Thanks Though.

DD

you need to get it on diagnostics to make sure its the gearbox . . . .

mingin is right your probably gonna need a professional assessment...

Yes fellas, I agree. Thanks for all your help, I'll let you know what occurs

DD

When restarting I assume the fault occurrs, whilst it's still hot. If you were to switch off and wait for it to cool down, then restart, does it do the same?

Hippo said:

When restarting I assume the fault occurrs, whilst it's still hot. If you were to switch off and wait for it to cool down, then restart, does it do the same?

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Hi Hippo,

Yes it does mate. To be honest, I don't know wether or not ot does it when it's warm, as the engine had only been on for 2-3 minutes. I tried it yesterday morning after it sitting for 12 hours and it was no better. Obviously I need to get it "plugged in" for diagnosis, but am so worried about causing further damage by driving it.?

Dan

Morning fella's

With this issue that I'm having at the moment, my next step is to get the fault diagnosed. My question here is, would it be worth me getting the OBD kit to try to diagnose the issue. Been having a read up and it appears that the "ELM 327" kit only really interrogates the engine, so would a gearbox problem show up? Any thoughts..?

DD

You could try, but to be honest, it probably won't work. To get to the autobox computer you need to talk to the cars main computer, which asks the autobox computer questions via the can bus. You’ll need LR's testbook (T4) or a hawkeye. Snowey was organising a group buy discount when I got mine, via another forum. He’s also a member on here too. Can’t put the price up on the forum, as we agreed not to, at the seller’s request. Other than that you'll need something better than a normal obdii reader. There are some out there, which will do a lot more, but I don't know which if any could find your fault. Don’t think the main computer would know of the fault codes in the autobox computer, as the autobox fault codes in mine didn’t register in the main computer when I was using my hawkeye. Where are you roughly? A main dealer will charge about £100+vat for a 1 hour investigation, as a fixed price. This will cover connection to T4, and an assessment of the problem. They won't start talking it apart though. This would give you advice on the fault, and the fix. Then you can walk away.

Hippo said:

You could try, but to be honest, it probably won't work. To get to the autobox computer you need to talk to the cars main computer, which asks the autobox computer questions via the can bus. You’ll need LR's testbook (T4) or a hawkeye. Snowey was organising a group buy discount when I got mine, via another forum. He’s also a member on here too. Can’t put the price up on the forum, as we agreed not to, at the seller’s request. Other than that you'll need something better than a normal obdii reader. There are some out there, which will do a lot more, but I don't know which if any could find your fault. Don’t think the main computer would know of the fault codes in the autobox computer, as the autobox fault codes in mine didn’t register in the main computer when I was using my hawkeye. Where are you roughly? A main dealer will charge about £100+vat for a 1 hour investigation, as a fixed price. This will cover connection to T4, and an assessment of the problem. They won't start talking it apart though. This would give you advice on the fault, and the fix. Then you can walk away.

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Thanks Hippo.

I think you are right. I'm going to have to get a proper diagnosis, but as I mentioned before, I really don't want to drive it, as I may well be doing more damage, and the way it feels I don't even know if it would get me there. I live in High Wycombe. Its a real shame as the main dealer (stratstone) moved from wooburn green a couple of years ago, which was about half a mile from my home. They are now in Slough, which is about 8 miles.

I'm really stuck, and being on a tight budget, just don't know what to do for the best.

DD

Are the barrel connectors ok? And are the cables to it ok? They sometimes snag on other stuff and tear open. If it were mine I'd want someone to either come out to it to diagnose the problem, or put it on a trailer/tow truck and have it carried to a garage. Have a look in the L shaped plastic box by the battery and make sure the connectors on both computers (main and autobox) are made properly.

http://www.ashcroft-transmissions.co.uk/ are the best for the Freelander auto, and come recommended by many who have had work done by them.

Hippo said:

Are the barrel connectors ok? And are the cables to it ok? They sometimes snag on other stuff and tear open. If it were mine I'd want someone to either come out to it to diagnose the problem, or put it on a trailer/tow truck and have it carried to a garage. Have a look in the L shaped plastic box by the battery and make sure the connectors on both computers (main and autobox) are made properly.

http://www.ashcroft-transmissions.co.uk/ are the best for the Freelander auto, and come recommended by many who have had work done by them.

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Thanks Hippo, you've been great.

This is interesting though....

I was just looking on "Bell Engineerings" website, and was reading the "symptoms" section about faulty VCU. They describe the feeling of driving with the breaks binding, especially in reverse......I wonder...????

Did you buy it from a garage? If so, and it has a warranty, then it may be a good idea to contact them and advise them of the problem, and what they’re going to do about it.

From reading the above, I think your saying you have no reverse gear, and forward gears work, but the car seems to be running slow, or under powered. This won’t be due to the bell statement. They’re talking about transmission wind up, which is caused when the vcu is seized. This forces the front and rear wheels to turn at the same speed, as opposed to the norm where the fronts drive 0.8% faster than the rears, on 2001 onwards models (model year).

