Engine OFF can select gears, engine ON can't select gears

[Akzo]

Just tried my van after driving fine yesterday and now with the engine ON can't select gears but with the engine OFF can select gears. Only wanted a fish finger sandwich... leave it lol! fortunately the shop wasn't far away, so took a risk and did a bit of testing. Got to shop and back again.

1. Clutch pedal feels fine, nice and springy, not slack
2. Engine off, I can move gear knob into all gears
3. Selecting 1st gear, clutch pedal pushed in and then turning engine on stops van from pulling off, letting clutch and pushing accelerator gets me moving but cannot change gear
4. Tried 2nd and 3rd gears as per step 3. and all works OK.

Totally puzzled?

Working a 100 miles away from home at the moment, this could be a long, slow journey back next week

Van is a 2013 (63) 125 T350 LWB

[Akzo]

Oh it's got a 6 speed gearbox as well.

[knobby1]

Oh it's got a 6 speed gearbox as well.

All Euro-5's are 6 speed.

Your clutch is not disengaging properly, have you given it a good bleed..?? If it bleeds ok and still doesn't allow a good gearchange, I suspect your DMF and/or clutch pressure/friction plate is not well.

How many miles on the beast..??

Lord Knobrot

[Akzo]

115179 miles. Don't have the tools and resources here, I'm at a holiday let in Norfolk, been here for 2 weeks decorating and doing general maintenance will be here all this week and maybe a bit of next week. I might ask the local garage here to take a look and bleed it for me to see if that helps, maybe get me back home later on and my local garage can do a full service on it for me and sort out anything they find.

[Akzo]

I'd forgotten, I've recently had my rear discs and pads replaced by Formula 1, I had to take the van back because they damaged the seals and it was leaking onto the new pads and discs so it failed it's MOT, got it sorted, kind of, they used liquid gasket and that seemed to fix the issue, well enough to get my MOT, but the guy asked if they'd changed the pads but I just assumed they had, when I told him I'd had it done at Formula 1 he didn't have much good to say about them. I have to take it back to Formula 1 when I get home so they can check the liquid seal has worked, but I I decided it should be fixed properly not bodged plus I want the pads changing. To be fair to Formula 1 the job was a tough one and when I took it back they were as nice as pie about it but they shouldn't have let me drive it out in that state. During the first MOT test I'd got half the braking power on the rear left because of the leak.

Do you think this has anything to do with my issue now?

As you may have guessed I'm not mechanically minded but I can turn my hand to most things if need be, so could I bleed the clutch myself, if so are there any tutorials on this?

[metalworker0]

New disks and pads should not involve disturbing any seals and if any seals were damaged they should not be fixed with gasket goo. I'm scratching my head thinking what they have done. unless you are misinterpreting it all and the seal leak is on the engine and not the brakes.

all the best.mark

[knobby1]

New disks and pads should not involve disturbing any seals and if any seals were damaged they should not be fixed with gasket goo. I'm scratching my head thinking what they have done. unless you are misinterpreting it all and the seal leak is on the engine and not the brakes.

all the best.mark

Assuming he means the rear axle seals....must be a RWD..??

Lord Knobrot

[GrumpyOz]

Possibly a near seized spigot bearing, enough give to allow starting it in gear, but dragging once running

[Akzo]

Hi Guys, well today it's gotten worse, clutch pedal down in first or second and the van lurches forward as if in gear with clutch pedal up, think it's a Call to the AA and hopefully towed back home.

[Akzo]

New disks and pads should not involve disturbing any seals and if any seals were damaged they should not be fixed with gasket goo. I'm scratching my head thinking what they have done. unless you are misinterpreting it all and the seal leak is on the engine and not the brakes.

all the best.mark

Assuming he means the rear axle seals....must be a RWD..??

Lord Knobrot

Sorry, yes the rear seals.

[Akzo]

New disks and pads should not involve disturbing any seals and if any seals were damaged they should not be fixed with gasket goo. I'm scratching my head thinking what they have done. unless you are misinterpreting it all and the seal leak is on the engine and not the brakes.

all the best.mark

No, not misinterpreting, definitely on the rear brakes, the MOT guy was not impressed and neither was I, but I had to get the brakes sorted to get my MOT and get over to this job in Norfolk, but it was an opportune moment for the brakes as they started to grind on the way to Toolstation and Formula 1 were next door, before all of this brake thing the van was driving fine. I checked the fluid and it's full, I'll get underneath the van to see if there is any oil on the rear brake.

Regardless I'll be taking the van back because I'm not happy with the apparent bog job on the seal. (The leak was on the Passenger side rear brake)

Thank you all for putting some time in to reply, I appreciate it.

[Akzo]

Image of clutch/brake fluid reservoir, hopefully this is correct.

IMG_7997.JPG

[Sam123]

It sounds like you've leaked brake fluid. The clutch release shares the same fluid, and the inlet for clutch is usually higher than brakes in fluid bottle, so that clutch is sacrificial to brakes in event of fluid loss. That might explain why you lost the clutch before you lost the brakes.

Has the fluid loss been disguised by either of the garages topping up the fluid after bodging the leak?

So you've probably drawn air into clutch release circuit. Sounds like if you fix the fluid leak, then top up brake fluid and bleed brake and clutch you'll probably sort it.

[Akzo]

Hi people, thanks for all the replies, the van is going in today to be looked at, if it's a bleed job I'll be happy and then it will be off to F1 for a chat, else it will be a clutch repair job I suspect. Going to a good mechanic so I'm sure he'll sue it out.

[dannyjw]

I have exactly the problem right now, can hardly get a gear.
I have a 2001 200T280 duratorq fwd.
An indie suggested it might be the hydraulic tube from the master down to the slave.. it has some kind of in line valve?