Hi, My second post as I put my first one in the wrong place.Shows I'm a newby, I'm working on my sons mk4 1.25 1999 Fiesta. As the repairs done by a garage would cost about twice what the car is worth I've voluntered to do the jobs. Some suspension work was required and on his way to bringing the car to me for repair the clutch slave cylinder went. I'm working my way through Haynes to do the job. I'm changing the springs and I'm dropping the whole suspension out as one with the drive shafts. Neareside (left) is out and the off side (right) has all bolts etc. removed ready to go. The Haynes says to use a drift from the left side of gear box to knock it out. Looking in the hole I can see a whiteish looking bar across the middle of the gear box and I can see a small amont of the right side drive shaft above and below ther bar. Is this the right approach? It looks a doggy way to the job with a high risk of causing damage. Any advice please. Also the manual says to remove the nearside engine mounting bolts and the rear mounting link but doesn't mention the offside engine mounting bolt. Doing this the engine/transmission will drop down at an angle towards the nearside. Again is the the right way to do it? And one more thing, the exhaust drop pipe to intermediate pipe are a pig to undo without a power tool. I've disconnected the intermediate pipe support so as to allow movement. Will this do or will I run the risk of craking the pipe. Many thnaks in anticipation of receiving some help. Get the front done them I can move on to the rear!

 

yeah undo the engine mount above the gearbox and at the rear of the gearbox with a trolley jack with a soft thing (wood, jack rubber) betweet the jack and sump to take strain a bit . slowly let it down at n/s to give you enough room to remove gearbox,
as for driveshaft, probably better to lever it out but you sorta decided that anyway , dont fancy smacking a drift through a gearbox,
did the car fail mot on exhaust , why you removing it?
good luck and have fun

 

Hi, Thanks. I've learnt over the years to be wary about what the manuals tell you to do. I'm only looking at disconnecting the exhaust pipes because Haynes says do it and it seemed unnecesary to me. I've just taken it off the middle hanger to give it more freedom. Thanks for confirming it's just the left side and rear link mountings that come off. Just another question, if I may, Haynes says put jack under engine, which I've already done as I've removed the rear mounting link bolt, and put a trolley jack under the gearbox. Like most people I only have one trolley jack and have reserved this for the gearbox with a bottle jack under the sump with a block of wood between. Do I really need the trolley jack on the gearbox or could two people man handle it out ok? I'd feel happier with the more substantial jack under the engine. Thanks again for your time and trouble.

 

hey no trouble at all and yeah haynes is good for fiddly bits but tbh you have prob learnt more just cracking on ,
if you want put an axle stand or couple of bricks with wood in between under the engine , or tbh even when you undo the gearbox bell housing bolts it wont just fall off
the fiesta gearbox is relativly light compared to some so yeah two people could easily wiggle it off and on again, and if your doing the slave cylinder are you changing whole clutch, be worth doing whole job