EML, Loss of Power, then gears go whack!

Hi Guys,

Sorry for posting again! I'm sick of having these problems.

Anyhow, I was coming back down to Uni today from Durham -> Leeds, coming onto the motorway slip road, my car suddenly gave me an EML when I changed to 5th after being at 3-4K revs in 4th, and started pushing the gas, about 2K revs and I get an EML, beeps, and engine refuses to accelerate, I pull over immediatly (giving the guy behind me a bit of a shock when i hit my hazards!), and checked my engine bay, everything seemed fine, blah blah, i'd already checked all this prior to getting into the car to journey.

I thought nothing of it and continued driving.

After about 60 miles I come off the A1 and go towards the A64 towards leeds, I dropped from 5th to third, then out again to head to second, As i came out of third, my gears, which are usually VERY stiff and VERY hard to disengage / engage, suddenly loosened up massively, when trying to get into second, It was clunky but it went in, I never needed to go into anything lower than second until I hit the Seacroft Roundabout and my gears wouldnt go into first, but I persisted and pushed it in, once in, I tried getting it out again before moving, knowing that I couldnt get it out, I smashed my hazards on and pulled the gear out, I heard a 'clunk' noise as if something had fallen in the gear box, or something, possibly a nut / bolt, or just something metal that made a clunk twice, my gears then loosened up completely and it was very loose all the way back to my Halls, Gears were fine, but very loose, I got into 1 - 5 no problem, and reverse was the usual, wait until you engage.

I'm rather worried about the EML and the Gears, could they be related? I called my mechanic and he said I should use the car minimal this week, and get the RAC who i'm covered with to take a look on Wednesday and possibly get them to tow me back up north to get to my garage; sounding like it was a throttle sensor for the EML, then possibly a cable or something for the gears, possibly even the fluid needing changing.

I did notice however, on the passenger side, I held my hand near the base of the gear stick and it was warm, i've never noticed this before, so maybe I'm being over paranoid.

few things to note.

I had a radiator changed over the weekend, - unrelated i'm sure!
Car is a 1.4i Petrol C3 52 reg'

I've never had any issues like this before, usually the first gear has been hard to get in, and felt like there was a block, it no longer feels this way, it was if something was stuck there, and I've shifted it, but that can't be good.

Any help is appreciated.

Kind Regards,
Chris.

Whoops, looks like the wrong place for the Thread, can this be moved to Petrol?

Anyhow, I started the engine backup tonight in the cold, hoping that whatever the problem was, would magically dissapear, the gears are still loose, there's no leaks underneath (to eliminate any gear fluid running away), infact, the car sounded very healthy, got into gears easy, reversed fine, no jittering, honestly, feels like it's a better car, however...

I'm still concerned what has happened to make the gears like this; things just don't happen, and especially after 6 months of driving it, i've once noticed them go loose before but not as loose as this, it soon stiffened back up, this was when the car was warm one day and everything was a little bit easier, I just thought it was some gloopy fluid and never got around to replacing it.

And also, EML, how will I know if this is going to be a problem, and not just some one off, could it be related to the issue above? I'm convinced it's a one-off, and unrelated to the gears, I'm also convinced my car is going to have the worst 10K of it's life to get away from 130k

Thanks,
Chris.

How long have you had this car? I bit of history could help, things like if the gears have always been stiff, have they got worse?

With your gearbox, I'm pretty sure nothing has fallen off within the gears, you'd know about this because there would be major noise and the car would not go.

When the gears are stiff what happens when the car is stationary and you engage first gear? I'm wondering if this could be a clutch problem rather than the gearbox.

With the warning light and loss of power, hooking up to diagnostics might be a way forward, if there's a problem code stored it could save a lot of investigation.

Being nosy now, which halls are you in. My daughter is at Oxley and hoping to take her C3 in a few weeks.

Something else I meant to ask, does the biting point of the clutch change?

Since yesterday the gears are just loose, gears engage fine, there's a bit of a hold before I can get into gear, as if it's a more precise maneuver to get into it, sometimes I had to push through, and that similar exists now.

Car functions fine, clutch point has not moved.

I've read about the eml issue and it's pointed to a ignition coil as standard but then it turns out to be the sensor for that, noting that the light came one and went off. It's not illuminated at the moment and there's nothing on my dash. Fluke?

I'm at Leeds met and at kirkstall brewery

Thanks for the reply hope to get an idea of thus before it heads to the garage, or to give them some guidance to what ice researched.

Edit,
Car has been mine since Feb 13, gears were always stiff and uses to loosen a small amount now and again on short journeys or when it was warm, however they used to stiffen on motorways coming off as being in the same gear for ages, maybe that's just me.
They hadn't got worse, but first was usually difficult to get in, like there was something blocking me. In my head I have an image of a gate being over the 1stgear.

I could get throughh fine, though.
I noticed that my reverse hear wouldn't ways go in, it would get in, but it would just grind when coming off the clutch, as if it want engaged properly. It sometimes took a double clutch or out of gear and wait a few seconds before re engaging reverse.

Thanks,

So anyhow, I've drove it around for about 20+ miles, brought it to 60, had some low-revs in each gear, everything sounds fine, nothing out of the ordinary.

Now that I'm driving with it like this, I'm preferring it (I can just slide in and out of gears rather than gripping and pushing), however, It feels like it's going into gears really easially, like, as if there's no lubrication for it, it just feels dry, and mechanical... if you get what I mean, should I be able to feel some sort of lubrication for the gears? I never noticed before hand because it was stiff anyhow. And I've never drove a car without stiff gears, apart from my test car, which had the gear box mounted halfway up the center console and was a brand new car, really smooth in and out.

Thanks Again,
Chris.