Tha Original i30 Owners Club
GOT PROBLEMS OR ISSUES? => DIESEL => Topic started by: Bazzerz on October 31, 2025, 07:56:42
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Hi!
I really hope someone with great experience can help me out with your knowledge and experience about my issue.
I bought a used Hyundai i30 CRDi 2013 year model a few months back from a car dealer with 130.000km on it. From what I remember the gears went smooth (easy to move the gear stick) but the clutch engagement point was very very low to the floor.
A mechanic said that the clutch needed to be changed, but they also said that the gearbox was leaking oil from several spots so they needed to change that to.
They changed both the gearbox and the clutch.
When I got the car back I immediately noticed that it was quite hard to engage first gear, I needed to push the gear stick quite rough to get it into gear, the mechanic said it was because of the newly installed second hand gear box (it had 140.000km on it). It was also quite hard to engage reverse and even harder to get it out from reverse to neutral position. Immediately after a 30 minute drive the gearbox started to grind while trying to go into reverse while parking.
They then tried to bleed the clutch system several times without success to solve this issue. They also changed both the main and slave cylinder without improvement to the problem. The mechanic then tried another gearbox (with 110.000km on it) which apparently also had the same grinding problem but with the third gear instead of the reverse.
After that they decided to install a fully renovated gear box, and now no gears are grinding but its still hard to engage first gear (and also hard putting it out from reverse to neutral) more or less exactly in the same way as with the first second hand gear box they tried and now when it has gotten colder outside there is also hard to engage second and sometimes third gear also when the car is cold, or at least the speed of the car and rpm of the engine needs to be very very precise for the gear to lock in smoothly and I have also noticed that the gear stick judders for a fraction of a second while going into third and sometimes fourth gear, but that judder symptom disappear very fast while driving for only a few minutes.
The clutch is engaging more in the middle now it feels than with the old one, but I still have a feeling that the clutch isn't disengaging properly, if the car is standing still with the engine started and the clutch pedal all the way down I can only put the gear stick to first gear position (with a little force though, the amount varies) and any other position is impossible and there's quite some vibrations in the gear stick while moving it sideways.
Can this really be normal?
I have at least never drove a car before where you can't move the stick freely between gears while standing still while the clutch pedal is all the way down with engine on, or is this normal with this specific model?
I also want to mention that the gear stick moves freely to all positions if the engine is turned off.
The mechanic says that all this is because of the design of the gearbox, but all went smooth with the first gearbox and the old clutch so I dont understand their opinion about it, if this was something about design, shouldn't the first gearbox also have had the same symptoms with hard to engage gears?
I forgot to mention that they also removed the clutch damper valve which some people has suggested to fix some clutch issues.
This message went very long, I hope anyone takes time to read through and has some insight of this problem or similar experiences to share with potential solutions, I would feel very grateful for that.
Thank you!
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I have a 2015 1.6 CRDi, with 195,000 km. The clutch on my car has a concentric slave cylinder, and the only problem I've experienced is where the clip holding the hydraulic fluid hose is loose, allowing fluid to leak out. This is obvious as a pool of fluid builds up on the engine undertray, also the fluid level drops.
I also had a 2011 1.6 CRDi which is earlier model but with same engine and similar gearbox. The slave cylinder is external, and around 350,000 km the gears became difficult to engage as you have described. I also removed the damper on the master cylinder which made a slight difference, but not for very long. I had the clutch replaced, which was very worn, and the release bearing had worn out which prevented full movement of the clutch, so the clutch wasn't disengaging fully. If you had a new clutch fitted then the bearing should have been replaced at the same time.
I made a YouTube video to show the condition of the clutch.
:link: - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFg5K1vsSGw&t=2s)
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I may be missing something, but why did they change the gearbox? The gearbox only has the input shaft and driveshaft output seals to leak from on these I believe.
It's as simple as this, they've fitted a knackered untested gearbox with new clutch.