Occasional difficulty selecting reverse gear

[barrym381]

Stop guessing and get it looked at before it gets worse and while it’s still under warranty

Totally agree, but the only issue will most likely be that they can’t recreate the issue as it appears to be only on a very specific set of circumstances while coming out of his garage/off the driveway. All other times it’s no issue.

But by making them aware of a problem makes claiming any warranty work further down the line if they can’t sort it easier

[Exonian]

Meant to reply yesterday but didn’t get chance.

The dealers will have a set process they have to follow in order to make a warranty claim.
They’ll certainly need the car overnight to replicate cold start gearbox selection issues.

My suggestion is taking a few videos of you starting the car, pushing in the clutch and attempting gear selection over a few days then show this to the workshop when booking the car in. Ideally emailed to them as hard evidence. Their tech might not be able to jump in and replicate it on day one but it’ll show that there’s a genuine fault rather than keys being handed back and “sorry, no fault found”, they’ll just have to persevere with fault finding. Hopefully a simple fix (cables).

[Yusee]

Thanks Exonian. Very helpful suggestion-Will do just that

[dean5125]

it's absolutely fine when warm. in fact, it's fine the minute I pull onto the road. Very odd, the way it only does it on the driveway, when cold.
all sorts of suggestions online- from clutch problems to linkage issues, to some saying it's pretty normal and you find a way round it.
the main decision I need to make is whether to book in. I may just wait and see, I don't get the impression it's a big problem

Get it booked in and until it's sorted if you only have issue getting reverse off your drive very first thing in the morning, what about leaving it in reverse over night.... ok it's not a cure but it's a work around until it gets looked at!!

[Lordie]

Hello. I have a suggestion that might be worth trying. It's not a complete fix but might work like it did for me on my last car. Whenever I started the car from cold and went straight into reverse gear to get off the drive it would almost always make a grinding noise. All I did was go into first gear and then into reverse (without releasing the clutch pedal between) and it never did it then.

[Yusee]

Hello. I have a suggestion that might be worth trying. It's not a complete fix but might work like it did for me on my last car. Whenever I started the car from cold and went straight into reverse gear to get off the drive it would almost always make a grinding noise. All I did was go into first gear and then into reverse (without releasing the clutch pedal between) and it never did it then.

Thanks, that normally works for me. Only once did reverse not go in. the car has nearly 2 yrs warranty to run so I must get it booked in when I get chance

[Yusee]

So the car went in to have this looked at yesterday evening.
The problem has been a little worse- on 3 or 4 occasions I have been totally unable to select reverse ( and now first) gears. On 1 occasion, I videoed it as suggested by Exonian.
Only ever occurs first thing in morning, particularly on a cold day. Absolutely no problems otherwise.
Certainly no clutch slipping.

When I took it in yesterday evening, I showed the master technician the video, and explained the issue.
He seemed pretty disinterested, though that may be my perception.

Just had a call back from the dealer. Pretty unsatisfactory really
He says the only thing the master technician can find is that the clutch is heavy. He says the clutch is worn. And the service chap tells me this wouldn't be covered under warranty- it would only cover a clutch for 6 months.
I said I don't accept that the clutch is worn. Why does the problem only occur on cold start? He couldn't answer that.
I've never once needed to replace a clutch on any car I've ever owned- 26 years- and many went into high mileage.
I certainly won't accept that the clutch has worn through misuse.
He suggested I could seek a second opinion from another VW dealer

I think the master technician's findings are nonsense. I suspect he couldn't find a fault, so made something up, knowing that I was expecting something to be found.

I'm off to collect the car now. Would appreciate thoughts on how best to proceed.

[Watts]

As you say, not very satisfying. Only thing I would say is that when my PP went in for a service I had a 1.5 Golf and the clutch felt feather light compared with mine so I suspect yours is normal.

[Yusee]

Thanks Watts. Just collected the car. I asked to speak to the technician. I particularly wanted to know if he could replicate the problem- he couldn't. The report says " clutch heavy and requires new complete clutch assembly"- for which they are quoting me £1066.
Well the clutch doesn't feel heavy at all to me- in fact it feels light.
I said I didn't agree, and that if it was the clutch, I'd expect this to be done under warranty.
I'm a little stuck really. It's certainly not a major problem and is not affecting my enjoyment of the car.
But if it is a faulty component I would insist this is replaced under warranty.

[kmpowell]

When I had my EPC fault, I posted some information in the thread that may help you here...

On the drive the technician told me that now the car is back for a 3rd time they are allowed to have "free rein" on diagnosing issues. On all 1st and 2nd investigations, they have set test plans for every problem which they have to follow in order to satisfy VW warranty conditions, so they are just following a book rather than being technicians.

This means if they get part way through a test-plan and they get the 'all clear' from the systems, they stop, regardless if they think there might be a further fault. That's the instructions from VW to all dealers, not their choosing. He said they would now keep the car for longer and use their rolling road etc to diagnose, trouble shoot to find the root cause.

Knowing what I now know, I'd guess that in your case they got part way through the fault finding process and have now stopped.

My advice, push to see the inspection logs. The dealer bills VW for all warranty inspection/work, so it's in your interest.