1st gear baulking

[sidewaze samm]

Does anyone experience baulking when selecting 1st gear?

Mine's a 1.9 130, 05 reg, and sometimes takes 2 or even 3 attempts to select 1st gear. There doesn't seem to be any consistency around whether the box is hot or cold, or the previous gear selected. All other gears are fine.

Sometimes declutching again while in neutral allows easy selection, and sometimes makes no difference. I'm not sure if selection has worsened or not, and I'm fully used to it so don't notice it too much - probably happens 10-30% of the time. Is this common, standard or cause for concern?

Warranty is up in a month or so, so comments gratefully received.

On a seperate note - I never have liked the 'wooden' gear lever of the Elegance and prefer the leather lever from the Comfort. Easy to swap? Worthwhile economically?

Cheers

:mw:

[rotodiesel]

First gear baulking is only a very occasional problem on my 130 PD, certainly no worse than most other cars. A more irritating fault (uncorrected by VAG for years on the Passat) is poor synchromesh action on a 1 - 2 change with a cold gearbox.

Luckily, I live in a rural area and generally only have to make one change out of first gear; the next time I need it the gearbox is warm and the problem has gone.

It's worth bearing in mind that the B5.5 gearbox has synchromesh on reverse (try it). This means that you can't do the standard "crunch" test to see if the clutch is dragging. It's probably reasonable to assume that the clutch is OK if the take-up point is normal and reverse does not baulk.

rotodiesel.

[ChrisBP]

I sometimes have trouble getting it in to first gear. 1st and 2nd are always a bit tighter than the rest. I guess its problematic about once or twice a month - but always tighter than the rest.

The issue I find is that it sometimes wont go in to 1st at all. I have to stick it in reverse or 2nd and engage the clutch a bit to get the cogs to shift a tiny bit, thsn it goes in to 1st okay.

Do you have the same prob?

[numskull]

I don't have a problem with selecting 1st. I do have a problem with a terrible clatter when fully hot and changing down from 3rd to 2nd as the clutch is re-engaged - sounds like a old bag of nails! Still trying to find time to go to the dealer to warranty it (and fix the clutch judder pulling away in 1st when cold!)

[Baker21]

On a seperate note - I never have liked the 'wooden' gear lever of the Elegance and prefer the leather lever from the Comfort. Easy to swap? Worthwhile economically?

Cheers

:mw:

I replaced my wooden gear lever with a leather unit but you have to replace the gear lever, gaitor and plastic surround which comes as a one piece item from your friendly local stealer for around £65......

[Bluefox]

Does anyone experience baulking when selecting 1st gear?

Mine's a 1.9 130, 05 reg, and sometimes takes 2 or even 3 attempts to select 1st gear. There doesn't seem to be any consistency around whether the box is hot or cold, or the previous gear selected. All other gears are fine.

Sometimes declutching again while in neutral allows easy selection, and sometimes makes no difference. I'm not sure if selection has worsened or not, and I'm fully used to it so don't notice it too much - probably happens 10-30% of the time. Is this common, standard or cause for concern?

Warranty is up in a month or so, so comments gratefully received.

This is exactly the problem I have. My solution will be to change the oil for something to combat this, although I've not had time or chance to do so as yet.

Glad to know I'm not the only one though...

[allclownsareevi]

Sorry to ressurect an old thread, but I'm wondering if anyone else has similar issues to the OP's above?

I'm getting something similar. It can be a ltitle difficult to select first gear, almost like a very slight crunch just as the gear is selected. Also get the same when selecting reverse. Double clutching often helps. However, I don't get shuddering under acceleration from low revs in higher gears. The clutch pedal travel is smooth, the bite point is fine and there's no slippage. It's also more pronounced when the gearbox is cold.

The car has covered around 57,000 miles. So I'm wondering if anyone has similar or advice. I'll double check the fluid levels tomorrow but I'd like to think i'd have spotted it if it were low. In the meantime, if anyone has any advice, gratefully received. Thanks.

