... manifests itself in Morrisons car park today in my otherwise flawless 35k mile 100HP

I selected reverse as normal to back out of my parking space, and it crunched in noisily despite the clutch being fully depressed. And then started to crawl back despite said clutch being down, and I had to hold the car on the brake; and refused to come out of reverse gear.

So I turned the engine off and it came out of gear and into neutral perfectly. Couldn't get back into reverse with the engine off, so I started the engine with it in neutral to spin the gears and tried again; in it crunched and off we went again.

After another couple of attempts I decided to see if I could just back out enough to select a forward gear using the same technique - but no crunch (that I remember) it just selected as normal. And, once I was moving forward, my normal lovely gearbox returned and I drove home without incident.

Doesn't feel like a dodgy clutch - any ideas? Thanks all.

PS I love my 100Hp. Just drove down to Marseilles and back for hols and it was flawless, fun and economical. I bore all my friends with stories about how good it is, and how reliable; this is the first blot on an otherwise perfect landscape

There is no syncromesh on reverse, which is why it crunched. A tip to avoid this is to select a a forward gear first (whilst the clutch is depressed) then go into reverse. You'll find it does so without the crunching/grinding.

The car cannot move whilst the clutch is not engaged, so I don't really understand that.

trackdayqueen said:

There is no syncromesh on reverse, which is why it crunched. A tip to avoid this is to select a a forward gear first (whilst the clutch is depressed) then go into reverse. You'll find it does so without the crunching/grinding.

The car cannot move whilst the clutch is not engaged, so I don't really understand that.

Click to expand...

I know reverse doesn't have syncro - what I usually do is put the clutch down and wait a couple of seconds to let the gears spin down before selecting reverse and it's then fine and crunch-free. In this case I guess the clutch mech wasn't working properly and the internal gears were still spinning, hence the crunch.....

Sounds like the clutch plate temporarily stuck to one of the surfaces then freed itself. Who knows why? Usually happens when the clutch has not been operated for a long time and got a bit damp but not the case here.
As long as it doesn't happen again, don't worry.