1st gear overrun whine, help!
 

I have had this problem since i bought my scooby, been meaning to ask you lot for a while. My gearbox runs perfectly in every gear, with no problems selecting gear or whines, untill you come to be in first with no throttle. If the car is moving and you shift into first or take your foot off the accelerator in gear, it makes a sound like its in reverse, with or without the clutch depressed. Its relative to the cars speed, it doesnt make a peep if the car is stationary or pulling away. I cant understand it, can anyone think what the proplem could be? Nows the time to sort it, ive got the engine out atm!

My blob does it and has done for the last 23k in pretty much every gear, I have used the car in a couple of sprints and launched it on the drag strip, as well as driving it reasonably hard on track and it's still going.

Some say it's the thrust bearing but I'll wait till my clutch gives up before changing anything.

To be honest you shouldnt be putting it down into first.

My Blob does that was well. Bob Rawle said it was nothing to worry about.
I was concerned because my classic doesnt do it

Im not downshifting into first to rag it, portsmouth traffic is appauling, you see everyones slow moving ahead and go right down to crawling, put it in first and you can suddenly hear a reverse like sound that gets higher pitched as you slot it into gear and the syncromesh matches the shaft speeds. Shuts up with any throttle, comes back when theres none. I scrapped my block today after i found a multitude of damage, including pretty serious crankwalk, you could see scrape marks past the oil pickup where the counterweights had been rubbing. Could this have contributed?

My commiserations...

Had this problem on my '01 Bugeye 5-speed at c100k miles.
I'd regularly ease slowly out of my drive onto short sloping downhill section, coast along still in 1st and: whine, whine, whine.

It drove me mad. So when I had my engine rebuild it seemed like a good idea to rebuild the gearbox, beef up the synchro and fix the blasted, irritating gearbox whine.

Engine done, gearbox rebuilt, all back in, guess what? Whine, whine, whine.

After 4 further 'box out/strip/bearings change/rebuild/re-install' cycles and plenty of head scratching, cursing, sweating and swearing we binned the box, got a replacement box from a breakers, rebuilt it and, hey presto: no 1st gear whine.

The 'box builder was an experienced chap who knew his craft and came recommended by one of the best Sube shops in the country. The garage was very reasonable and my only extra cost was for the (cheap) second-hand box.

But we have no idea what caused the whine. I hate to say it but, seems some of them just do that.

It all adds to the appeal lol, wait until you polybush the underneath with diff and gearbox bushes...then it will whine :D

mine whines already and it's not polybushed...