Jump to content

1.7 & 1.9 SDI gearboxes


NickJones

Recommended Posts

Hi,

We have just got hold of an Arosa 1.7SDi for my son as his first car.

It's a pretty tidy car with a good engine and was bought fairly cheap with a failed power steering pump. We've sorted the PAS easily enough, but uncovered a problem with the gearbox.

Although the gearbox works well enough and makes no nasty noises, the gearing is ridiculously low with 3000 rpm in 5th giving less than 60mph. It does go quite well up to 60 mph..... but motorways and dual carriageways are a problem.

It seems that the car has a 1.0 petrol gearbox in it and this is supported by the gearbox being marked (in felt tip pen!) "ESY". Looking up the ratios for the ESY code 'box this would match the rpms we are getting pretty well.

What has me puzzled is that as far as I can tell the petrol engine gearboxes are not a direct swap and have a different bell housing end casing with the starter in a different place - so somebody must have built this gearbox on purpose. Can't imagine why as it seems to have just about the worst ratios possible for a diesel from the range available!

My questions:
Is it correct that the petrol and diesel gearboxes are not directly swappable and must have the bellhousing end casing swapped first?

Is it possible to swap out the 5th gear ratio with the 'box in the car?

I guess the Lupo 1.7SDI gearbox would be a direct swap, but what about the Polo (6N/6N2), Ibiza or Cordoba?

What about gearboxes from the 1.9SDi cars? Polo, Ibiza, Cordoba? Caddy? Inca? Skoda Felicia? Seem to be a number of combinations of rod change vs. cable change and hydraulic clutch vs. cable.

Are these gearboxes really as feeble as it seems from all the horror stories on the net?

Anybody have one for sale? Don't mind rebuilding one provided it's not gone beyond the bearings and seals stage.

Thanks

Nick

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 9
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

  • NickJones

    5

  • Gaz

    3

Top Posters In This Topic

Posted Images

The 5th gear set should be swappable, it's accessible behind the end plate of the gearbox.

I always thought the diesel box was a completely boggo '085' petrol box externally. Had a look on google images and yeah...what I can find is the starter in front of the box rather than behind the engine, and a slightly different bellhousing pattern (Wider at the top)

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/POLO-1-9-1-7-RECON-GEARBOX-085-ETF-FFV-/270822020301

I will have a look at the ratios for the Lupo and Polo 1.7/1.9 SDIs. I know for sure that the 1.9SDIs are geared very long. But the old 1.4 diesels were geared the same as the 1.3 petrol, not too dissimilar to the speed/revs you are reporting. Does seem wrong on a more modern engine though. the old 1.4s were only 48bhp

Edited by Gaz
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Should be very long geared like you say. DED DXQ ETF FFV are lupo 1.7 SDI gearboxes. Even if you change the 5th gear you won't end up with as long a 5th as the right box, the final drive is shorter on the ESY

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Gaz,

Thanks. Yep, you've come up with the same list of codes I did (finally managed to get Elsawin working) - they all seem to have the longest 3.33:1 final drive. There are some others (FFG, ETA DPX and DCH) that seem to get used on diesels with a shorter final drive of 3.58:1 and the same 0.74 5th. I'd be happy with any of those. There are also some 1.4 petrol boxes with pretty much the same gearing combinations, but would need the bell-housing end swapping over to fit on the engine. Would prefer to avoid that, but they may be easier to find.

The thought behind swapping just 5th was trying to get an acceptable cruising gear with minimum effort and expense. It would be a bodge though and cause a very big gap between 4th & 5th.

Cheers

Nick

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It can be done. I've done it myself. you have a 0.85 5th now. The longest 5th you can get is a 0.64 (34/53) but it's pretty rare. (audi A2 diesels) 0.74 (37/50) and 0.706 (36/51) are more common. - the 0.706 was used on the 1.9 SDIs

Like you say, the gap between 4th and 5th becomes quite large though. I did it on a 1.3 GT engine (from 0.85 to 0.74) - on that the drop in revs from 4th to 5th at high revs was too much. It may not be so bad on a diesel, the drop is about 33% in revs. so from 3000 in 4th to 2000 in 5th. It's a start isn't it!

I'm sure you could use any gearbox of the same type - I'd be wary of sourcing one from the Ibiza/cordoba/polo classic though as I'm pretty sure they use the larger gearboxes from the golf. Skodas use their own gearbox with a bellhousing adapter afaik

Edited by Gaz
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Gaz,

Thanks for your help. "Just" got to hunt a donor down now. I'll swap the box complete if I can find one.

