Hi All. Hope you are keeping safe and well.

My wifes 2013 Multijet 4x4 has developed an annpying fault where the gear lever wont centralise. Halfords have said they have disconnected the cables and its something inside the gearbox thats causing this issue and will be an absolute fortune to even investigate it.

Is this likely to be correct? It changes gear smoothly etc, no issues there. Its just that the side to side movement is stiff and it doesnt centralise.

Can anyone help??

Not sure how post a link to the thread directly , but if you search this forum for

“4x4 TA gearchange loose”

Not the same problem exactly but , easy to check and possibly eliminate . The clips are yellow and look a bit like clothes pegs , I would pop them and re seat them , nothing to lose
Worth a try ...

Try lifting the gator and lubricating the bottom of the lever with WD40 silicon spray This has worked wonders on cars in the past. Its amazing how dry these parts can get and how stiff this makes things.

MY 4x4MJ had something that sounds pretty much the same. I had the main dealer look into it. They gave it back having lubed everything that was easy to get to, but they said that they thought it was the selector mechanism inside the gear box and as you said even to investigate this was going to be very expensive. My car had also developed a rather nasty judder that seemed to happen at random times (and never when a mechanic was looking!). In the end I decided it was time to replace the car (I now have a 2019 4x4 Cross TA).

My wifes 4x4 had the same problem and I found the fault to be the shaft on top of the gearbox that the two cables connect too had seized.
Remove the battery and battery box, pop off the gear cables. Undoe the nut that holds the shaft in place, push out the shaft and dust seal, clean the shaft with emery paper and lubricate with a light waterproof grease and reassemble.

landie9 said:

My wifes 4x4 had the same problem and I found the fault to be the shaft on top of the gearbox that the two cables connect too had seized.
Remove the battery and battery box, pop off the gear cables. Undoe the nut that holds the shaft in place, push out the shaft and dust seal, clean the shaft with emery paper and lubricate with a light waterproof grease and reassemble.

Click to expand...

Sounds promising thanks

At the end of the cable set..

https://www.fiatdalys.lt/en/catalog/parts/212/21/20/1/33/0/0/0/CMBDS/GDX/gear-stick-flex-shaft

Or bolted to gearbox?

Take a look at this older post https://www.fiatforum.com/panda-iii/458882-gear-lever.html?p=4332014 It is not the gearlever in the car, or the cables from it, that needs lubricating. It's where the mechanism mounts on the top (outside) of the gearbox...

Herts Hillhopper said:

Take a look at this older post https://www.fiatforum.com/panda-iii/458882-gear-lever.html?p=4332014 It is not the gearlever in the car, or the cables from it, that needs lubricating. It's where the mechanism mounts on the top (outside) of the gearbox...

Click to expand...

I went to my 2018 version of the 4x4 MJ to try and take a photo for you... but on that later model you can't even see the gearbox! Not only the battery and its tray in the way, but also all the ECU stuff which is now mounted higher up, between the battery and the engine (to stay dry I suspect). Sorry - did try

It is not the gearlever in the car, or the cables from it, that needs lubricating. It's where the mechanism mounts on the top (outside) of the gearbox...[/QUOTE]


This unit ?

https://www.fiatdalys.lt/en/catalog/parts/212/7/20/1/33/0/0/0/CMBDS/GDX/gear-box-covers
Herts Hillhopper

LyndonEdwards said:

Hi All. Hope you are keeping safe and well.

My wifes 2013 Multijet 4x4 has developed an annpying fault where the gear lever wont centralise. Halfords have said they have disconnected the cables and its something inside the gearbox thats causing this issue and will be an absolute fortune to even investigate it.

Is this likely to be correct? It changes gear smoothly etc, no issues there. Its just that the side to side movement is stiff and it doesnt centralise.

Can anyone help??

Click to expand...

Let us know if this gets resolved

Thanks

varesecrazy said:

It is not the gearlever in the car, or the cables from it, that needs lubricating. It's where the mechanism mounts on the top (outside) of the gearbox...

This unit ?

https://www.fiatdalys.lt/en/catalog/parts/212/7/20/1/33/0/0/0/CMBDS/GDX/gear-box-covers

Click to expand...

