TD5 gear crunch when engine warm not cold

Bit of a mystery here and worried about expensive investigations at the garage. After a long motorway run my disco TD5 (2003/ 77K miles) crunches moving from 1st to 2nd. Very careful changing at very low engine speed avoids this, but then moving on at 5mph in 2nd is going to knacker the clutch.

Clutch seems fine, bites a bit less keenly than on my old 300Tdi but I understand thats normal and it hasn't changed in the year I have owned the the TD5.

My specialist garage says it is rare on TD5s and normally stops when they warm up not starts. On short runs around town and country its fine- only happens after running for a an hour or more at 70mph then coming off motorway into town. Totally fine once the engine has had time to cool.

Garage want to check the gear box oil first and check the clutch then are talking about 12 hours labour to take the gear box out and check the insides- could be looking at £500 for starters.

Any hope here?

Garage sound about right .. I'd drop the gearbox oil and replace it. How long is it since the gearbox oil was changed? If you don't know or are a bit vague I'd change it anyway. Indeed I'd change all oils, engine, gearbox, diffs and transfer box (use the correct type and range for each) if there's any question.

See if you can see what colour the gearbox oil is ... it should have ATF oil in which is red in colour.

Notchy change from 1 to 2 is a 'known' issue with TD5's and generally it's when wrong oil has been used. You should be using either ATF or latest is to use MTF94.

Disco's suffer worn gearbox syncros, change the oil may help.

there is no point checking a clutch if you're not going to put a new one in, for all that labour charge you might as well fit in a new one.

clutch was done in the past by previous owner, don't know when oil was done- bought at a dealer last spring and he serviced it, so if its part of the service then about 6K miles ago. He's going to give it a full service and I guess I'll try it with new oil before laying out more cash.

id have the gator off the top of the box and check the grease hasnt dried up causing it hard to change gear.?

Paul D said:

Garage sound about right .. I'd drop the gearbox oil and replace it. How long is it since the gearbox oil was changed? If you don't know or are a bit vague I'd change it anyway. Indeed I'd change all oils, engine, gearbox, diffs and transfer box (use the correct type and range for each) if there's any question.

See if you can see what colour the gearbox oil is ... it should have ATF oil in which is red in colour.

Notchy change from 1 to 2 is a 'known' issue with TD5's and generally it's when wrong oil has been used. You should be using either ATF or latest is to use MTF94.

Click to expand...

If it's a Disco2 with an R380 gearbox it should have MTF94. If it has ATF that is likely to encourage this crunching due to it's lower viscosity.

Edit note: tried to paste in a table but it didn't work !!

As you will see there are literally huge differences in the effective viscosities of oils that could be used in our gearboxes, but ATF is shown to have a lower operating viscosity at 100°C than MTF, by about 30%.

My advice would be, drop the oil out of the gearbox and replace with a good quality MTF94 and evaluate.

Thanks, this sounds encouraging- I like the idea of low price of oil changes before anything more dramatic.

I'm glad I found this place, just sorry I can't offer others much technical help, but I'm learning.

Paul

Why not accept that Disco gearboxes are quite big gearboxes, and don't "shift" like some little buzz-box Corsa. So you need to drive it like a BIG gearbox. Learning how to match engine speeds to the next gear helps a lot.

NEVER start off in second gear or the clutch will be wrecked.

Use first, drive away gently, at an early stage change gently but smartly into second, let the clutch all the way up, then deck the GO pedal. Lorry drivers do it that way. I used to be one.

CharlesY

Its not me- I've driven Landies ever since I passed a test and this one is the first to do this and only when its been in 5th a long while.

sheffieldpaul said:

Its not me- I've driven Landies ever since I passed a test and this one is the first to do this and only when its been in 5th a long while.

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Sure, it isn't you, but YOU have to live with it and learn deal with it!

Two options:

1. buy a new box or recon box and have no change out of a grand. This new box will do the same thing after about a year. That's £20 a week.

2. ignore it and learn to deal with it and love it. IT'S A LANDROVER !
After another year with it you'll have saved a grand.

CharlesY

CharlesY said:

Sure, it isn't you, but YOU have to live with it and learn deal with it!
Two options:
1. buy a new box or recon box and have no change out of a grand. This new box will do the same thing after about a year. That's £20 a week.
2. ignore it and learn to deal with it and love it. IT'S A LANDROVER !
After another year with it you'll have saved a grand.
CharlesY

Click to expand...

But Charles surely, if there is a way to improve this obvious faulty performance, then you'd want to investigate it, wouldn't you?

Otherwise we would all be driving round in ever more delapidated vehicles until one day they just refuse to run.

The change quality on our LT77-equipped TDi200 was iffy to say the least and yes, we did try to drive around it, until I heard of EVO1 oil from Difflock. I put that in, the change quality improved dramatically for the better with smoother, quieter running.

