Stuck in Fifth Gear

[Davey_B]

Help! Was driving along and suddenly found myself stuck in fifth. I can't get the gear stick out of fifth though the cluth is fine and so is the engine.

Anyone have any ideas or advice? Is this related to the known gear linkage problem - and if so, what is that and how do I fix it?

Any advice appreciated....desperately.


Many thanks in advance.


Davey_B

[Doug]

99% a shifter cable problem = so search the Forum for those related discussions, etc.

Could be failure of cable, cable end, bracket, or even binding or obstruction of the cable. At worst would require cable replacement.

Having a true tranny issue like that, while not impossible, is very unlikely.

[Davey_B]

Cheers very much, I'll look into it tomorrow.

[Mike Y]

1)Is the gear stick stuck in the fifth position?

2)Is the gear stick wobbling about like out of date celery and does not seem to be conected to much?

If it is 2) it is likey to be the usual cable problem i.e. firstly check your cables have proper circlips fitted not the silly cheap U shaped wire fitted originally to early Elans (Check both ends of both cables). If they are secured correctly it is cable failure normally at the nylon adjuster (replace cables).

If its 1) check your selector is not worn, damaged, jammed at the gear stick end first. Always look at the simplest cheapest solution first before looking at the worst possibility which is internal gearbox problems.

Regards Mike

[Candles]

Having exhausted the good suggestions above, it is quite simple and you don't lose any tranny oil to just undo the four bolts that hold the selector housing to the gearbox. Once undone, break the gasket seal and lift it clear.

Now you will be faced with a small rectangular hole in which sit three sliders. The car-forward most slider is 5th/reverse. Using a clean screwdriver and a torch, see if you can move this back to the central position which will involve pushing it towards the car-left hand side. Don't worry about breaking something, trust me they are very strong. Be very careful not to drop any grit or other into the gearbox.

If it moves to the middle, hurray! You are in neutral. Drive home without 5th and sort out the problem with the selector/cable mechanism. If you can't get it to move, you have an internal gearbox fault that will involve some kind of strip down. Bummer!

Let us know how you get on, and good luck!

Candles.

[Darren]

Candles,

You just reminded me of a conversation I had with Roy at Paul Matty's. It went something like that they'd seen a fair few M100's where the 5th gear cog had worked loose and could simply be tightened up by removing the inspection cover you mentioned.

Does this sound about right ?

Darren.

[Davey_B]

Well, thanks to all for the advice so far. It's an S2, but I have at least got it home (to a garage) by getting a tow and keeping the clutch down the whole way.

The mechanic has told me that he disconnected the cables and it still wouldn't come out of fifth, so it looks like the gearbox

[Mike Y]

Being an S2 you should not get any Gear cable related problems so you are right it looks internal. There is a bolt on the end of one of the gear shafts that works loose if it falls off completely it normally causes alot of damage if it is just loose you may be OK.

Good Luck.

Candles might have a spare gearbox

Regards Mike

[Candles]

Yes Mike but the spare now is the high-miler!!

Tell the mechanic to follow the instructions in my post above and see if it then comes out of 5th. It can be quite telling.

As for repairing 5th: Yes, 5th gear is under the end inspection cover and is held on with a very tight nut that should be peened over. I find it hard to imagine how they work loose, but I have heard of it before. It would certainly be well worth jacking the car up, draining the tranny oil then looking in here first. The other reason that could cause this to stick would be a failure in the little plungers at the end of the selector shafts, but this again I would think is unlikely.
Sadly, these are buried right inside and would mean a complete strip down.

Candles.

[Davey_B]

Well, it did require the gearbox to be removed and stripped. Apparently as soon as they got the box apart it slipped into neutral.

They couldn't find anything wrong except some accumulated crap which they removed. They only thing they could suggest was that by some freak of chance a small sliver off one of the gears had managed to get somewhere it shouldn't.

Anyway, it's all working now so I guess I can't grumble too much. Cost me £315 all in.

Cheers for all the advice.

Dave

[Doug]

"interesting" story

make you wonder if they really had to take it apart!! "gee something tiny must have got stck in there"--sounds like a bucket of s**t to me

but it's working now and you didn't get as big a bill as you could have so be happy and go drive it -- just be careful of those cables in the near future . . .