oh dear , i had similar issues, however, yesterday i fitted the clutch master cylinder brace rod, in the cab , cost of it £25 all in , and to fit it , was'nt as hard as i'd imagined, heres how ,
1.oped driver door if its rhd as mine is, ,2 .kneel down and shove your head under the footwell where the pedal box assembly is , there you will see to the left of the clutch pedal a steel wall, which is where the master clutch cylinder is bolted to , bare in mind that the lugs x 2 on that cylinder, are welded nuts, so look on the other side of that nut or both , and you will see a smaller headed bolt, 10mm to be precise, ( the cooldog clutch master cylinder brace rod comes with two brass nuts and one headed bolt, by the way ) and the rod , and the rod has two loops one either end of that rod, which have a hole in , 3. ratchet , and 10mm 6 point hex socket , undo the bottom bolyt which goes thru the bottm welded nut , and remove the bolt, replace it with the bolt from the cooldog kit, hold the rod brace end up until the hole lines up with the hole on that bottom welded nut yeah , then put the bolt through and put one of the brass nuts on to the bolt thread once the rod end loop is over that shaft of the threaded bolt, ok, and tighten the brass nut finger tight , then the other end will push over the protruding bolt on the bottom right hand side of the pedal assembly plate , and no you dont remove the nut from that bracket ie the plate where your pedals fit to, no, what you do , is you offer the loop end of the rod bracket to that bolt thread and put it over it ,and then you add the second brass nut , and tighten it, and then you tighten the other brass nut , and then , after doing that , your gears should go in to position and not be sloppy joe slumpford , and yes it does work , , now also if you have any sense, open the bonnet look at the gear linkage on top of the gear housing in the engine bay ( so on the right of the engine when stood in front of the van) and there is a bracket where one gear cable goes to , or arm, or lever , depending what you call it , which movers forward and back , and should have minimal sideways movement, now a known flaw for that section, is this, the bush or rubber donut that fits inside the hole where there is a 14mm headed pivot bolt that passes through that hole , if your van has like over 100k on the clock ,that bush is most likely mullered, or so worn out the sideways movement = sloppy gear lever selecting problems, - and here is a massive light bulb for you all, i had the gear stick shear off from the bracket it attaches to behind the dash , bought a replacement one with gear stick , took the old one out , and on that housing bracket there are some fairly chunky bushes, and hey freakin ho, those bushes fit 1. inside the metal eye loop end of the yellow marked gear cable end loop in the cab which goes on to the pivot arm that your gear stick is attached to , and the spare one also fits the translator lever arm on the top of the gear housing in the engine bay , so i will remove that bolt from that arm i the engine bay , and replace the bush with the bush from the gear selector box housing , and then no need to buy febi or any other to sort out the sideways slop, does the rod brace work ? yes definitely does, do the bushes fit ? yes definitely do, does that fix the gear issues ? well it has on my maxus yes, and mine is a short wheel base lowe roof 2006 maxus , and yes it works , as does the fix, but i will also replace the detent springs as well, before i replace any of the gear cables, oh and also so you know, the arm pivot pin on the gearstick side of the van in the cab behind the dash , has a brass sleeve on it , and they wear out and the r clip that passes through the hole on that pin , can work loose, so i removed the brass sleeve , took the bracket housing the busted gear stick lever and the rest of it , to an Independent firm, and they made a new brass sleeve £30 , and yes it is a mega snug fit on that pin on the replacement unit , plus i added a new r clip , from machinemart , and yes i bought the febi bushes, and no they do not fit either of the problem areas, and as for the gear cables yeah so they dont cost £105 each , you can buy them from alibaba site and the cost even with shipping is no where near to the used stretched rip off prices for used stretched gear cables you see on idiot bay uk, lesson learnt yet ?
Tim Fletch
April 2026
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