DXQ, DED, FFV, ETF & FDQ seem to be exact matches ratio wise and diesel fit

Also FFG, ETA, DPX, DCH, DCT, DXF, EQX & FFF are diesel fit but lower final drive and in some cases higher 5th. I'd be happy with any of these.

Plan B is a 0.74 5th gear and try the in-situ swap. Not ideal but better than we have now.

There are also some 1.6 petrol boxes with the same ratios but would need the bell housing end of the casing swapping. Were I to happen across one cheap I might take this route and freshen up with new bearings.

The scrap men seem to be wise to the cheese & chocolate construction of the 085 box and charge accordingly....... couple even suggested that it was a waste of time as they are "all knackered"! Bit pesimisstic I hope!

Nick

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Result. Found a correct ETF code box in a local scrappy for £ 75 (after some haggling). Had to wrestle it out of the car first, which wasn't such fun 1 car up on a stack but got there in the end. Car appeared to be there due to accident damage.

All gears select easily. No play detectable play in diff or input shafts. Can't check output shaft without opening it up but all seems to turn freely and quietly. Flushing through with ATF hasn't released any significant swarf. Dare I fit it as-is?!

Needs a new clutch release bearing and also the release bearing guide sleeve (part of input shaft bearing/seal cover?) but I'm having trouble sourcing these. May be able to re-use the parts on the box stil in the car but would prefer to be prepared! Clutch in the car seems fine and was replaced a couple of years back so not keen to buy the whole lot as fairly pricey in the context of a £ 500 car!

Cheers

Nick

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Just to report back on this one.

Advice was that these boxes are fragile with the diesels so well worth checking the condition before fitting. I first took the 5th gear cover off, which revealed some fine shrapnel and some endfloat in the mainshaft. I then went one to split the casing and that revealed that the "usual suspect" mainshaft bearing was a bit past it's best

post-917575-0-59775800-1409257790_thumb.

and also that the diff planet gears were deeply pitted causing concern about complete failure in the near future

post-917575-0-56823600-1409257966_thumb.

I then invested a further £100 in a bearing and seal kit and set about full dismantling. This is not especially easy and does involve some "special tools" or at least some modified ordinary ones! Gearing the outer race of the mainshaft bearing out of it's blind hole was a particular challenge (no way was I spending £ 75 + on the fancy internal puller) but we figured it out. You have to do this twice as you need to do a dummy build with the new bearings to calculate the correct shims to use.

Having got it all apart the good news was that most parts were ok and no teeth on the input shaft or mainshaft themselves were damaged. The bad news was that reverse gear was well chewed.

post-917575-0-52068500-1409258256_thumb.

post-917575-0-98829900-1409258299_thumb.

Oh poo.......

At this point, Vic of this forum deserves a special mention, as having already provided encouragement and advice, he also offered the parts needed at reasonable cost and went out of his way to make sure we got them quickly. Top man!

This meant I was able to finish building the box back up during the evenings last week

post-917575-0-30807100-1409258535_thumb.

and we then had the fun task of wrestling the old box out and the new one in on Sunday. Checked out the clutch along the way, which turned out to be just about down to the rivets. Luckily I had invested in a new friction plate, though for some reason the splined boss in the centre was 5mm thicker than the old one on the flywheel side, which meant it had to have a tickle from Mr Grinder before it would fit. (yes this is the bush mechanics workshop!)

Happily everything works as it should. All forward gears engage sweetly and run quietly. Reverse sounds like reverse and the correct ratios transform the car. 70mph at 2550 rpm now. As a bonus the clutch action is now much lighter.

I'm calling it a win for now. I wonder what will fall off next.........?

Many thanks to all who have chipped in!

Nick

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 years later...
Guest Curtis1222

how did you split the box? ive got mine on the bench now, undone all the bolts between the bell housing and box but its not moving. can sort of get my fingers in the gap but i think the selector is holding it together.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
Guest curtis1222

turned out to be the large bolt on the bottom of the box engine side which holds the slector shaft in place.

 

i ended up swapping the bellhousing onto a 1.0 box the opposite to what the OP did i guess. couldnt find a diesel box for a reasonable price so this will get the car back on the road for now!

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.



×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. Terms of Use Privacy Policy Guidelines