Transmission Nightmare

Pictures by Graham Jackson and Witt Sparks

Originally published in Land Rover Monthly No 75 Oct 2004

"Stuck in Dakhla, looking for a tranny"

 That was the title of my post on the Sahara Overland forum. No, I didn’t need a transvestite for my Land Rover, though some on the web seemed to think so. Actually I needed a new R380 gearbox for my Defender 110.

This is how it happened:

My wife and I and two friends, built a pair of 110s with the intention of driving overland from England to South Africa. That in itself is not unusual,- except that we live in Colorado in the USA. By the time it left Colorado for the UK, my 110 had 16,000 km on the clock, and had started grinding going into fourth gear. I thought nothing of it, having owned a D90 that spent three years grinding into second. I began to pay attention in Morocco, when crossing the Atlas, third began to grind. followed by fifth gear shortly thereafter. A check of the oil level revealed adequate fluid.

We pushed on south towards the Mauritanian border taking the barren coastal route. At the second of many police checkpoints, I let off the accelerator to be greeted by a nasty grinding sound from the gearbox.  For the rest of the day the sound persisted, and I noticed that oil had started to leak from the bell housing and was coating the rear axle.

 We pulled into Laayoune that evening, and I immediately called Charlie Haigh at the Land Rover Flatirons dealership in Colorado. Charlie is a wizard with Land Rovers, and soon diagnosed my problem as a blown oil pump in the gearbox. Cheaper to replace the whole unit was his conclusion. Looking at the map, we where 500km Looking at the map, I noticed that both Laayoune and Dakhla had airports. Laayoune was 20km back up the road, while Dakhla was 500km further on our intended route. The Lonely Planet guide mentioned that Dakhla has a profusion of mechanics shops, and that tipped the scale for me. Before setting off we decided to drain and check the oil. Or rather, as it turned out, see how much oil was left in the metal. The ATF had a great metal sheen, and the drain plug looked like a monster fur ball coughed up by some huge metallic cat!

Bad focus on the metallic hairball

So we set off, stopping every couple of hours to let the transmission cool. I had this vain hope that banging on the back of the gearbox with a hammer might dislodge the blockage if something was blocking the intake or outlet from the oil pump. Of course I had no way to tell if this was the case, so I continued to believe that it was a great help, apart from the therapy of beating the dying lump with a hammer.

 The drive was long and hot and barren, its boredom only alleviated by the massive swarms of locusts that crossed the road at intervals and began to coat our car with a noxious yellow goo.

 I awoke the next day with the daunting task of finding a spare Land Rover transmission in the middle of a small town in the Saharan desert. I’m not sure how it happened, but one moment I’m walking along by myself, and the next I’m explaining my problem so this elderly gentleman who speaks very good English.

‘It is no problem!’ exclaims Aziz after hearing my story. ‘I take you to best Land Rover mechanic. He fix your problem in no time.’

 Now I should say that, I half expected someone of his friendly nature to come forth and “help.” I had been involved another friendly but ultimately fruitless search for a replacement spare tire Casablanca that started the same way. Already, I began to plan in my head how to deal with the inevitable tangle I would get led into. However, since I speak only rudimentary French and no Arabic his services as a translator were welcome. Aziz guided me to the shop of the best Land Rover mechanic in town. “He is the only one I trust with Land Rover,” he beamed.

 The shop consisted of a solitary unassuming door in the wall of a long row of buildings. Optimistically enough there was an old Series Land Rover sticking out of the door. The young mechanic came out wearing jeans so oil stained they were shiny. After a failed attempt to explained the problem to him, followed by his fruitless inspection of the axles, we were able to convince him to come along for a test drive so that I could demonstrate on the road. We jumped in and off we went. I took the truck through its paces showing him all of the interesting noises that I had been experiencing all through Morocco. The mechanic still looked unimpressed, so I pulled over and motioned for him to drive. That proved to be the unwise, as he proceeded to drive all over town, with his head stuck out of the window. All the while, he was looking down at the vehicle, oblivious to the other traffic, often swerving dangerously close to fellow motorists. It took all of my nerve to not throw him out the window into on-coming traffic.

 Miraculously, we got back to his shop unharmed. Upon arrival, he proceeded to go under the Defender and open up the back cover off the transfer case, despite my protests that the t-case was fine. I grabbed my overalls and pulled them on. By the time I got under the car, the t-case innards were exposed and the mechanic was prying on various gears with a screwdriver. He looked at me with shock and surprise as I slid next to him and looked into the t-case. I stabbed my finger into the t-case and said. “Pas de problem!” Then I tapped the gearbox. “Problem ici!” Again he poked around in the t-case, before finally relenting. “Problem ici!” he said and tapped the back of the R380 where it meets the t-case.

