I'm curently in Agadir, my 1998 R reg discovery 300tdi has developed transmission porblems. I managed to get it to a land rover dealers service garage but as I don't speak French the language barrier is proving really difficult. After a test drive with a mechanic they've removed the propshaft and drained some oil. They then told me that they had to go to lunch for a couple of hours so I'm sat over the road in an internet cafe. Currently the car is in bits and to be honest I'm panicing, before getting to the garage the car was driveable but now it's not. They are a main dealer which gives me some hope but I'm pretty on edge about the whole thing.

Is there anyone reading this who is in Agadir who speaks good french or knows an english speaking mechanic? Or can point me in the direction of an interepter?

Any help would be so gratefully received as I'm 10 days into a 2 month voyage which looks to be cut pretty short as I'm wondering if I'm going to have to ship the vehicle back to the UK at this point.

Don't panic you will get back on the road and Agadir isn't a bad place to be for repairs (its a horrible town but well set up with repair places)

As a toyota driver I can't help with specifics but ask around for an english speaker to translate - maybe at the internet cafe? that will help with the language barrier and help get a clearer understanding of whats wrong.

I have details of a turbo repair place and the owner speaks good english but I don't have contact details with me at the moment to pass on. I have posted them here somewhere.

There are also big scrap yards just outside town for spare parts.

Gee (Thimba on here) who is doing a round Africa trip had transmission problems in Casablance and got repaired ok might be worth contacting him for another source of information.

Details of the Turbo place, Aziz may be able to put you in contact with a translator/ land rover mechanic

Aziz Aboudhak
www.turbo-motors.net
GPS N30 25.247 W -9 34.117
gsm 06 61231904
52 Av El Hansali
El Khaim
Agadir

Thanks for the reassurance, I did see lots of scrap places on my way to Tiznit which is where I decided to turn back knowing there was a main dealer in Agadir.

I guess more will be revealed after lunch when I go back.....

What's the problem with the transmission?

Peter

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There has always been a bit of a clunk when changing gear which I've been told by the mechanic (who recently did a lot of work on it in the Uk) was nothing to worry about, there is a bit of play in the front prop shaft if you turn it, usual for a disco of this age. However, there now seems to be a metalic rattling and sporadic deep crunching noise, this tends to happen when changing gear but is fine when the car is under drive especially in the higher gears. I thought it might be the UJ's but these seem fine with no play. This occasionally turns into a metal on metal vibration noise which seems to be coming from the centre of the car. The sound seems as though it;s traveling down a propshaft but obviously it's hard to explain a noise from a car on a forum post!

I was just about to head down to Western Sahara when the problems arose. Knowing there was a land rover main dealer in Agadir I turned round and headed there. After a test drive with the mechanic they've double checked the Uj's and taken of the front prop shaft, after moving it a bit with the diff lock on (without front prop shaft) they drained the oil from the gear box and went to lunch. The language barrier is very difficult. They've come back from lunch and decided that it's the transfer box and it needs a new one. they also can't source the part...saying all that however I think they have misdiagnosed the play in the gears for the actual problem. They also removed the spline from the bottom of the shaft and couldn't work out why it didn't go back it, I managed to stop them from hammering it in and vaguely managed to explain that it only goes in one specific way, (they hadn't marked it) I fixed this myself in their workshop using a clamp by trial and error marking it so I knew where i was then turning through each of the splines/rings until it slid in nicley....as you can imagine I'm not exactly filled with confidence...they are a main dealer with a service shop but they only had brand new cars in there and were mostly seeming to change brake pads etc

I'm now having dinner having paid 600dh for them to look at what I already knew and checked through myself. Really at this point I need someone with experience of older rovers and who speaks pretty good english. I can;t really risk heading further south only for the problem to get worse and me further from home. Of course these sounds could just be the play getting a bit worse and in reality nothing to worry to much about assuming I'm very careful changing gear.

At this point I'm really trying to work out my options unless by some stroke of luck someone through here or landy forum comes to my resuce with some help. I gues limping it home in a vain hope it makes it is m best option. Very gutting as I was really hoping to make Senegal.

January, 2014 | Travels with Thimba

Link to Gee's blog where he mentions some of his gearbox troubles in Morocco. He got a gearbox shipped in from the UK so may have some contacts who could help.

Otherwise all I can think of is the garages in Zagora who see a lot of 4x4's and should be able to diagnose/repair and speak English. Mohamed Gordito is very highly regarded, I've used Team Ali Nassir several times, English not brilliant but we managed. Replacement parts might be more difficult to get hold of there though

Contact details for Mohamed Gordito
Garage Mohamed Gordito

Adresse : Avenue Mohamed V, 47900 Zagora–Maroc
Téléphone : +212 668 960 594
Email : mohamedgordito4x4@gmail.com
GPS : N 30º 20 22.85 - W 5º 50 13.35