Renault Megane Gear Box

Jonathan222

All,

Looking for a bit of advice here but, while driving last week (and a couple of times for about a week before that) the cruise control kept disengaging on My Renault Megane and losing speed as we were driving. I didn't think it was a big deal as we don't really use the cruise control all that much. Anyway the car is under warranty for another 18 months or so so i thought i would ring the renault garage and ask them about it.

They told me that if there was a problem with the cruise control, it should be covered under the warranty so i should bring it in to them, so i did. They drove it just to see what i was talking about and after about ten seconds, he said to me that this isn't a problem with the cruise control, the clutch is gone and that is what is causing it to disengage, i need a new clutch.

So that is annoyingly expensive, he was going to charge me €1,400 for a new clutch but i got a better price from a friend who has a garage and where I brought the car and i dropped it into him this morning.

He rang me back ten minutes later and asked me if anyone had done any work to the car recently as there were two upper bolts missing from the gear box and the third bolt was only just hanging in there. I said that there was a gear box replaced by the renault garage under warranty last november and he said that it looked like they hadn't fixed the bolts back properly.

I talked to the renault fella who initially denied that they had done anything wrong but then looked for the number of the garage where I bough the car, so that he could ring them. I then rang my friend after renault had talked to him and he said that renault had told them to do whatever he was doing to it (i.e. replace clutch) and then i could drop the car back into renault and they would fix whatever was missing (i.e. missing bolts)

So, my question is how serious not putting bolts into a gearbox might be, could this have caused the damage to the clutch ( Renault apparently didn't secure a uv line or something like that which is leaking grease in the area as well)?

I would defo say that any loose bolts in gear box would have an effect on the clutch as it probably means the clutch had to work harder to get in gear etc.. (especially with leaky grease).

Any advice would be appreciated as I think Renault are to blame.

Many thanks.

Interslice

Jonathan222 wrote: »

I would defo say that any loose bolts in gear box would have an effect on the clutch as it probably means the clutch had to work harder to get in gear etc.. (especially with leaky grease).

Any advice would be appreciated as I think Renault are to blame.

Many thanks.

Yep, clutch would engage and disengage crooked. Particularly if you had all bolts missing through more than 180 degress of the bell housing. Would explain why you had trouble changing gear.

mullingar

Hard to say if 2-3 missing bolts would be enough to cause the gearbox to partially separate. I would have thought there were 6+ bolts to mount the gearbox (Open to correction though for this car!).

But anyway, very poor form not to replace the clutch when the gearbox was out if there was any reasonable wear on it.



I'd say the bolts were not torqued to spec when fully re-assembled

mickdw

I wouldn't touch the car. Straight to Renault.
Gearbox bolts loose and you think it is leaking fluid around the area. The fluid is a likely reason for your clutch issue.

Jonathan222

Appreciate all the feedback. This could be a long drawn out process of denial of liability from Renault.

kaahooters

Jonathan222 wrote: »

Appreciate all the feedback. This could be a long drawn out process of denial of liability from Renault.

If another garage has worked on the car, won't renault blame that garage and wash their hands of it?

Jonathan222

kaahooters wrote: »

If another garage has worked on the car, won't renault blame that garage and wash their hands of it?

Renualt have already told the other garage to go ahead with the clutch and then send it back in to them and they will fix the 'bolts' but claiming the bolts are seperate to the clutch going.

mickdw

Jonathan222 wrote: »

Renualt have already told the other garage to go ahead with the clutch and then send it back in to them and they will fix the 'bolts' but claiming the bolts are seperate to the clutch going.

Other garage or not, if other mech strips it and finds a oil destroyed clutch, Renault would find it hard to get out of it.