Hard to make out from that drawing - but I've marked what I think it looked like on a photo I've found online (not necessarily a Panda gearbox). The cable connects to the ball at the right, and then a rod passes inside a cast section before reaching the nut. I lubricated that by dripping oil in the nut. (If not this exact part, certainly one that looked very much like it )

Hi All and many thanks for the help. I investigated myself and took 5 minutes to fix it. Underneath the gator is a ball that runs in those plastic housings as The Panda Nut said. Just cleaned and regreased and its perfect. I have written a letter of complaint to Halfords main office. Robbing Buggers. I reckon they were taking the **** as it was my wife that took it in

Which part on the diagram ?

(I appreciate nobody has taken a photo)

varesecrazy said:

Which part on the diagram ?

(I appreciate nobody has taken a photo)

Click to expand...

Take the gator off completely and the ball is on the bottom of the gearstick. It moves inside a plastic housing. Just clean and re grease. It’s like a new car now. Dead easy and takes 5 minutes.

Hopefully somebody can state which joint on the cable assembly

https://www.fiatdalys.lt/en/catalog/parts/212/21/20/1/33/0/0/0/CMBDS/GDX/gear-stick-flex-shaft

It isnt on the cable, it was the base of the gearstick. Here: https://www.fiatdalys.lt/en/catalog/parts/212/21/10/1/33/0/0/0/CMBDS/GDX/transmission-outer-controls


It really is very simple. Take the gator off and its right in front of you.

LyndonEdwards said:

Hi All and many thanks for the help. I investigated myself and took 5 minutes to fix it. Underneath the gator is a ball that runs in those plastic housings as The Panda Nut said. Just cleaned and regreased and its perfect. I have written a letter of complaint to Halfords main office. Robbing Buggers. I reckon they were taking the **** as it was my wife that took it in

Click to expand...

Glad that worked for you,. In the case of my 2013 Panda, and that of @landie9, lubricating the ball at the base of the gearlever inside the car had no effect, nor did lubricating the cables themselves or the joints on either end of them, - because the problem was corrosion (likely from winter salt) causing part of the mechanism on the outside of the gearbox itself to become stiff... hence the more involved replies.

Herts Hillhopper said:

... I've marked what I think it looked like on a photo I've found online (not necessarily a Panda gearbox). The cable connects to the ball at the right, and then a rod passes inside a cast section before reaching the nut. I lubricated that by dripping oil in the nut. (If not this exact part, certainly one that looked very much like it )

Click to expand...

Bouncing this back up, as my 2018, 31,000 mile Panda 4x4 MJ has today also suffered the same problem as my previous one - the gear-lever became stiff and didn't 'spring' to the central portion of the gate.

As before, the problem is stiffness were a metal rod passes through a casting in the gearbox outer casing (and as before the stiffness occurred a few days after driving through flood water, so assume corrosion between the rod and the casing causes the problem).

This time I have managed to (just about!) squeeze the iPhone camera in behind the battery to show where the nut is on the end of the rod in question. You might just make it out in the photos - which gradually get closer in, having first 'set the scene'. See if you can compare these views with a photo of a similar gearbox 'out in the open', which appeared in my earlier post, and can be seen here: https://www.fiatforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=207449&d=1585775210. in that photo, the red circle is drawn around the whole unit in question: the gear lever cable that moves when the lever is pushed from side to side connects to the balljoint at the right side of the red circle. The nut is at the left. the motion of the gear-lever is turned through 90deg by this mechanism to move the selector system up and down inside the gearbox, via another rod which is under the large rubber cover just to the left of the red circle.

Applying a drop of oil between that nut and the casting, and wiggling the gear-lever to get the oil to move down into the casting has cured the problem. I used a kids paintbrush on a bamboo cane to apply a drop of engine oil here!

My 1.2 pop on really frozen winter mornings gets a stiff gear lever but soon goes back to normal when the engine has warmed up on the drive which does not take too long as I have the heko grill cover for the winter months.

Bouncing this back up again, as today I got around to removing the battery and its tray, to clean and lubricate the troublesome pivot that leads to a stiff gear change on my diesel 4x4. Described and illustrated here: https://www.fiatforum.com/threads/gear-change-cables.489785/post-4619583