 “Finally,” I thought, “now we are getting somewhere.” The mechanic put the t-case back together while yelling at Aziz.

Not what you want to see coming out of the drain hole!

 I dug the service manual out of the back of the truck, and I showed Aziz the R380 page and explained what I wanted. He looked dubious again and it was back in the car to visit another mechanic. This one didn’t want to look at the car. He was much more impressed with the workshop manual which he clutched tightly while flipping through the pages. When Aziz asked if he had an R380 he shook his head and motioned to the North. “Agadir!” he exclaimed.

 Aziz came away with me and told me to meet him back at the hotel at three. Then he would have a gearbox for me. I agreed to meet him and went back to the internet café to check on the status of my online search. Things there were proceeding well: Ashcroft Transmissions in England had been contacted as well as Conrico, the official supplier of Land Rovers to much of the third world. My friend Nathan from Pangaea Expeditions was proceeding with typical American efficiency and speed. He had a called Conrico to find out the status of the warranty on my car, received pricing from a couple of different vendors for the replacement gearbox and was looking into shipping charges. My father had been in contact with LR Special Vehicles and they sent me the number of the main Land Rover distributor in Morocco. A quick phone call at the local teleboutique was less than useful. Yes, they could help me, the lady told me, if I would just bring my car into their main garage in Casablanca over a thousand miles to the north.When asked if they had an R380 they could ship to me, the response was “If you bring your car to our garage in Casablanca we will see if that is the part you need.”

 On the way back to see Aziz, I ran into Witt, our traveling partner who had ran another local repair shop. The mechanic looked at my car and rattled off some questions in French. Suddenly Aziz appeared and engaged the mechanic in a rapid-fire conversation of Arabic. Aziz turned and translated to me “He wants to buy Land Rover parts from you.” Splendid, I thought. They know the transmission is bad and now they want the rest!

 Our next stop was at another street filled with decrepit buildings. Aziz stopped in the middle of the street, turned to me and said, “Maybe we can fix your transmission?”

 “Er, no,” I said, “I need a new one.”

 “Shush!!! Not so loud!” exclaimed Aziz and told me to stay put. He wandered down the street, returning minutes later with an elderly gentleman who he did not introduce. He explained cryptically that this man worked for the military and could “fix anything.” The guy looked under my car and shook his head. There was much heated negotiating in Arabic before Aziz smiled to me. “He will fix your car, and all work is guaranteed! He can start right now. Only fifteen hundred euros!” Aziz drew the figure in the sand at my feet in case I didn’t catch it.

 Disbelieving this high sum, I managed to make an excuse about having to check on a transmission in England at the internet café, and escaped none the poorer. Now, 1500 euros may be a fair price for a reconditioned or new R380 in the Western Sahara, but for a rebuild on mine with no replacement parts in sight seemed a bit ludicrous to me.

 The next morning, Aziz intercepted me on the way to the internet café, and asked me to go with him to another garage. We agreed on a meeting time, and I went off to check my email. Word was that ROW (rest of the world) Land Rovers came from the factory with a paltry 1-year, 12000km warranty. Ashcroft had a transmission, but couldn’t ship until Friday, and was still waiting for a shipping quote.

 A variety of suggestions trickled in on the overland forum, ranging in usefulness from helpful-contacting the Land Rover parts supplier in Gibraltar, to useless- the obligatory “go buy a Land Cruiser” I sent Nathan my credit card info and told him to order me a transmission as soon as possible from Ashcroft. I then went with Aziz to meet up with yet another mechanic.

 This new mechanic was a surly fellow, who stood proudly in his garage with one foot propped on a rusty LT77 and transfer case. Aziz smiled at me and pointed at the LT77. “Cinq vitesse!” he exclaimed proudly, “He can put it in your car today!”

I looked closer at the pile in the garage floor and groaned. It was obvious from the thick dust surrounding it that the transmission had sat there an impressively long amount of time. The bell housing and input shaft were for something other than a 300tdi, and it was unclear whether the bell housing from my R380 would fit. Aziz and the mechanic were hashing out the details at an alarming pace, and I was sure that my oil was about to be drained again. “How much?” I asked.