So things can change for the better if we are open to trying new solutions.

Sounds to me like the oil in this guys gearbox is deteriorating with temperature, which would be typical of average quality ATF. I reckon it's worth a change to some better stuff before talking about new 'boxes, don't you think?

Right, that's me done for the day,

Cheers all and good luck,

Dave

cheers biglad for resotring my faith in this forum, Charles' post got a ruder reply as I found it condescending but fortunately I edited. I know if I wanted a perfect 4x4 I'd have a Land Cruiser but I have a Landrover addiction and with a relatively young and fairly expensive TD5 I'm not going to put up with the driving qualities of a Scammel Lorry and a make do attitude if a bit of quality oil and a thorough service can perk things up. My previous 200Tdi defender and 300Tdi Disco ran like dreams thanks to High Peak 4x4's care and attention so I'm sure they'll sort this too at the upcoming serivice.

sheffieldpaul said:

cheers biglad for resotring my faith in this forum, Charles' post got a ruder reply as I found it condescending but fortunately I edited. I know if I wanted a perfect 4x4 I'd have a Land Cruiser but I have a Landrover addiction and with a relatively young and fairly expensive TD5 I'm not going to put up with the driving qualities of a Scammel Lorry and a make do attitude if a bit of quality oil and a thorough service can perk things up. My previous 200Tdi defender and 300Tdi Disco ran like dreams thanks to High Peak 4x4's care and attention so I'm sure they'll sort this too at the upcoming serivice.

Click to expand...

I know you know this already but I feel I have to say that in my experience LR Disco diesels are VERY air hungry and need really clean air filters to give of their best.

I change all the filters on ours every 5000mls, Paddocks do a kit for TD5 of the 4 filters for £16+vat so at that price why wouldn't you??

The very best of luck, get some MTF94 in that box and don't let anyone tell you otherwise,

Cheers
Dave

That's great, I always run fairly elderly landrovers (12-15 year olds) and this is the newest one I've ever had but I'll still treat it with the same TLC- a full service on their birthdays, I only do about 5000 miles a year at the moment and it may be this one has had a couple of corners cut in the last couple of services which were done by dealers in prep for sales. Its getting done at Easter then we are off on holiday so I'll report back! Seeing as I've only had it since last May its not a had a thorough service yet so fingers crossed.

thebiglad said:

If it's a Disco2 with an R380 gearbox it should have MTF94. If it has ATF that is likely to encourage this crunching due to it's lower viscosity.

Edit note: tried to paste in a table but it didn't work !!

As you will see there are literally huge differences in the effective viscosities of oils that could be used in our gearboxes, but ATF is shown to have a lower operating viscosity at 100°C than MTF, by about 30%.

My advice would be, drop the oil out of the gearbox and replace with a good quality MTF94 and evaluate.

Click to expand...

Fair points, thanks for pointing it out.

TBH I checked it was ATF with my manual (300 Tdi and R380) and it does say ATF .. but if MTF94 is what's recommended now then I apologise for misleading info .. it was posted in good faith.

So ... would you also recommend using MTF 94 in a 120000 miles 300 Tdi gearbox? Must admit to having no problems but I'd like to keep it running that way and if MYF works better then I'll change it at next service.

sheffieldpaul said:

it may be this one has had a couple of corners cut in the last couple of services which were done by dealers in prep for sales. .

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Trusting a dealer to do a full service is dodgy at best of times. Trusting them to do it properly for free just to sell the car would be a bit naïve. I suspect most of them will just change the oil and run a check for anything that might go wrong under warranty and cost them money. Especially at the moment when cash is tight.

hello my this is my first time posting i have had the same problem with my gear box as well as blowing oil out of the breather. Has any one else had that prob.

PASTMASTER said:

Trusting a dealer to do a full service is dodgy at best of times. Trusting them to do it properly for free just to sell the car would be a bit naïve. I suspect most of them will just change the oil and run a check for anything that might go wrong under warranty and cost them money. Especially at the moment when cash is tight.

Click to expand...

Even more reason to hope a really thorough service puts this problem to bed for a while. The dealer who sold it me has now sold me 3 Landies, so he's not in the business of selling a duff machine to a loyal customer but of course he wouldn't break his back prepping a perfectly sound vehicle when he rather let me run it for the 3 month warranty and see if anything comes up that way.

My 2003 Disco TD5 with 90k on the clock has also developed a similar misbehaving gearbox after 30 minutes or more at motorway speeds.

My question is - did changing the gearbox oil solve the problem?

Thanks

Mike

Totally agree with thebiglad - I had the same problems when I got my TD5, difficult to get 1st to 2nd when cold and gearbox turned to soup after long high speed run.

On recommendation changed to EVO1 from Difflock - completely different gearbox. Have been recommended to change again after couple of ,000's for a really good box.

Bit expensive (£60 if I remember) but well worth it.