Having owned my 2004 4.4 V8 petrol (M62) Range rover with very few problems for 10 years , I think it may be time to let her go

Have just had the rear suspension bushes done, new disks, back plates and calipers fitted all round, new front suspension arms and wheel bearings done, but have noticed over the past few weeks that there has been a bit of a CLUNK when going from reverse to forward as the drive was taken up . I checked the prop shaft and could see nothing obvious, so I put it down to my normal Range Rover disaster paranoia and convinced myself I was imagining it .

Last night, after going down the motorway at 70 mph with no issues, we stopped at a junction. Went to pull off and the Rangie did not move , the engine revved but no movement . Tried again and there was a CLUNK and she started driving ok, and ran ok until we got home 10 miles later along some country lanes. No bongs of death or messages appeared on the instruments cluster.

She has done approx 110,000 miles , I changed the gearbox oil and fluid ( ZF gearbox) at around 70,000 miles . It has always held on to gears , but lately I noticed I have to drop to sport mode to climb some hills because she seems reluctant to upshift.

Last year I changed the geabox cooler pipes ( rusted through and dripping oil) and topped up the gearbox, so the oil level was checked then .

I'm hoping it is just low gearbox oil , but I have a funny feeling it could be the gearbox gone .

Fingers crossed ............ Its big , its black and we call it THE BEAST !

You may wish to try a gearbox flush rather than just an filter change.
With a flush 100% (I think) of the oil is taken as opposed to 60% with just a filter change.
Worth trying? 2012 Orkney Grey Westminster 4.4TDV8 with Ivory interior.........nice!
Alfa Romeo Giulietta
Just one Montesa now, 349 White Wonder
Austin A40 Farina MK2
1975 Morris Marina 1.8TC

Thanks for the suggestion, any help much appreciated.I will be taking it to my local RR specialist this week . Hopefully something simple . Its big , its black and we call it THE BEAST !

Might be a solenoid on the way out
have you had a look to see if there are any fault codes ?

I would definately do a full flush and new filter first. When I fisrt got my fatty i just did a filter change and top up. It took 4.5 litres to fill and thought that the old oil coming out was fairly clean. A year later and the gear change was clunky so I did a full flush. The old oil was very dark and dirty. Not black but not good either. It did the job and sorted the clunky shifting.
The point is an oil and filter change, IMHO, doesnt do a good job. A full flush does.
Hope you get it sorted. 2007 Vogue TDV8 in Zermatt Silver with Charcoal

Just spoke to my local indy, they say that the symptoms are unusual , so its going in this week for an evaluation. Time to dust off the credit card again  Its big , its black and we call it THE BEAST !

10 years with no trouble. Think this should be a sticky lol.

Hope you get it sorted easily and cheaply bud. Regards

Daz

-------------------------
2011 (61plate) 4.4 tdv8
sumatra black

previous cars

e46 m3
e53 x5

Yes , ‘tis true , but then I try to stay on top of the preventative maintenance and not wait for things to fail. Generally the strategy works ok, except this time I did bury my head in the sand and convince myself it was my imagination

The only thing I have had constant problems with is the handbrake- no matter what I did I could never get it to work properly, until I gave up trying to fix it myself and took it to my indy instead who sorted it for me. Its big , its black and we call it THE BEAST !

Losing drive when setting off from junctions rings a bell. On mine it also started happening whilst driving along.

Turned out to be the gear selector pivot. Very common for the pivot at the end of the lever (at the gearbox end) to seize up. An easy DIY fix for 40-odd quid.





Whole mahoosive thread on it over at the Disco 3 forum!
http://www.disco3.co.uk/forum/topic31656.html[/img] 2006MY 4.2 SC
BMW R1250 GSA Rallye TE
Triumph Tiger 1050 (sold)
1979 Pontiac Trans Am (sold)

What I would be concerned about is the fluid change. The gear selector pivot has it's possibility too. If your lines rusted through how do you know rust or water hasn't contaminated the fluid? There are concerns about doing the total flush. Theoretically it can dislodge crud and get caught in small passages. One would assume if it is done right it will blow all of it out. I've done one filter and fluid change at 119k, 2 just drain and fills up to 165k with semi synthetic and now a drain and fill with pentosin. Have a filter waiting but I tore the gasket. Got better after every change. Very smooth now.

Thank for the suggestions guys, it is all Grist to the Mill .

With regards to the oil cooler pipes, the leak was due to corrosion causing a pinhole or hairline crack , so the possibility of water entering the system was very low, besides I drained some oil from the gearbox to check its condition and there was no evidence of water contamination.

Here is the write up I posted last year of my DIY repair .

https://www.fullfatrr.com/forum/topic46369.html Its big , its black and we call it THE BEAST !

Update on the gearbox fault.

My garage just called with the news that the gearbox is indeed logging faults . Paraphrasing what was said here , but basically the owner said that under sensible driving, it behaves perfectly normally , but if you "give it the beans" the gearbox starts to slip.

He said that a gearbox flush / filter may cure the problem, but this was uncertain whether it would work on a 120,000 mile gearbox and it would be an expensive £350 if it doesn't work .

They have ( very occasionally) seen the teeth stripped out on the transfer box chain drive , resulting in a loss of drive, but the only way to diagnose this would be to remove the gearbox and remove the casings on the transfer box to eyeball the components . ( This one has me interested because it kind of fits the symptoms I am seeing)

If a new gearbox is required,he would also recommend the fitting of new cooling lines and oil cooler. ( due to my repair on the cooling lines and the possibility of the cooler springing a coolant leak into a new gearbox ) , and what the heck, I just remembered that my radiator sprang a leak last week so I might as well get that changed at the same time .

But hey , what else am I going to spend my 167 million pounds lottery win on
 Its big , its black and we call it THE BEAST !

Can you not do the drain and filter yourself? It's not hard. I've gotten Febi brand fluid for as little as $8 US a litre. Pentosin for $10. Goiter and gaskets are cheap. $450 US is just an outrageous price for what can be done for about a tenth of that.

Yes, I can, and I have indeed changed both the oil and filter in the past , but to fully flush the system it will take a lot of oil but I really don’t think an oil change will fix the gearbox on this occasion Its big , its black and we call it THE BEAST !

You may be right but even if you do just a drain and fill without a new filter, drive it a bit, you may see a change to give you an idea if this is right path.