I came up with a different solution.

I pulled all the plastic off. Trimmed down the four internal mounts with a sharp chisel and made this reacenent.

It's 2mm kangaroo leather wrapped around a piece of scrap wood, cut and sanded to size. 1mm smaller than the appeture

It's a sung fit fixed with an all purpose glue
https://www.freel2.com/gallery/albums/user...Render.jpg

As I have the lacking lock problem with the unlock button stuck in the unlock position, I wanted to know how to fix and avoid the 100 EUR plus investment.

So I left the knob in position but put the gear in D.
I managed to get the unlock button out. It hinges on the top and that's where you need to insert something to get it out. I used the normal tool to remove interior parts.
I found the spring broken and removed it.
Also I removed the white part which transfers tHe move movement of the unlock button to the vertical nylon rod that goes down the inside of the gear lever.

As I do not have a new spring. I used a rubber ring about 15 mm in diameter and 6 mm wide. A short piece of a rubber tube would do.
I fixed that in the gear knob with a tie wrap (how do you spell that?). Have a look at my lousy drawings
In order to do that I pried of the silver thing on the back of the knob, by starting from the bottom.

It is a bit hard to see how the original spring was fitted but I figured out that the two ends at stuck in two horizontal holes in the top of the knob..

As you might notice I did not have to remove the knob.
So I put all together and... It worked partly. I could now no longer move it from P (ignition on and brakes on).
However with the engine running and no brakes (I had the handbrake on) I could still move it from R to N to D and back.

Is that normal?
I have taken sum pics but I do not know how to present them in the correct order. So have a look.

































Last edited by Jaaph on 7th Jun 2015 6:50 am. Edited 2 times in total

I left the silver thing off for the moment as the tie rap prevents it from fitting. I can remove some clips and Then it will fit.

I just fit a new knob on the wife's new to her LR2. Thanks to the forum, removal was a snap. Installation wasn't really reverse of installation however. You have to pull up the tip of the boot around the base of new knob, fix it near the top with the little tie strap that came with the new knob, then you can get the lock ring back up into position and locked on. I just ponied up for the new knob from dealer. Was $80 Canadian, not TOO bad. I'll maybe refurbish the original one just incase the new one fails down the road. Update. Seems I spoke too soon. All back together, but the button doesn't really push much, and you can still move the gear shifter without pushing the button. Any idea what's up?

Mine was replaced free of charge & it was not even broken, the dealer said it was a design fault & they wanted to replace it before it breaks & I get stuck somewhere. They were actually trying to do the job without me knowing (while fixing something else) but they damaged the wires to the park/reverse/drive LEDs. I had to take the car back a few weeks later again once the got the other part they broke from UK.

I did have a go at them saying if something needs replacing just let me know. They did fix everything properly. Procrastination, mankind's greatest labour saving device!

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Bushx wrote:

Snip.... Seems I spoke too soon. All back together, but the button doesn't really push much, and you can still move the gear shifter without pushing the button. Any idea what's up?

The gear knob on my auto '57 plate HSE was suffering from this problem. I contacted some spring manufacturers none of whom had something comparable "off the shelf" the cheapest of which wanted £145 to manufacture between one and 50 springs. Whilst this might have been a way forward, I wanted a cheaper, quicker solution.

I saw a suggestion on a South African Land Rover forum that the spring from a household downlighter fitting had a similar style of torsion spring so a quick trip to tool station produced a suitable fitting for £2.34 (part number 80494 mains voltage R50 downlighter)





The spring has very similar dimensions (taken from the schematic higher up this thread) however the "beak" ( centre ) of the spring needs to be bent back through the longer legs until the angle is similar to that shown in my cut spring pic ( although it is best to do this before cutting the legs off)







The longer legs then need to be cut at about 17mm from the coiled centre - conveniently this is at the point where there is a bend in the long leg . See pic of complete spring vs cut legs.




The spring then needs to be inserted into the gearknob in the place of the original ( I won't cover the removal / refitting of the knob here as that is covered elsewhere, suffice to say that it is important that the spring fits into the two small holes in the top of the knob underneath the sockets that house the locking button. Long nose pliers are great for this.



The white lever needs to be tilted right forward whilst the locking button is reinstalled ( I used a pencil pushed up into the Gearknob from below) see pic of spring installed before button replaced. In this pic the white lever is behind the spring , however it needs to be in front



Lastly, you need to hold the button in as you reinstall it on the gearstick this allows the small white lever to locate on the white inner shaft on the gearstick.

Not sure of the longevity of this fix as only installed mine this afternoon, but you do get 2 springs for your £2.34 outlay so you can have a second go if necessary !

Hope this helps !

dscholey wrote:

dealer quoted me £60 for a new knob, cos they don't do the spring as a spare part. so recyled a coil spring and made my own. works a treat again.

Top work Lr_defender - I've had the same issue and never noticed it was a problem until I knocked it out of Drive!

A trip to Toolstation and £2.34 later it's all resolved and working perfectly!

If anyone needs a spring, I have the spare from the downlighter I bought, it will need modifying but will save everyone the hunting!

i guys, as I was parking today the button stopped working. I have to order the spring, but I Need to know if I can still drive couple of days without causing damages to the car.

Thanks !

solved! all you Need is some Inspiration a this tutorial!

developed the fault over night, making it difficult to pull out of park and select drive so a quick trip to tool station and in about 1 hour later was all good again. Thank you all for the good information
One tip I can offer is,when you have pushed the knob back onto the lever, prise up the gear chrome surround with your fingers (held in with clips ) to enable you to slide the lock collar back up and twist lock

Hi all first of all a great write up about the spring


My question is this is it an easy fix as I'm crap with fixing things and our spring has snapped

Yes it's really easy just make sure you don't smack yourself in the face pulling the top part off.

10 minutes to swap it no need to pull hard just release the white plastic clip

Get some 1mm stainless steel mig wire thats what I used on mine Lee

Welshman ​living in England
2011 SD4 HSE auto
2004 1.3cdti Corsa Energy