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R380 Gearbox Oil Change


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Hello, The second gear on my R380 is starting to crunch when you go from first to second, It has ATF fluid init at the moment but I will be changing it for MTF94, Do you think this will stop the crunch into second? Also whats the best way to fill it up as there isn't much room to move, cheers. Ben

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Same as white90, I also use a large syringe but I've replaced the short plastic pipe with about a metre of hose which allows me to thread it between the chassis and floor and use it upright from the side of the car, makes it a lot easier for doing the front and rear axle oils too.

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I used a pump up plant sprayer and a length of tubing (oxygen tube from an operating theatre but anything will do). Means you can go and have a cup of tea while it is filling.

See: http://landroveroneten.com/index.php/gearbox-oil-change/

Me too but with the original tube, valve and the 'hanging basket' attachment which hooks nicely into the orifice. :)

In my case I found that simply replacing the ATF with new helped the gearbox enormously..

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It's the Manual Transmission Fluid recommended by Land Rover for R380s and it does make a difference using it. May not completely cure the crunch though, my new Ashcroft box is still notchy 1st-2nd.A lot more expensive, about £45 to fill the box. Besides dealers I think Texaco do it but many buy from from the Difflock store http://shop.difflock.com/difflock-evolutio...litre-p-51.html

I use plant sprayers, got several with differnt grades in, will pump cold EP90 no problem, just takes a while!

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i use dexron 2 or 3 in my r380 box and no crunching gears .

you need the thinnest oil possible and definately nothing any thicker than red dexron ATF .

if you have any other kind of auto trans fluid in the box it may be causing the problem of crunching gears .

i have tried other types of fluid in my boxes but nothing beats proper dexron red fluid .

unless you can buy a fluid that has a thinner viscosity than dexron, id steer clear of it because it will make things worse not better .

what you need to try first off is to put half pint of diesel into youre gearbox as it is with the old oil in , and then if the gears go in smoothly you know the oil was too thick and you need something real thin in it , then you can try another oil and see if it works or makes the gears crunch even more .

of course you might also need to make sure the clutch rod is set up correctly and that it actuates the clutch right , sometimes the nuts can come loose on the rod coming from the master cylinder , and if it becomes too loose then you may end up not engaging the clutch far enough down .

there are other things to think about as well with what you are experiencing , ie clutch plate centre breaking up and eventually losing all drive [as mine did recently] and release bearing and cover plate wear or inoperation .

ive just changed my clutch in my R380 due to the centre disintigrating [poor clutch plate design and engineering ] and found the old release bearing was seized and not rotating and had marked the fingers on the cover plate over a period of time .

my gearbox first got a bit sloppy on the overrun and a lot of clunking going on , then eventually one day i changed into 3rd gear and all the drive went .

took box out, found clutch centre had fallen apart due to the plate in the centre suffering metal fatigue and cracking on all the square edges , if the edges had a radius in them this plate wouldnt have cracked in those places .

any time ive had problems changing gear, its allways been when the weather has got slightly cooler and is allways when i first drive the landy in morning etc , once warmed up the box was ok , thats how i found out it was the fluid in the box that was a little thicker than it should be , and i changed to normal red dexron and all was fine after .

i had an old classic 2 door range rover that crunched gears , and back then you were supposed to put engine oil in the box , i put a pint of diesel into the gearbox and it ran lovely from then after .

i had an LT77 box changed by a company once that put some other type of auto trans fluid in the box , i had to drive home from shropshire with the gears not selecting very well at all .

as soon as i got home i drained the gearbox and put dexron ATF in it and it was so perfect after that .

same thing when i got my 300tdi/r380 LANDY , gears werent going in that well , i drained the clear fluid out and put normal dexron in , then its been great ever since , it never crunches in even the winter mornings , except for when i dont push the clutch pedal down far enough .

for all its worth though about all ive mentioned above , sometimes though it can be just a case of pushing clutch in and counting to 2 before dropping into 2nd gear and all is fine, it can just be trying to go through the box too quick thats the problem and nothing else .

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HOW much? :blink: :blink: :blink:

Last bottle of Genuine LR branded MTF94 I bought from a local LR specialist was ~£20 for 5L and was more than enough to fill the box.

I think it is about £25 here and 5L should be enough for two changes on an R380 if it doesn't have an oil cooler.

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morris oils do a mtf oil has any one used this about 25 pound for 5 litres thay say its for the r380 box,chris.

I am using this and it seemed to improve the 1st-2nd shift slightly. But I don't know what was in before; I do know it wasn't atf. Morris is easy to deal with.

Nigel

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I got round to changing the oil yesterday, It is still crunchy first-second but it does feel smoother going into the other gears, Also there was a lot of metal in the oil should I be worried about this?

the bits of metal could be from the synchromesh hub on 1st/2nd. drop Ashcroft TRansmissions a phone call or email & request their advice.

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