Hello,

I must confess I am more of a Citroen man, however have been doing a favour for a friend and am attempting to fix their '98 Felicia diesel.

After the return spring in the ignition switch failed, they managed to drive the car with the starter engaged, which obviously caused a certain level of carnage, killing the starter, and seemingly chewing the ring gear, as a new starter refuses to engage properly, making nasty noises.

I set upon the car last week, with the intention of removing the flywheel to have a new ring gear fitted, however so far my attempts to remove the gearbox have failed. It seems the car uses a Skoda gearbox which is mounted to the VW engine via an adapter plate, and it is this which is causing a problem. I can release the joint between the adapter plate and engine, but it seems that the shape of the plate is such that when trying to withdraw the gearbox it contacts the flywheel. I then tried to seperate the joint between the adapter plate and gearbox, only to find that despite having removed all bolts/nuts the plate is stuck fast. What confuses me is that in the area above the starter on the bellhousing (which is where the plate is lodged) a threaded stud can be seen to emerge by about 5mm. This does not seem to have ever had a nut fitted (it does not protrude enough for that) but it seems to be here that the plate is stuck. It has no means provided for removal, and due to the small amount of thread protruding a stud extractor or double-nutting is not possible. I have tried all manner of prising, and yet the adapter plate remains stuck fast. I fear that if I apply any more force I shall break something, and am now at the point where I am considering drilling out this strange stud.

Comments and advice from anyone who has been here before (perhaps to replace the clutch) very much appreciated.

Best regards,

Jonathan.

Good evening!

I can't help much, but I just scanned my Haynes manual and there is a VERY BIG WARNING!!! If you disconnect both drive shafts from the diff, and you do have to in order to take the gearbox out, you must put a metal rod of approximately 26mm diameter into the inside bore of the left differential side gear. If you don't, it risks falling into the casing since it's unsupported, and then you have to have the whole diff rebuilt by a transmission specialist.

I assume that you've supported both the engine and the gearbox separately on car jacks or similar so that there is no weight one way or the other preventing the surfaces from separating. Just a thought.

Good luck and best wishes,

Mr Music

I've never removed one from a diesel, but I know you can do so with the adapter plate still attached to the GEARBOX, not the engine - in fact this is how it's supposed to be done. Sorry to not be any more help than that though.

yeah that's right darren, the adaptor plate CANNOT be remove from the gearbox till the gearbox is taken off the engine... the flywheel should fit through the giant hole in the centre of the adaptor plate with about 10mm clearance all around.... @mr music, i've never had a problem with the diff sun gears falling in... if you dropped the gearbox they might do but that is just haynes manual scaremongery

Oh, I've had a gearbox drop sun gears, while just being put in the car. And someone I know (on the other Skoda Forum) had that, and ran the engine with it like that. End result = explodey casing, in a BIG way!

Thankyou so much for all the helpful replies. God knows why I failed, I guess I must have just hit a sticking point and wrongly assumed that the adapter plate was hitting the flywheel, I shall be having another shot at it tomorrow. Good point about the diff too which I didn't know; I'll stick a driveshaft back in to the diff to support it.

Incidentally, I don't suppose anyone has a suitable flywheel available?

Best,

Jonathan.

no not a diesel one sorry

. Good point about the diff too which I didn't know; I'll stick a driveshaft back in to the diff to support it.

You don't need to do it with a shaft, you can just roll up a bit of cardboard, just make sure it goes in deep enough to the sun gears (easily done) - much easier and less awkward than a shaft.

Is the Felicia 1.9d gearbox the same as the one used in caddy/Felicia pickup?

I've had these in and out a few times on the diesel it's not the easiest of jobs but the proper engine bar support for the engine and gearbox from above with adjustment to lower at the right angle makes life a lot easier.

I know it's a stupid thing to ask you that you've not missed a bolt anywhere have you please tell me offended we've all done it

 

Also if anybody can answer pickupmikes question above please do