GingerPuss

Active Member
After using my Landy on a friends farm to get everything ready for bonfire night...I parked up. After a nice meal, I jumped in and sped off across a ploughed field when I had to reverse into a farm track opening. After reversing I found I couldn't get it into neutral...the gear lever was moving around - but felt like it wasn't connected to anything it was stuck in reverse !! By this time it was 8pm...dark...and cold !

Called the AA...not expecting a fix..just a tow home. The AA guy turns up and to my surprise says he can fix it! Walks across muddy field with tools...takes up the floor panels and centre tunnel cowling...to discover the end of the gear lever had jumped out of the 'cage' of selector rods...the ball-end of the lever seemed a bit worn. He undid the two bolts holding the lever bracket...levered it up and back into the correct selector slot. Getting the bracket back to put the two bolts in took nearly two hours...the bolts didn't line up with the threads because of needing to lever it up to get the gear lever back in...he came up with the idea of a ratchet trap to pull the bracket back down and used a small lever to line up the bolt-holes and it all went back together.....and the box was working fine again.

Now all I have to do is get a new lever with a ball-end that won't slip out from the selector again....God knows how I managed to fook it up in the first place...but fair play to the AA guy who turned out to be a Boss !
 
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is a very very common fault just run a bead of weld around and grind smooth
 
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His boss will tell him about the letter and he will be dead chuffed for the rest of the week.


Lynall
 
Tonight was the bonfire party. After yesterday's fix by the AA man it had been working fine- Im gonna give him a good report on the feedback form as he deserves it. I needed to turn around in the farmyard.....and the bloody thing had got stuck in reverse AGAIN ! Taxi home this time.

I have ordered a new gear lever and cage bracket. Managed to reverse it into a stable so at least I can work on it in the dry. Just have to find a way to remove two seized bolts holding one of the two floor plates on. There's no power supply for a grinder. :(

The girls at the party said they like old landy's and reckoned the X5 one of the guests had was a 'hairdressers car'. ;)
 
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whats a cage bracket ,end of gear lever just needs a bit of weld to make bigger and check selector jaws are set so not to big a gap
 
whats a cage bracket ,end of gear lever just needs a bit of weld to make bigger and check selector jaws are set so not to big a gap

The metal bracket that the lever ball sits in (and held with a grub screw)...mine was bent a bit out of shape when getting the lever back in. I know you can weld around the old selecter to make the end bigger...but a new one is only a tenner and I can fix the old one later and keep it as a spare.

How can you alter the selecter jaws...are they not part of the shafts?
 
I have a question....just want to be sure I know what I am doing before setting about the job.... in the following pic (grabbed from a UTube vid):

boxpic.jpg


The bolts circled in BLUE are easy to remove (this bracket is what the AA guy bent upwards with a prybar). The two front bolts (one shown circled in YELLOW) seems to attach the other side of this bracket to the bell housing (the AA guy didn't see them and so bent up the bracket to free the gear-lever when he had removed the two blue-circled bolts).....but is there a nut and washer on the other side of the yellow-circled bolt that will fall inside if I undo them??? I'm assuming that would need the trans to come out otherwise.

Failing that....would it be quicker to remove the 4 small bolts holding the gear-lever retaining 'cup' (?) to the main bracket (bolts circled in GREEN):

boxpic2.jpg


I need to do some research now...when I actually do it next week I will be away from my tools and a power source.

Cheers.
 
After using my Landy on a friends farm to get everything ready for bonfire night...I parked up. After a nice meal, I jumped in and sped off across a ploughed field when I had to reverse into a farm track opening. After reversing I found I couldn't get it into neutral...the gear lever was moving around - but felt like it wasn't connected to anything it was stuck in reverse !! By this time it was 8pm...dark...and cold !

Called the AA...not expecting a fix..just a tow home. The AA guy turns up and to my surprise says he can fix it! Walks across muddy field with tools...takes up the floor panels and centre tunnel cowling...to discover the end of the gear lever had jumped out of the 'cage' of selector rods...the ball-end of the lever seemed a bit worn. He undid the two bolts holding the lever bracket...levered it up and back into the correct selector slot. Getting the bracket back to put the two bolts in took nearly two hours...the bolts didn't line up with the threads because of needing to lever it up to get the gear lever back in...he came up with the idea of a ratchet trap to pull the bracket back down and used a small lever to line up the bolt-holes and it all went back together.....and the box was working fine again.

Now all I have to do is get a new lever with a ball-end that won't slip out from the selector again....God knows how I managed to fook it up in the first place...but fair play to the AA guy who turned out to be a Boss !


Must of been Ratty to the rescue:D:D
 
glad the AA man fixed it enough to get home!
Mate of mine had an AA man spend two hours trying to get the landy started, he checked the spark on the plugs, but put the leads back on in the wrong order, spent two hours scratchin his head then declared he couldn't fix it. think half of that time was sprnt looking for where he plugged in the computer!
5 mins after i got there it was running again, cleaver of LR to print the firing order on the engine for you i thought!
 
Yep, no problem to remove the yellow ringed bolts. However, they are a bit fiddly to get back in because there is a thin blanking plate sits under the stick bracket on top of the bell housing and its difficult to keep it in place with the holes lined up, especially for the 2nd bolt. Have fun.

Dip the new knob end (ooh err mrs) in the grease bucket before fitting.

You might want to replace the reverse detent springs whilst you're there. Only pence & old ones do have a habit of snapping. If they do, its all floor out again to get at them.
Easy to check g/box oil level whilst floor out.
 
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Yep, no problem to remove the yellow ringed bolts. However, they are a bit fiddly to get back in because there is a thin blanking plate sits under the stick bracket on top of the bell housing and its difficult to keep it in place with the holes lined up, especially for the 2nd bolt. Have fun.

Dip the new knob end (ooh err mrs) in the grease bucket before fitting.

You might want to replace the reverse detent springs whilst you're there. Only pence & old ones do have a habit of snapping. If they do, its all floor out again to get at them.
Easy to check g/box oil level whilst floor out.

I did the job over the weekend...could have done it in a few hours...but took the whole day to do it right. Had to clean a huge amount of crud from the selector jaws...cleaned everything off including the top of the gearbox with brake cleaner....then fresh hi-temp grease on the now sparkling selector shafts and jaws....new mounting bracket with new shiny bolts/washers then covered with some grease to stop them rusting up...and as you say, grease on the knob-ball...with a new spring, washer and circlip. Put all the floor panels, tunnel cover and firewall trim back with shiny new zinc-coated fixings and gave it all a good road test - all sorted !
 

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