Stiff Gearchange

[Noblescort]

The gearchange on my 2.5 went all stiff on me at the Car Limits activity day in October and I have finally found enough time to root out the problem. The stiffness was due to the coating on the outside of the cable inner becoming damaged and bunching up inside the outer. This caused additional friction and stopped the gear lever being able to be moved into 1st, 3rd and 5th properly. The thing is I'm not sure why it's happened. It could just be wear and tear (38k so it's possible), or could it be the heat from the front turbo melting the coating? I am doubting the latter as I would expect the covering on the outer to be affected aswell, so I'm leaning toward wear and tear as the root cause. Has anyone else suffered from this problem? I have had a new cable made for 1/3 the cost of the Noble part and all seems fine (well it is in the garage anyway). Any thoughts or input gratefully received.

[worty]

Noblescort said:

The gearchange on my 2.5 went all stiff on me at the Car Limits activity day in October and I have finally found enough time to root out the problem. The stiffness was due to the coating on the outside of the cable inner becoming damaged and bunching up inside the outer. This caused additional friction and stopped the gear lever being able to be moved into 1st, 3rd and 5th properly. The thing is I'm not sure why it's happened. It could just be wear and tear (38k so it's possible), or could it be the heat from the front turbo melting the coating? I am doubting the latter as I would expect the covering on the outer to be affected aswell, so I'm leaning toward wear and tear as the root cause. Has anyone else suffered from this problem? I have had a new cable made for 1/3 the cost of the Noble part and all seems fine (well it is in the garage anyway). Any thoughts or input gratefully received.

Had the same with mine at about 30k miles. It was like it when I bought the car and I just thought they were all like that . It went to the factory for a service and they sorted it out and may have re-routed the cable as well. Its been fine since . I think they said that the cable inside the couter sleve had started to fray which then jammed it all up.
worty

[Noblescort]

Good to know I'm not the only one! Did the factory explain why they thought it had happened?

[obes]

I changed the cables on mine too at about 28k