Help…gears messing up…100miles from home

I suggest that this one is worked through progressively :

If the clutch is the source of the problem: then if the engine is dropped, the clutch release bearing can be checked, and the release arm and its spring checked as they are then accessible in the bell housing. If nothing is found then the gearbox can be removed very easily with the engine out of the way.

The nose cone of the gearbox can then be removed and that inspected : if the bracket in the nose cone is broken or the donut on the end of the hockey stick needs replacement, that can all be done by the garage on site.
Up to that point its more labour cost than parts cost.

If it goes deeper then its recon gearbox time.

I chose Bears Motorsport for my gearbox refurbishment - because they give some idea of initial costs : £275 to strip down, clean and inspect and re-paint plus parts and labour on top of that resultant from the inspection, and have about a 4 to 5 week turnaround time. Courier delivery via UPS of 37kg cost £57 plus a lot of cardboard as its quite big..

To me the cost is not really important : its still a fraction of the value of my bus. I dont like paying out thousands but if thats what it takes.

I could have paid £800 for a recon gearbox but not known what was done to that gearbox.

Having already had a recon gearbox that was more noisy than the broken gearbox I exchanged 10 years and 85000 miles ago (that one lost some gears, not crunchy or noisy) I dont want to risk that again.

I expect to be paying at least £200-£300 more for the main bearing and steel thrust plate work.. Plus maybe a synchromesh spider part , and hopefully not the main differential gearing worn by the movement of the main shaft.

 

Nice one….thanks for the low down! managed to get it booked in at a friendly in fortnight. Should take a few days, exchange or if it’s just the clutch they can see it.
Main thing is to get moving again really, for practical reasons. Costs a lot more to hire things to do stuff.

suspect I’ll now find out more about the inner workings of a box now.

 

Well I'm sure Bears will look after you but to put your mind at rest your main differential gearing (I assume you mean crown and pinion final drive gears) won't be worn by movement in the main shaft.
It'll be worn by movement in the pinion bearing...
What is a synchromesh spider part?

 

By the way @stewart kombi , you're doing the right thing. It's pointless speculating on what the issue is until you've got the box out and on the deck. Checked it externally before you dive inside, and by that I mean the cable and associated bits, linkage, clutch, clutch bearing, clutch operating forks ( they can crack, easy fix) input shaft and its support bearing in the crank! All easy to check, and relatively inexpensive to fix.
Then concern yourself with what to do about the main box when all the simple stuff has been eliminated...

 

i think I’ve checked all those things, tightwad that I am. It’s something out of reach going on.
Tbh my strategy so far is to do the stuff that I can do myself, and at the same time put some dosh aside for stuff I can’t do, to keep it moving. Hopefully

 

Ah, so you've had the gearbox out already? Apologies, I hadn't realised...

 

My not-quite-broken but worn and noisy gearbox has been quoted as needing about £650 of new and reused parts total £1200 . So the £800 recon lottery (same package as where I started with £650 , 10 years ago) may or may not be better value for money .

 

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