They conferred again. “Seven hundred fifty euros,” Aziz told me.

 Again I made the excuse of having to check on a transmission in England and they both looked disappointed.

Looking weirdly happy . . .

 Back at the internet café, I heard back from the outfit in Gibraltar. They did not have any R380s, and their understanding was that Land Rover was back ordered as well. More surprisingly there was no word from Nathan on the Ashcroft situation. Being late in the day on Tuesday, I decided to give Nathan a call on the sat phone. This confirmed that he was still waiting to hear from Ashcroft, and, more importantly, had sourced another R380 at LEGS in Shropshire, England complete with a shipping quote.

 I called LEGS and got the transmission ordered. The price? Five hundred pounds (about $900 US) plus shipping for a completely rebuilt R-380 with a longer warrantee than my Land Rover had new from the factory.

 Wednesday’s pilgrimage to the internet café was greeted with bad news from LEGS. Seems Dakhla is in disputed territory, and the airport cannot receive international shipments. The closest airport it can be sent to is Laayoune 500km back the way we came! The good news was that it should be in the following Monday, 7:30am in the morning through Royal Air Maroc.

Luckily, we made it back up to Laayoune and arrived at the airport at the prescribed time. No one was there. We found the Royal Air Maroc office, but in classic African fashion, it was completely empty. A nearby arrivals screen showed no flights scheduled to arrive until later that night.

 We returned back to the airport 7pm that night. I found a man at the Royal Air Maroc air cargo office, but no package. He would let me know when they found it. At about 8pm he showed up with papers in hand and asked me if I was expecting a transmission. “Yes!” I exclaimed.

He looked at me sadly. “You must come back tomorrow.” The customs office closed for the day five minutes before the flight came in. I left the airport fuming impotently at yet another delay.

 The next morning we were back at the airport, but unfortunately the Air Maroc agent wasn’t. So we sat at the airport shop patiently and drank coffee.

 As soon as the Air Maroc agent arrived, he escorted us over to the customs office. There I met two customs agents. Neither of them seemed inclined to work, and they suggested waiting for the customs chief to arrive. Half an hour later, the customs chief finally appeared. After a bit of paperwork, we wandered outside to the warehouse. There behind a pair of locked doors, tucked into a dusty corner behind a number of other shipments was a small wooden crate from LEGS with my name on it. I stood there excitedly, like a kid at Christmas as the customs agent ripped into the crate. Inside was my beautiful new R380- the only thing standing between us and continuing our trip now was a simple installation…or so I thought.

 The agent began taking down all the numbers and markings on the gearbox and on the crate, before grunting and heading for the door. We all exited the warehouse leaving the new gearbox behind. I was told to wait at back at the coffee shop.

 Half an hour later, I was called back into the customs office. After extensive negotiations, we arrived at an import duty fee of 228 dirhams, or about $25 US. Resigned, I pulled out my wallet to pay, but the chief shook his head and told me to follow him out of the terminal. Instead of going to the warehouse, we had to go with the chief and drive to another customs building. This building looked very official, and I deduced through my limited French interpretation of sign in front was the main customs office.

 Here, I was ushered into four separate offices, where a series of papers were produced, stamped and scrawled upon. Finally I paid the duties and was given a piece of paper with 12 stamps on it. I was then told, anticlimactically that I could go and get the gearbox.

 With the papers in hand, we were ready to go back to the customs office at the airport. The airport customs agent had by now disappeared, meaning we had no ride back to the airport. We took a taxi back to the airport, driving though a major sandstorm had suddenly blown in from the desert.

Back at the airport, I went to the Royal Air Maroc office and showed the paper with 12 stamps. This was impressive enough to the agents that they saw fit to charge me another 244 dirhams for freight, despite the fact that I had already paid for shipping in England.

 Finally, after 10 days of waiting, we were able to pull up to the warehouse and load the crate from LEGS into the Rover. Because of the sandstorm we couldn’t install the gearbox that day. The following day, at local overland travelers campsite, we pulled the offending R380 out of my Defender and replaced it with the new one, fishing some significant chunks of metal out of the old gearbox, attesting to its ill health.

 To top off this tale of woe, the shipping charge to send the old gearbox back to LEGS in the UK was more than the core charge, so I left the old gearbox in Morocco. Admittedly, despite being a lifelong Solihull fan, this whole experience tested my faith somewhat. For my next overland trip, I think I have to listen to those Land Cruisers fans after all.