steelblue ghia

we went back in april this year,I would definately drive again,its motorway most of the way and really easy to find,it took us just over three and a half hours to get from dover to eurodisney,I wish we could have the raised speed limits on our motorways that france have !!

We experienced the same loss of gears on our old mk1 tdi last year,the selector bolt had sheared and it then smashed through the bottom of the gearbox !,I did manage to repair the box myself,the gearbox did not have to be removed,it was a case of supporting the gearbox by wooden blocks and a jack,removing the battery and the battery shelf (which is part of the engie/box mounting hence the box needs to be held up)I could then gain access (just !) to the selector assembly where it bolts to the top of the gearbox,remove the selector assy and replace the sheared bolt which cost literally pennies !,I reasembled the selector,put everything back together and luckily the cover that sits under the engine had caught the smashed piece of gearbox casing which i managed to plug back in the hole and patch (bodge !) up whith chemical metal putty,the other part of the sheared bolt luckily had dropped down into the gearbox and was stuck to the magnetic gearbox oil drain plug !re- filled with the correct oil,road test and to this day still works perfectly and does not leak,also worth mentioning that the gearstick in the car was really sloppy feeling before the bolt sheared,once the box was fixed the gearstick was solid and as it should have been,obviously the bolt had been working its way loose for some time.

when our 2004 115 bhp tdi had its aircon compressor renewed under warranty last month I enquired about the cam belt change and was told it is renewed every 40000 miles and the dealer printed off an estimate for me and the final price would be

have you checked that the gear linkage cables are still in place on the gear selector?they can "pop" out of their sockets (you will find 2 cables attached ,look under the bonnet under the battery),how did the gears "feel" before this happened,did you have problems selecting gears or did the gear lever feel as if there was a lot of play ?

Thanks for all the replies so far....will keep to the speed limits.....the galaxy has the dvd screens installed so should stop the "are we nearly there yet" questions from the grown ups !!!........kids will be busy map reading.....!!!

hi all,we are off to eurodisney 30th march,driving there with four adults and three kids aged 6,6 and 4,staying in the hotel cheyenne in the park for a four night stay,dover calais crossing,I would be grateful to read anyones comments who've been there on what you thought....?the route from calais to disney....well signed....?any tips for when at the attractions...?will I be sane enough to drive back home at the end of the holiday...!!!!.cheers.

I've just taken a look at your photo's and when you enlarge the right hand picture you can actually see the little imprints that have been left in the paint that the mole grips or pliers they've used to bend the sills "straight" again !!!."muppets"

I would guess that it will be anti roll bar links,our car had the same knocking noises,just had ours replaced under warranty,o4 tdi and only 26500 miles.

We had trouble selecting a couple of gears on our old mk1 tdi,the gearlever was also very slack and sloppy feeling in general,turned out it was the gear selector shaft bolt inside the gearbox that had been working its way loose until it finally made contact with a gear and promptly got smashed out of the bottom of the gearbox....! I did manage to repair the damage myself without removing the gearbox thanks to some sound advice I found on this forum...I hope this is not the symptoms that your car is showing because it was a pig of a job !good luck.

Well I have to say I'm impressed with the dealer so far,it turns out that the air con system contained enough gas to run the system and after carrying out the neccesary tests our gal's compressor/pump is faulty,now just waiting for the go ahead from ford for the replacement pump on warranty,...fingers crossed....so far so good !!

Thanks for the replies so far..I guess I shall see what tomorrow brings.....will report back with the outcome !!

Hi all our august 2004 registered galaxy tdi 115 is in at our nearest main dealers for them to look at the non functioning air con tommorrow(tues). In the conversation I had with the service manager when booking the car in,he said they would first do a vaccum test on the system to see if there is a leak within the system ,if so then any repairs will be under warranty,if there are no leaks found he then told me that the gas in the air con system only lasts a couple of years and then needs topping up or re gassing (quoted approx

