Why do I hear a clunk noise when changing 1st, 2nd and 3rd gears, and when at idle depressing clutch pedal ?

[Fastlife91]

I feel like giving up on cars now, I have had 4 cars and just on the 3 previous cars I have spent around £6000 on repairs, in 4 years.

 

On current car I have had it for 9 months or so, already spent around £1300 on repairs and then found out yesterday that head gasket is gone ( no obvious symptoms and it runs great, only thing is that I have to top up water once a week by about 2 cup fulls )

Garage charged £950 for HG not long after buying it, but later found out they only replaced waterpump, I went back to see owner of garage yesterday and it seems he is not prepared to do anything or give a solution to fix it.

A mechanic friend of mine said he can do it for £400 (I have to pay extra £30 for machine work) and he will do timing belt as well but said valve stem seals don't need doing as my car runs great, no smoke at all so we will reuse those.

 

HERE IS MY QUESTION , PLEASE HELP ME

 

I noticed this noise about 2 weeks after buying the car, it is a cluck noise, only noticeable in gears 1 , 2, and 3 , you can hear it about 92 % of the time

Also you can hear the noise whenever the car is stopped and idling if you press the clutch pedal and then take your foot off it, you hear a clunk.

 

However, car goes into each gear absolutely perfect with no hesitation.

 

My friend checked gearbox oil briefly, there were tiny bits of what looked like metal in there and oil looked very old, he did say that if we drain old oil and refill it that it may cure the problem.

transmission light comes on/off occasionally but he said it could be due to old oil.

 

any ideas please ?

 

 

ty

 

[jmurray01]

Sounds like the engine/gearbox mount to me, our MK1 Focus had that problem the entire the time we owned it.  It didn't cause any issues though (other than an irritating "clunk" when lifting off the clutch) so I never looked into repairing it.

I thought it was only the automatic models that had a transmission warning light?

[Fastlife91]

8 hours ago, jmurray01 said:

Sounds like the engine/gearbox mount to me, our MK1 Focus had that problem the entire the time we owned it.  It didn't cause any issues though (other than an irritating "clunk" when lifting off the clutch) so I never looked into repairing it.

I thought it was only the automatic models that had a transmission warning light?

I have a bad engine mount, the middle mount. However I noticed this clunking before any bad engine mount smptoms.

 

It would be very good if it was only the engine/gearbox mount causing the noise and I will have to get it investigated and hope for the best.

 

Would it still clunk though at idle if it was a mount ?

 

 

Thank you

[TomsFocus]

You really need to try and stop worrying about every little thing on your car...it's an old car, things will be wearing out or not as tight as they used to be - and you get odd things even on brand new cars.

I do exactly the same, worry about every little noise, feeling, smell, whisp of smoke, lack of acceleration, steering wobble, oil disappearance, so I get it, I really do, but even fixing everything won't take those doubts away.  I've ploughed loads of money into old cars trying to make them perfect but it just isn't possible, you'll still find something to worry about.

Honestly, this problem just sounds like gears being selected, the synchro's in the gearbox won't be perfect now, but as long as you can still get all the gears and it's not popping out it's not worth repair/replacement.  It could be a mount as well though, best way to check that is to get a pry bar or a long screwdriver or something and see how much you can move the mount with a bit of leverage.  It shouldn't be much at all.  Didn't you also have some bolts missing from a mount, were they ever refitted?