Need Gearchange Linkage Advice Please

[Mark0573]

Thanks John,

I will be trying to sort it out tomorrow, will post my results.

Regards Mark.

[mc21.8]

The pin at rear of box with R clip going through is always a good place to start it wears as it is very small<s3>same as s2?maybe

[molemot]

Spot on, that man....the pin wears and the hole goes oval, too! You can get a complete new part for it....me, of course, being influenced by the Scots blood, bushed the hole and made up a new pin from a socket headed bolt.....

[Mark0573]

Gday crew,

finished my service yesterday, after investigating i found the cross gate lever had a large amount of vertical and lateral movement in neutral, very worn from my observation.

This maybe the issue, so far I have not been able to reproduce the reverse gear issue, so i have checked linkages etc and thought I need to replace these components first.

Regards Mark

[richardvg]

Just a sill question.....have you tried (when hot and cannot engage) to switch the car off and try engage reverse .If it does easily then you know it is not a linkage problem.I personally believe if it is heat related ,it is either clutch/and or pipe or it is the gearbox oil.

[Mark0573]

G'day Richard,

Reverse was not engaging with the engine off as well as running. I have found that first gear is becoming a little funny. Im using Redline gear oil. Have braided clutch line and no slave cylinder issues. I did find my cross gate lever very sloppy with large amounts of lateral and vertical play. I'm waiting for new bits to arrive.

Regards Mark.

[molemot]

Richard....what can possibly happen to the clutch to prevent engaging reverse? Either the clutch releases fully and the gear slides in, or it doesn't and the gear will graunch. There's no synchro on reverse...the reverse gear pinion is simply slid into engagement by the selectors. If the linkage is fine, the crossgate part of the linkage will move the internal part of the selector mechanism across the gate so that it is aligned to permit reverse gear selection. Then, when you move the lever backwards, it will try to engage reverse by sliding the reverse pinion into engagement....regardless of whether it's rotating or not! If the clutch is faulty, the box will be rotating and hence horrible grinding noises will result. If the gearlever will not move the selectors in such a manner as to engage reverse, it's because the internals of the selectors are not properly aligned and the box is, effectively, trying to engage two gears at once. This usually means that the crossgate mechanism isn't moving the selector shaft far enough out of the box, and this results in the internals being out of alignment and no reverse.

What can the gearbox oil do to stop reverse gear engaging? Again, I can see no possible failure mechanism that could cause this....reverse will engage even if there's no oil in the box!

I must admit that I've seen lots of suggestions as to what can cause this, but analysis of the suggested failure modes is usually lacking. Hence I tried to do some, having suffered from the "no reverse" problem myself; since I thought it through and followed my analysis I have had no problems. Anyone who can provide a reasoned analysis for their suggestions, please post it....I'm certainly not infallible, and perhaps we can get to a definitive solution between us?

First gear is the other extreme of the crossgate mechanism...you often find you can get 1 & 2 OR reverse...but not both! Again, that points to the crossgate mechanism being subject to lost motion due to wear.

[Mark0573]

Hi John,

The cross gate lever has a lot of play, it would appear to have 30 yrs of wear and tear. I'm surprised that it's lasted this long.

Regards Mark.

[molemot]

You've found the same as I did, then....I've been doing things to the crossgate mechanism for years! This time round I decided to get it RIGHT. Over the years I have soldered a shim around the peg on the bellcrank, drilled and bushed the cable end and the bellcrank where it fits.....this time (having a MIG wleder!) I put a spot of wled on the peg and filed it to a nice fit in the cutaway on the selector arm....got a new bush for the bellcrank and fitted that, shimming out the endfloat, too...made a new stainless pin for the cable/bellcrank interface. Inside the box I've slightly reshaped the selector fork to ease the way into reverse, as well. The only thing I forgot was to attend to the transfer lever on the RH engine mount; but that's part of the tubular linkage which doesn't seem to give any problems. The gearchange is light and precise and I enjoy changing gear so much I do it for fun!! Having adjusted the throttle position UP stop to align the throttle and brake pedals, heel and toe changes are immensely satisfying, too.

You'll soon have your box similarly tamed, I'm sure!!

[lotus4s]

I know very little about the Citroen boxes but evidently this is a fairly common problem. Here is a post from Barry Spencer of Spencer's Motorsports on another forum regarding the same issue on an 88 with Citroen box. I'm assuming the linkages are similar: Barry is an old school factory trained Lotus tech.

"you need to lenghten the cross gate rod which is located on the right hand top side of the transaxle. Lossen the 10mm nut at the front of the rear rod. Remove the clip and pin at the rear. Slide the rod off the lever and turn it counter clock wise looking from the back. Try only half turn at a time. Install the pin and try getting it into reverse. Normally it will only take half or one turn to fix ths problem.

Barry Spencer"

Edited July 8, 2011 by lotus4s

[molemot]

Absolutely right, Jim!! Lengthening the crossgate cable rod by that adjustment ought to enable you to engage reverse...the problem is, if there is enough wear in the system, you can then lose the ability to select first and second as the crossgate linkage, although able to push the bellcrank into the reverse position, can no longer pull it far enough to get the other side of the gate! It also depends on the state of your crossgate cable, too...if it's anything like mine, the adjustment looks like something brought up from the deep by Jacques-Yves Cousteau.....rusty and immovable and costing lots to replace.

It is, as you state, a common problem; but one which has attracted much illogical advice over the years.....

[Andyww]

The red hose thing is a red herring....may have some effect on LH drive vehicles as the clutch line routes near the exhaust, but gear selection problems are usually due to crossgate adjustment.

 

Just found this very old thread as I am about to set up my crossgate. 

