1 gearbox dead and maybe another just eaten?

[spleenboy]

Hi People

Last week I changed gear and then could not move the gear stick into another gear. The garage drained the transmission fluid and found a lot of small metal bits and concluded the gearbox had gone. Fair enough I thought although unusual at 75000 miles. I sourced a 2nd hand box for £330.00 guaranteed for 90 days and that was fitted with a new clutch. The test drive went well and I collected the car, 200 yards down the road whilst changing gear the same thing happened. Whilst pushing the car back to the garage with my foot on the clutch something freed up and I was able to get reverse which I used to get back to the garage.

I cannot believe 2 gearboxes have gone within 5 miles of each other so does anyone have any other ideas? Is there any way the gear selector could be telling the box to eat itself? Could it be the diff? I'm not a mechanic so I do not know how the transmission works on an mr2.

Any help would be appreciated as the garage looked perplexed to say he least.

Thanks in advance
Matt £900 down and still counting : (

[Anonymous]

first question are you standard.
second are you manual or smt

if standard and manual i would say the new box was duff in the first place

[spleenboy]

forgot to say its a 5 speed manual not an SMT

[spleenboy]

and standard

[Anonymous]

Input shaft bearings are a known weakness with the MR2 gearbox,I had mine reconditioned at 52000 miles.
 l viewtopic.php?f=11&t=31934&hilit=+gearbox l

[Anonymous]

sounds like i would get your money back on that guarentee

[spleenboy]

so there is nothing in the car that could be causing the gearboxes to die? Not engine management, not a dodgy selector? nothing?

The annoying thing is - because I sourced the part (because the garage wanted to use a £1200 gearbox) I have to pay for the £300 labour again.

[Wabbitkilla]

Yes, use the warranty, unfortunately that's the cost of using the garage  ... and can't really be avoided if you don't have the facilities to diy (I was in the same boat recently). Might be worth getting onto the supplier about labour as it's failed so quickly!

[Anonymous]

not really but it does happen that you might buy duff parts. the seller might even not know that it was duff.

[ChrisGB]

Any chance that the gearbox is ok and it is just something in the selector mechanism? If a bearing had gone I would have thought you would hear it.

Chris

[spleenboy]

that is what I thought as there was no warning noises like in other posts regarding gearboxes. It just locks into a gear or no gear and wont move. This was freed when we moved the wheels of the car when pushing it.

Is the diff on an mr2 internal to the gearbox or a seperate unit?

[Toplesscouple]

If the box had a 90 day warranty on it, it sounds like a breaker or transmission 'specialist'. It is possible they just took it off a broken car and sold it on. After all it costs them nothing to give you your money back, just a gamble. Sad fact of life I'm afraid.

[Wabbitkilla]

So when it is in gear you can drive the car in that gear, but you can't change gear with it running?

If this is the case then it may be the clutch and the box is ok.

[ChrisGB]

So when it is in gear you can drive the car in that gear, but you can't change gear with it running?

If this is the case then it may be the clutch and the box is ok.

+1, could well be the clutch not disengaging which could cause the symptoms you are experiencing.

Chris

[Anonymous]

was fitted with a new clutch so thats ruled out

[Wabbitkilla]

was fitted with a new clutch so thats ruled out

Not necesarily, if the symptoms are like the oned i have suggested then very likely to be the clutch.
Of course the shift cables could just have come adrift fron the gearbox!

[spleenboy]

brand new clutch was installed - even when it first broke down and it was stuck in reverse I could start the engine in gear with clutch depressed and it did not move. So the clutch was activating. Although thinking about it,  I must stress than when I drove it with the gear changes felt great so maybe there is some substance in the clutch idea? maybe with the cable rather than the actual clutch itself?  I think the only way forward is to get a recon gearbox I have found and if the same problem occurs then we can at least rule out the box and look alsewhere. However that is an expensive way to diagnose if it is not the box : )

[Anonymous]

if you can take the selector out of the box try and see if it works out of the box and look for broken bits. maybe the last dead box throw something at the selector and damaged it.

[Wabbitkilla]

The clutch activation is hydraulic so if the pedal is returning, then that's ok.
I suggested the clutch purely because mine has just been replaced, pedal action was normal but i couldn't get in or out of gear with the engine running. Obviously a new clutch shoukd be absolutely faultless but it's not an impossibility for it to fail or be installed badly.

Cheaper to replace a clutch than a gearbox.

[spleenboy]

I couldn't move the gear lever wether the engine was running or not

[Wabbitkilla]

I couldn't move the gear lever wether the engine was running or not

Ah, bugger!
Better use that warranty then!

[Toplesscouple]

Doesn't it seem a bit odd that both gearboxes should have the exact same fault? Maybe there is a problem with the linkage?

[Anonymous]

if you can take the selector out of the box try and see if it works out of the box and look for broken bits. maybe the last dead box throw something at the selector and damaged it.

have u checked

[mrzwei]

All of this has been said really but gearboxes dont really 'change gear'   s:roll: :roll: s:roll:   everything is in constant mesh so the problem is either the clutch not disengaging, probably eliminated because it worked fine when you drove it away, or the selector mechanism. I've not much specific MR2 knowledge (ex SMT) but the selector mechanism will usually be a mixtture of cables and rods ending with some sort of connection at the box. I don't think you would get this stuff with a replacement box, you would just refit the original.

Look there first before replacing the gearbox again because my gut feeling says you will get the same problem.

Someone on here will be able to confirm whether or not you get the selector mechanism stuff with the replacement box.

[Anonymous]

Gearbox has a metal lever on it that the cables go to,see if you can move it manually by hand or small crowbar type lever without too much pressure.I have moved this by hand before,see here for some clue.   l viewtopic.php?f=47&t=18234 l
You can see the lever in the top of this pic.