Thanks for your reply Neil, I have been phoning around for prices of gearboxes and the cheapest is

out for a drive this afternoon and just slowing down upon entering a 30 mph zone and there is a bang from under the car and the gearstick keels over !!,oh great,I popped the bonnet and checked that the gear cable had not worked loose but all was well and it felt as though the gear selector was not attached to anything in the box.I managed (awkward) to manually select a gear by lifting the selector up and twisting it and got back in the car and started up.I had found third gear and managed to limp home (15 miles,interesting!).I did a search on this wonderful forum and decided that it was probably the selector bolt that has sheared inside the box---great!!,so I started to have a look at the car and noticed that the underside of the car and engine under tray is covered in oil !,I removed the under tray and the bad news is that it is a sheared selector bolt----,the even badder news!! ---I can retrieve the sheared sodding bolt through nice little hole its punched through the gearbox casing.!!I just wish I stayed at home.I am thinking about repairing the box as the bolt is out and I believe I may be able to get the hole welded up but I would appreciate any help about how to remove the gear selector off the box without removing the gearbox if its possible ?or if anyone has had to have a gearbox replaced on a mk1 tdi gal what sort of money is involved,thanks in advance.

the amp is situated inside the centre console hidden from view but if you remove the plastic tray that slots into the dash directly below the head unit you will find it !

2000 mk1 tdi ghia,130k, still original clutch.

evening all,I have recently fitted new wipers on the front(correct bendy expensive ones !!) and even when there is heavy rain the wipers seem to drag across the screen and also judder,I was wondering if this could be a sign that the wiper linkage is about to sieze although the motor appears to be working as it should,anyone else had juddery wipers ? thanks !!

the nearside rear door and rear panel speakers did not work in our 2000 tdi ghia,upon investigation I found that there were 4 broken wires in the door to pillar wiring harness,I repaired these but the speakers still didnt work and would make a crackling noise every time the radio was switched on or off,the dash also started to smoke and smell of burning :D to cut a very long story short I found that the amplifier had suffered a partial burn,I replaced it with a second hand one out of a mk1 mondeo ghia x and hey presto fully functioning stereo system.I had one hell of a job to find a second hand amp as they are only fitted in ghia models and didnt fancy paying

Ive just filled our mk1 110 tdi up today,it had done 587 miles on a tank full and by my calculations had returned just a fraction below 42 mpg,again this was a mixture of mway/town driving,I thought it was good for the size of the car.

I had the same problem with water in the footwell,I did remove the carpet from the front,it wasnt too difficult,sill cappings , centre console ,handbrake cover to remove and I also had to remove the sound proofing matting as well,a hell of a job!!!,in the end I ended up cutting the matting along the transmission tunnel and up high against the bulkhead,it took a week to dry out !!.I thought our leak was coming in through that small plastic corner windscreen scuttle panel as the mastic had dried up and water was entering through it when I put the hosepipe over it.I resealed it ,thought job well done and left it overnight.downpour overnight and went to check the footwell in morning,guess what?, flooded passenger compartment again !!! :blink: I then found our water leak within 5 mins!,removed the little dash panel by front quarter light glass,prized out the little grommets on the screen pillar ,removed the screws and the trim panel pulled away,the wife sprayed the hosepipe over the screen and there was a stream of water flowing down the side of the pillar,running behind the dash and gathering in a nice little lake in the footwell :blink: only when the windscreen was replaced I could see how bad the factory bonding of the screen had been,it was like braille B) our gal is now watertight and doesnt smell like a rotten cabbage anymore,remove your screen pillar trim on the passenger side and give the screen a spray,you never know !!! :lol:

well we do not want it to go up in smoke,its a great vehicle and since I have been reading the excellent topics on this forum ,our passenger side footwell swimming pool is fixed (new screen)and I found that the pollen filter was incorrectly fitted,our radio will remain without power until we can get it to an auto electrician,would love to know if anybody else has had similar audio/discharging battery probs. cheers.

hi, could anybody possibly shed any light on problems that have just developed on our mk 1 v reg TDI gal. It all started a couple of weeks ago when the speakers would crackle and bang when the ignition was either switched on or off, the radio stiil appeared to be working ok however last sunday after having left the doors open to clean the car out the battery went flat and we had to jump start it. It has since flatened the battery again,so I removed the radio fuse which cured the speaker crackling and the battery stayed charged, today I decided to take a look to see if I could trace the problem and this is what I found:- Broken wires in near side rear door loom, I repaired the wiring, reconnected the radio and found the speakers still crackled I also noticed both near side rear speakers do not have sound and a couple of hours ago whilst driving I could smell burning and noticed smoke coming from behind the radio. I removed the radio and found that the amplifier was red hot. Im sure this problem is linked to the audio system as the battery did not go flat while the radio fuse was removed, any ideas???