Your auto box is hydraulic. It uses a number of sensors to measure things like torque, temperature etc and calculates it’s set-up based on this, and what your right foot wants, and the current speed/demand on the car. All this data helps it to orchestrate the gear change/response. Gear change is done by moving solenoid values, which control the flow of transmission fluid to select gears. Somewhere in all this you’ve got something that’s gone wrong. Be it a faulty sensor giving the wrong info, which upsets the calculation, or a value not moving or stuck, which forces the wrong gear to be selected or not.

Can you feel all 5 gears change when pulling away from a stand still, and under normal acceleration, up to 50mph? What does the rev counter do whilst doing this?

Have you had any other work done on your hippo recently? Is it leaking transmission oil? Correct oil level is important on these auto’s. Would agree with what the others said on the other thread. I don’t think it’s oil level at fault, but checking underneath if it’s leaking is free to do.

I’m not an expert on hippo’s. I just learnt the hard way by having lots of faults. Including a leaking auto, which needed replaced in the end. A diagnostic is probably the only way forward on this. They’ll need a puter to do it.

Hippo said:

Did you buy it from a garage? If so, and it has a warranty, then it may be a good idea to contact them and advise them of the problem, and what they’re going to do about it.

From reading the above, I think your saying you have no reverse gear, and forward gears work, but the car seems to be running slow, or under powered. This won’t be due to the bell statement. They’re talking about transmission wind up, which is caused when the vcu is seized. This forces the front and rear wheels to turn at the same speed, as opposed to the norm where the fronts drive 0.8% faster than the rears, on 2001 onwards models (model year).

Your auto box is hydraulic. It uses a number of sensors to measure things like torque, temperature etc and calculates it’s set-up based on this, and what your right foot wants, and the current speed/demand on the car. All this data helps it to orchestrate the gear change/response. Gear change is done by moving solenoid values, which control the flow of transmission fluid to select gears. Somewhere in all this you’ve got something that’s gone wrong. Be it a faulty sensor giving the wrong info, which upsets the calculation, or a value not moving or stuck, which forces the wrong gear to be selected or not.

Can you feel all 5 gears change when pulling away from a stand still, and under normal acceleration, up to 50mph? What does the rev counter do whilst doing this?

Have you had any other work done on your hippo recently? Is it leaking transmission oil? Correct oil level is important on these auto’s. Would agree with what the others said on the other thread. I don’t think it’s oil level at fault, but checking underneath if it’s leaking is free to do.

I’m not an expert on hippo’s. I just learnt the hard way by having lots of faults. Including a leaking auto, which needed replaced in the end. A diagnostic is probably the only way forward on this. They’ll need a puter to do it.

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Hippo, that's really helpful (AGAIN).

It was a private sale from a family friend, so no warranty. Its done just over 100,000 miles, and is halfway between services, which have all been main dealer. It has had no work done at all recently. I'll have a good visual check on the points that you have mentioned in the morning. The symptoms are very weird, in that when I initially put the car into drive when it happened, it pulled away through the gears perfectly, although as I mentioned it feels like the handbrake is on. Also, when the selector is in the neutral position, the wheels are locked, ie it wont free wheel. All gears including reverse give that slight jolt that you expect to get when correctly selecting a gear, although no actual drive happens, and it feels like it will stall unless you rev it hard.

Your help is really appreciated

Dan

So just to get this right, it won't drive forward without revving the nuts off it? And no reverse gear?

The neutral locked wheels thing would make me want to check what it does in 1st gear, when manually selecting 1st. Had a simular problem to you and it was the barrel connectors coming apart. I had F4 alternating on the dash when this happened. Also put it in D and push right to check it physically will go to sports mode, and show on the dash. This is a way of checking the shift level is set to forwards, when in D. If it pushes right when in neutral, then the lever is set wrong.

Hippo said:

So just to get this right, it won't drive forward without revving the nuts off it? And no reverse gear?

The neutral locked wheels thing would make me want to check what it does in 1st gear, when manually selecting 1st. Had a simular problem to you and it was the barrel connectors coming apart. I had F4 alternating on the dash when this happened. Also put it in D and push right to check it physically will go to sports mode, and show on the dash. This is a way of checking the shift level is set to forwards, when in D. If it pushes right when in neutral, then the lever is set wrong.

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Exactly right, but no unusual lights showing on the dash. I'm just about to eat dinner, and then I'll pop out and have a fiddle with the neutral/sports thing. I did play with that yesteday, but can't remember exactly what the results were.

I'll report back within the hour.

ps, my Mrs thinks your great.!! LOL

Dan

Hippo,

Right just been out and started the engine and popped it into drive. Feel a slight jolt but no drive unless I rev the balls off it. When I push the stick from drive to sport, the "sport" indicator illuminates. WHen I push forward it selects 2, and if I push back it selects 1. In both cases I only get any forward movement if I really give it some revs.

Weird Huh.

I'll remake the gearbox loom connectors in the morning.

Dan