Reverse gear question
 

Had my S just over a month now, its all been great and I have been loving it, been blessed with some of the best weather I can rememeber since I have had it, cant remember the last time I drove to, or back from work with the roof up!

My question is though, do you actually have to push the gear lever downwards, as in towards the ground before reverse will engage?

the reason I ask is that I now dont have reverse gear at all, yesterday it refused to go in, it felt like it was half in, but would just pop out with a grinding noise if I tried to reverse. I can get the car to reverse very slowly if I am on a level surface and I hold the gear lever in place firmly and ease the clutch up, but rush it an it pops out again.

the thing is it has always been a bit tempremental getting into reverse, BUT i have never previously pushed the gear lever down to engage it, the gear lever does not move downwards in the slightest, not one bit, so if you are supposed to push it down to get reverse, how have I managed it before now? sometimes it would take 3 or 4 attempts to go into gear or i would have to move forward a bit, or it would go into gear with a clunk, but on the whole it worked fine.

if it is supposed to go down to engage reverse, hopefully the 02-046 fix will solve the problem, if not I need to order a used box asap, at least in time for next weekend so I can get that in.

:hello:

I've had mine almost 10 years, and I've always had to press the gear lever down and in to engage.

From your description, it sounds like you have some form of gearbox problem.

Someone more knowledgeable will hopefully be along to advice you.

Good Luck.
Bharat :)

Try doing a search on 5th gear problems. There's a few threads on it but the same issue can cause problems into 5th or reverse (but seemingly never both)

Basically centre console and gear lever out and the square bracket that holds the lever in can have bolts come loose.

I had 5th gear issues that were solved in about 20 mins when I put the 2 bolts back that had come out.

thanks for the replies, so it appears I should have to/bea able to push down on the gear knob?

I had the centre console off yesterday, and pulled the first rubber boot up, looked to be signs of rust on the 2nd rubber boot and the nuts. Didn't have time to take the nuts of, but will do so on the weekend. Tried to get some wd40 down the 2nd boot to see if that helped and a lot of rusty residue appeared to ooze out.

If it is the case that I should in fact be pushing down to engage reverse then hopefully if I can fix this it might fix the problem without more drastic measures.

Incidentaly, 5th used to be a bit reluctant to go in every now and then, but anfluid change sorted that out.