Question: Rover 75/MGZT gearchange

[Stanky]

I can haz question.

 

What should the gearchange of a ~100k MGZT 2.5 190 manual be like? Obviously no spring chicken, and presumably the clutch lives a hard life, but how clunky should you expect it to be?

 

The reason I ask is that I had a ride in one of my colleague's one a few weeks back and was appalled by how rough the gearchange was. He wasn't giving it the beans, far from it, but it was very noisy, clunky and snatchy - head forward, head snapped back type thing.

 

Is this normal? given the choice I'd opt for a slush-box was I going to buy one of these, but this experience really did cement the argument.

 

Or is he just shit with clutches?

[red5]

Mine was superb @ 109k - manual 190.

[purplebargeken]

Should be fairly smooth. Sounds like trouble isn't too far away.

 

Tell him to burn it. 

[Stanky]

He loves it, and spent well into 4 figures fixing things already so is unlikely to stop in the event of gearbox/clutch problems. I was surprised how bad it seemed, and the gearchange in the Nissan is far from slick - hey ho, not my problem!

 

Thanks for the info though guys, good to know for future reference.

[stripped fred]

I read an old review if the 75 the other day and it said the manual gear change wasn't the best.

 

'the shift quality of the manual box, though adequate, not being one of the Rover's strongpoints.'

 

http://www.rac.co.uk/buying-a-car/car-reviews/rover/75/207427

[Mr_Bo11ox]

Mine was pretty decent, not exactly a quickshift-equipped type 9 but certainly smooth and never un-cooperative. I think they all have the same Getrag manual box (NOT a PG1) so it sounds like theres something wrong with his.

[Roverageous]

I had a 1.8 n/a 75 with a horrible gear change. The box felt tight enough but I had SO much trouble actually getting smooth changes. One day the aux belt snapped while I was driving (it had been whining terribly for some time) and the car felt a lot livelier and the gearchanges went a LOT better all of a sudden.

[FrazzleTC]

Sounds like his lower engine mount is gone. This makes smooth changes really tricky. Clutches get seriously heavy as they get older too, again, making them a bit tricky to drive smoothly. Gearboxes aren't that bad.