[sidewaze samm]

Hi - OP here!

Approaching 5 years and 50k miles later and my car is still the same - still baulks going into 1st as often as it did, but never any problem with reverse.

Good luck.

[allclownsareevi]

Ah ok. Well thanks for the reply Samm

[R11KUP]

I have driven my 2005 octavia 2.0 tdi with this exact problem for 3 years now. Had a couple of people look at it. One suggested cables, the other changed the gearbox oil. Still the same and I have covered over 60,000 miles like it. A bit annoying but how much money do you need to throw at a problem that nobody really knows how to fix?

If anyone knows what causes this please share how to fix!

[Phil-E]

This is a very common problem on vag gearboxes.

 

The first thing is to check the cable adjustment.

 

Then change the oil (which you've done).

 

It then starts to get a bit more expensive from there.

 

If those still don't solve your problems then it's either the rivets on the selector fork for 1st/2nd that are coming loose or there is a problem with the bearings.

 

You may need to get the gearbox split open and looked at before the problem gets worse.

 

We had problems on our Cordoba PD130 6 speed box. I tried changing the oil which temporarily eased it. It then ended in a catastrophic gearbox failure due to failed bearing. One reconditioned gearbox, clutch, DMF and over £1k later the problems were fixed!

 

Phil

[rotodiesel]

To avoid confusion:

 

The Mk1 Superb gearbox is longitudinally mounted with a right angle final drive. It has a rod linkage (simple for the 5 speed, lousy for the 6 speed) and no cables. It has nothing at all in common with the transverse units. 

 

The 5 speed units will generally outlast the car; the 6 speed units often suffer from premature pinion bearing failure due to inadequately controlled bearing preload. Old 6 speed units eventually develop a very sloppy linkage due to poor design.

 

The tallest ratio 5 speed unit (GGB) is very nearly as high-geared as the 6 speed unit. At 70 mph in top gear, the GGB transmission gives a mere 120 engine rpm increase over the 6 speed unit in top. As it's far more reliable and much nicer to use, it is much the better transmission.

 

rotodiesel. 

Edited 2 May, 2015 by rotodiesel

[R11KUP]

Well, I took the Octavia into a gearbox specialist for some advice.

"Does it go into all the gears no problem when the engine isn't running"? Asked the gearbox specialist.

"No problem at all there" I replied.

"Then your clutch isn't releasing properly. You need a new clutch and dual mass flywheel, that ain't cheap" was the advice from the gearbox specialist.

So, I need to lay out around a grand for this work. Don't know whether to have it done or is it time to part company with the old girl?

Decisions decisions.....

[jimbof]

Sounds like a lot of money for a clutch and DMF job... I got my whole automatic gearbox rebuilt for £1500...

[iob]

I paid around 700 Euro for the complete job (DMF+clutch kit+labour) in a 6 speed manual, so it sounds a bit too much in your case, maybe you should change the service or get another quote from different indy...

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Edited 1 June, 2015 by iob

[098Joe]

How does the mechanic know dmf flywheel will need replacing?  I had a Honda Accord that did about 160000 miles on original clutch before it started to slip.  I had the flywheel (as a precaution) and clutch replaced together (as it a very labour intensive job on that model).  The old flywheel was well within tolerance (less than half worn) when the mechanic inspected it. 

[iob]

A good mechanic would know, looking at the surface of the flywheel and checking the play in it if it needs changing. However it is better to change both of them together, as the surface of the new clutch plate would just speed up the wear of the flywheel (already having some wear) and you would end up paying twice for the costly labour. Moreover, some service garages don't even offer guarantee unless changing both at the same time. In my case, I changed last year just the clutch (flywheel was looking quite Ok) and I end up paying twice for the labour as 1 year and 20000 km later, I had to change the flywheel as well...

I guess it makes sense to change them in steps only in case of premature clutch issues and only upon inspection by a good mechanic of the flywheel state...

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