2001 TDI GOLF suddenly difficult to shift when running

AlwaysFaster

Member
Joined
Mar 19, 2018
Location
Huntsville, Ontario, Canada
TDI
2001 Golf, 2006 Golf
Hi,

I bought a 2001 TDI GOLF for a decent price. My friend and I (one after the other) thoroughly tested it and ran through all the gears and everything was fine. I drove it over 200km home without a problem, however maybe 10km from home it started having problems switching gears, have to put more effort than one should to change gears. It switches gears without a problem with the car is off.

Now that the weather is finally nice outside I would like to figure out the problem before the bugs come out.
Looking online it seems that it can be anything from the clutch, to changing the gear oil, or possibly the master or slave cylinder?

Thank you very much in advance for your help!
 

Nevada_TDI

Top Post Dawg
Joined
Aug 17, 2008
Location
Reno, sort of...
TDI
2001 Jetta TDI
Gearbox was cold and no problems, gearbox warms up and shifting gears gets difficult?
And with the engine off it shifts "normally?" Possible clutch and/or an iffy gearbox?
Before you get too worried, I would make sure the shifting linkage is all indexed correctly; there are a couple of very well explained simple videos you can look at.
 

jettawreck

Top Post Dawg
Joined
Aug 2, 2004
Location
Northern Minnesota-55744
TDI
2001 Jetta and 2003 Jetta
I would do some (more) research yet, but suggest bleeding the clutch slave cylinder to start with ( and it can be a bit of a pain). However, I wouldn't be surprised to find you have a worn pivot, fork, etc.
A linkage adjustment and shift tower bushing clean up probably can't hurt either.
Sounds as though the clutch is "dragging" a bit.
 

Jet 02

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 13, 2007
Location
Californa
TDI
2002 Jetta, Vanagon AHU project
Hard shift clutch problem

My 2002 Jetta started having hard shifting problems. I changed gear lube. no help. It was like the clutch was not fully disengaging. Was prepaired to replace the clurch arm and pivot. Happened to take the car to the car wash.. Clutch problem went away... Turns out the car wash removed the floor mats for cleaning and put them back in over the locating pegs. Turns out the floor mat had slid forward under the pedals and was preventing full pedal travel. Felt stupid for not catching that but happy it was "fixed".
Jet 02
 

Momentslater

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 2, 2018
Location
Calgary, AB, Canada
TDI
2003 Jetta 535k km
I have a service record from Volkswagen of the PO of my car complaining about the car being difficult to go into gear but would go in fine with the engine off. Turns is the flywheel had "exploded". This I think is an extreme case but it was my car's problem at one point.
 
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