 

I see you agree with my recent thoughts on the red hose. I really cant believe the hype about this "problem". I am quite annoyed with myself for replacing this on my car because there was nothing wrong with it and the braided one is a poorer solution. I am not usually prone to replacing stuff without good reason!

 

Funny thing is, I also jumped to the (incorrect) conclusion that LHD cars might suffer from this, hence the hype, owing to the hose running close to the exhaust! (which it doesnt).

 

I would strongly suspect that any problems solved by replacing this hose are actually air previously in the system or old fluid. 

[MPx]

That wasn't my "red hose" experience Andrew.  But I accept it may depend when and how you use your car.  In my car, for the first five years of ownership, any commute into London sitting in traffic, any motorway queues, any track day and the clutch wouldn't completely disengage after the first 10 minutes making it very difficult to drive.   All sorts of stuff was changed (fluids, cylinders, seals) and nothing fixed the problem.  Then I had the red hose replaced with a braided hose and I've not had the issue again in the last 19 years on any track and no matter what traffic conditions, even in high ambient temperatures.  Absolutely the most essential mod in my view.

[Andyww]

OK thats good anecdotal evidence. 

 

Although when I used to own a dry-sump Turbo from 1984 to 1993 I also used to commute with it. I used to drive into London and park next to the Guildhall. Never had this problem. Maybe there is an issue with some of the red hoses. The one on my present car was marked Girling and is a really tough thick-walled nylon hose. Perhaps they used other inferior types on some cars. Or if the hose were to become damaged or kinked it would cause a problem of course.

[molemot]

The red hose red herring has been touted as the cure for being unable to select reverse.....which is obvious tosh....but if the clutch isn't releasing fully, then that could be lost motion caused by plasticity in the red hose. If you get the 'orrid grating sound when trying to select reverse, fitting a braided type hose might help...or it could be clutch wear, or master or slave cylinder problems. But being unable to physically get the lever into reverse is going to be a crossgate linkage problem. I, too, have changed to a Goodridge braided hose...even though the original red nylon was was working fine....now all the hydraulics go through those hoses!!

[whiskybob]

So how do you get to the cross gate cable nut inside the chassis...?  

 

 

[peteyg]

Just reviving this thread as the S2 in question from the original post is now in my temporary care. Hell knows what was done to it but you can see from the original photo the gear stick has been snapped at some point and welded back together. Reverse is still difficult to get into and there is a massive amount of free play at the stick both in and out of gear. Also the mechanism where you lift the stick to put it into reverse does not work, I assume something to do with the weld repair. Whether this is causing some of the issue with gear selecting, I will try and find out. Yet to properly investigate as there's a long list of other things to do but it would be nice to put the original and still existing issue to bed,  12 years after the initial post!

Pete

[MPx]

Pete, cant help with this myself, but...

I was down in the SouthWestLotusCentre last week and James and Phil showed me around a lovely dry sump Turbo Esprit that they are recommissioning to "as new" condition.  Its stunning and was ready to back out under its own steam for the first time when they found they couldn't get reverse.  Further investigation revealed symptoms almost identical to those described above including the snapped/welded lever.  The guys were actively making a good lever assembly from two or three others, each of which had some sort of issue.  Maybe you could give James (and/or Phil) a call and talk it through with them?

[peteyg]

@MPx

Thanks Mike, that could prove to be really helpful. Appreciate the heads up!

Pete

[Nelly]

Just to add some closure to the original thread post - as the car in questions is mine.  I obtained a used gear stick assembly from Lotusbits which has the lift mechanism and this has solved the problem.

To partially answer one of the earlier posts above I had to cut about 10mm of the body on each side of the opening in order to get the assembly out - clearly it is in place when the body gets put onto the chassis.

[whiskybob]

The answer to me question was quit simple, as it turned out.  Remove pin and nut from cable - undo gear shift mechanism and leave loose - tie strong string to cable end and push back through hole.  Cable end and string drops down and can then be pushed towards from of car and up through hole were gear shift has been loosened and pushed to one side and/or up.  Take of nut draw up through string.  Pull whole cable out of the back with long string still attached.  Replace broken cable to new cable to the string at engine side and pull new cable through to gear shift.  Attach new nut over the string and lower back into body. Push end end back through hole and attach end nut over string again.  Take off the string....

The answer to me question was quit simple, as it turned out.  Remove pin and nut from cable - undo gear shift mechanism and leave loose - tie strong string to cable end and push back through hole.  Cable end and string drops down and can then be pushed towards from of car and up through hole were gear shift has been loosened and pushed to one side and/or up.  Take of nut draw up through string.  Pull whole cable out of the back with long string still attached.  Replace broken cable to new cable to the string at engine side and pull new cable through to gear shift.  Attach new nut over the string and lower back into body. Push end end back through hole and attach end nut over string again.  Take off the string....

 

[Gregg88]

I have recently installed a new crossgate cable kit from SJ's - gears first to 5th are much easier to select - BUT reverse is still eluding me [can't get reverse get 4th]. What suggestions for setting it up for the first time with a new cable.

Many thanks

[Andyww]

Before adjusting the cable it might be worth checking that when you lift the gear lever upwards before going to the side, the limit pin is clearing the mechanism, allowing the lever to move fully across.

[whiskybob]

And once you've checked the pin, very, very slight adjustment makes a huge difference in being able to get reverse and first.  A quarter turn on the nut at the bell housing makes a big difference.  Then much the same with the modified SJ cross gate cable.

[Gregg88]

Many thanks guys - have done as suggested and can get all gears including reverse. However, still jumps out of reserve when under load. Do you think this is corssgate cable related or something else