TD5 Clutch Judder

[BilboBoggles]

MY03 TD5, with 220,000 ks on it. New clutch 5,000k's ago. Juddered before and now doing it again... Driving me crazy....

A few years ago, around 180,000'ks the clutch started juddering just slightly, and only occasionally. Especially in the morning it would get a bit nastier. I decided to bite the bullet and had the clutch, flywheel and various other bits replaced at around 215,000, including the rear main seal. I plan to keep this one, so though this would give it another 200,000'ks.

Well the clutch was perfect for the first few weeks, and I was well pleased. It drove like new!. BUT now the judder is back and on occasion it's worse.

The symptoms are, first thing in the morning it judders like crazy for the first few shifts. After it's warmed up it is normally pretty good. But just occasionally it will judder particularly at take off in 1st, and then changing to second.

It's really not pleasant to drive any more with it doing this. I've taken it back to the mechanic, and as luck would have it it won't reproduce for him.

I've checked or had checked some of the issues that might contribute to this, for example the engine mounts were new 40'000 k's ago etc.

So any idea's for a possible cause?

[rainman]

Given the new clutch and flywheel, I would say engine and/or gearbox mounts. Is it possible that your relatively new ones, or one in particular, has worn/perished prematurely due to an oil leak, or heat from the exhaust?

James.

[laney]

had same problem with my 02 td5 replaced fly wheel clutch pressure plate and spigot bearing. put in a solid fly wheel and heavy duty clutch and pressure plate I also replaced upper and lower slave cylenders to the clutch this seems to of solved my clutch judder problems hope this helps.

[landcol]

Perfect timing watching with interest. My 03 is also driving me mad first thing in the morning then seems to burn off. New clutch dmf etc 50k ago, all was perfect till my slave cyl let go, replaced that but still the judder. I look like a boof head kanga hopping away first thing in the morning

[landcol]

Also as bilbo said if it goes away when warm could it be the engine mounts? As they wouldn't be affected?

[BilboBoggles]

Popped the bonnet off last night and had a quick drive. The Engine does pivot quite a bit as you take off, wobbles around a good couple of inches. But is that normal? How much should a TD5 wobble when taking up load.

[landcol]

One thing I also noticed not sure if it affects you bilbo, is if I park overnight on a hill with bonnet facing downhill,it doesn't seem to do it as bad. Which makes me think could be contamination from somewhere

[BilboBoggles]

I haven't tried that. But does sound like a contamination. If it was a rear main seal, you would expect to see black oil leaking out the bottom. But it could possibly be a rocker cover gasket, leaking down the back of the engine. Should be visible I would think.

[BilboBoggles]

Well, it's leaking oil somewhere. Over the last few weeks, Iv'e been watching the bottom of the bellhousing and it's been oily. I've cleaned it twice, and it becomes oily after a week or so. I did have a rocker cover gasket leak and that was fixed, but still there is oil somewhere. I recently bought a cheapo boroscope and had a look inside the bellhousing... Looks like it's oily in there.

So possibly rear main seal? (that was done with the clutch 5,000ks ago), perhaps a sump gasket?

Any way.. It's back at the mechanics to see where the oil is coming from.

[slovenia]

Crankshaft bush, wrong lubricated.The bush is placed on your hand,filled to the brim with engine oil and then pressed with the other hand on top untill you can see the oil coming out the outer wall of the bush.If this is not done,the bush will dry out within a thousand kilometers.

Best regards
Bostjan Mulec

[BilboBoggles]

Ok, it's done about 13,000k's since last update, decided to use it as our primary driver just so I could see if it was going to finally break. Well for the first about 5,000 k's it started getting worse and worse, until the point it was doing the judder constantly. BUT then over the last 8,000 k's it's slowly faded and is now near perfect, with no judder.

During this time it's been inspected and the mechanic confirmed it was not getting oil contaminated using a boroscope. I also had a number of other oil leaks fixed.

My guess is that both the flywheel and clutch were slightly out of true, and have eventually bedded in and true'd up. Well perhaps the dillusion I'm choosing to live under. Because if I have to get a new clutch, I'm binning the whole gearbox/clutch and going automatic on it.

[carlosbeldia]

Mine was juddering as crazy after a clutch / flywheel change.... it was my low range sensor playing, was driving me crazy. Just cut off (horror!!!) cables going into ECU, but this is a MY99.....