Just swapped the head on my Mk2 and upon driving it out the barn I did a 3 point turn and when in reverse it just suddenly stopped like I slammed the brakes on, if I give it abit more revs it free's itself with a loud clunk and almost feels like your driving up a small kerb, its not doing it all the time but playing around with it Im finding it will do it in both 1st and reverse, I havent tried any other gears yet. When its jammed I can lift the clutch in neutral and cant hear any grinding or nasty noises. The box was rebuilt sub 1000miles ago with a 2nd hand but inspected quaife diff, linkage all appears to be fine, clutch was pretty new, oil is filled up and obviously fresh, inner cv's are all tight.
I would run the engine for a while in neutral, this will spin the gears in the gearbox and stir up the oil, then drain the gearbox oil quickly and check for any glitter / metallic particles. There is definitely no dodgy outer CVs or anything?
boooo, its the gearbox, full of metal some bits quite large with thread marks on them like a nut. Devastated doesn't describe how I feel, Im in no way flush with cash and this box cost me a few months of hard graft to buy the bits and have it built and it was something Iv wanted for years, didnt even get 500miles from it. I will be paying the gearbox builder a visit once I know what the failure was, I feel it may have been his fault as I got worried half way through the rebuild when he was having problems with bolts, I know its an 020 so you can't expect much but I had hoped for a few years use.
Darn, that is not good. If it has only done 500miles then it could not have been right when it was built for it to fail so soon. The diff may well still be ok as the internals are pretty well housed in the diff casing.
Id have a guess that it wasnt done right, actually said to Chris E at the britcar that I had no confidence in the box and really regretted not taking it to hotgolf. Im praying the diff is ok, state of the oil says its been chewing lumps of metal for a while but I would have thought the internals of a quaife where pretty tough. Im not giving up on 020 yet, if a suitable ratio'd replacement doesn't turn up in the next 24hrs then I have a diesel 020 with super long ratios and that can go in it as I need the floor space right now, the broken box is almost out the car just didnt have the energy to do the wrestling it out bit tonight.
