Rover 200 & 400 Owners Club

Having read on here about possible causes of clutch judder, I came to the conclusion that the front engine mount on my 216 GSi was probably the cause. Finding a replacement for the Honda engine was not easy, but eventually, by searching eBay using the Honda engine number, I was able to find something that looked right for not a huge amount of money – a very reasonable £22! Here’s the one I bought: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/195705859004

So to fitting, I jacked up the front of the car and removed the splash shield that goes under the bumper, which was fairly straightforward, this gives access to the bottom bolt of the engine mount. The central bolt holding the engine mount to the front subframe and the top bolt holding the mount to the engine were easy to remove, however the bottom bolt was a pain – both because there isn’t enough room to get a normal socket in, and ground clearance is poor when the car is just jacked up. Well, right tool for the right job – I ordered a low-profile 14mm socket and a small breaker bar and managed to get the bolt off.

I did jack up the engine to remove the mount but the engine didn’t move when it came off, so it maybe wasn’t necessary. With the old mount off, I could see that the rubber had almost completely detached, meaning the mount was providing almost zero resistance to movement! (I pushed it in for the first photo, you get see how bad it is) Comparing to the new mount, they looked identical…

until I tried to fit the new mount, when it became obvious that the bolt positions are slightly different – what a massive pain in the rear end! Fortunately, using a hacksaw to enlarge the holes, I was able to force it back on and connect it back up.

Now while I was doing this, I got a close look at the front subframe and it looked like this

Thankfully it was still sound underneath, so I cleaned it up and applied Kurust and Hammerite. Hopefully that will last a few more years!

The clutch judder is now gone, and the car is so much smoother to drive.

It's surprising just how rusty the subframes can get, when you consider how rustproofed and well protected the rest of the car usually seems to be.

The subframes always appear to have had a coat of black paint and that's it.

I have some clutch judder on my 420 r8 and have 2 new engine mounts to fit. I wonder if I’ll get a similar benefit. It had never occurred to me it could be related. I have engine vibration into the cabin at certain revs which is why I planned to change them.

When I bought my first R8 I was a bit disappointed with how 'harsh' it felt. I replaced an engine mounting and it literally transformed the car. Hopefully you'll feel the same benefit!

Black_GT wrote: ↑Sat Jul 06, 2024 10:29 pm Having read on here about possible causes of clutch judder, I came to the conclusion that the front engine mount on my 216 GSi was probably the cause. Finding a replacement for the Honda engine was not easy, but eventually, by searching eBay using the Honda engine number, I was able to find something that looked right for not a huge amount of money – a very reasonable £22! Here’s the one I bought: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/195705859004

Is your car an auto or a manual?

I believe that is an auto-transmission mount you've fitted. I wrote an article on the Honda engine mounts a good few years ago now. It's in the Viking technical index (available if you're a paid-up member): https://rover200.org.uk/members-login/viking-tech-index

Just do a "find on this page" option in Edge (or whatever browser you're using) and specify the word "mount"

I included long lists of part codes and succession part codes for each engine mount, and whole bunch of aftermarket equivalents. All available on eBay or a US stockist that seems to cover Honda cars well: Rock Auto. Prices are really keen, at between £7 and £20 for anything you may need.

It's worth checking out, particularly as there are some "gotchas" on the other 3 engine mounts too!

Just FYI: The auto mount appears to have more room between the centre rubber arm (which carries the mounting bush) and the outer rubber profile, so it imparts a greater engine "rock" back and forth during gear changes, acceleration, etc. Whatever you want to call this - "driveline shunt", or "inline jolt". You notice it on the auto transmission. It's a fairly pronounced "jolt" or "snag" when the box changes up or down. Actually, it's probably that the auto change up/down is a known quantity so the engine mount doesn't attempt to cushion the jolt too much. The manual mount has to cope with potentially greater jolts as drivers may be slamming the clutch out (fast/racing gear changes) so it has to be more robust and prevent too much rock.

MatthewL wrote: ↑Wed Jul 10, 2024 9:40 pm I have some clutch judder on my 420 r8 and have 2 new engine mounts to fit. I wonder if I’ll get a similar benefit. It had never occurred to me it could be related. I have engine vibration into the cabin at certain revs which is why I planned to change them.

Yep, sounds like similar symptoms - hopefully you get a big improvement too!

Johnny 216GSi wrote: ↑Thu Jul 11, 2024 10:51 am

Black_GT wrote: ↑Sat Jul 06, 2024 10:29 pm Having read on here about possible causes of clutch judder, I came to the conclusion that the front engine mount on my 216 GSi was probably the cause. Finding a replacement for the Honda engine was not easy, but eventually, by searching eBay using the Honda engine number, I was able to find something that looked right for not a huge amount of money – a very reasonable £22! Here’s the one I bought: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/195705859004

Is your car an auto or a manual?

I believe that is an auto-transmission mount you've fitted. I wrote an article on the Honda engine mounts a good few years ago now. It's in the Viking technical index (available if you're a paid-up member): https://rover200.org.uk/members-login/viking-tech-index

Just do a "find on this page" option in Edge (or whatever browser you're using) and specify the word "mount"

I included long lists of part codes and succession part codes for each engine mount, and whole bunch of aftermarket equivalents. All available on eBay or a US stockist that seems to cover Honda cars well: Rock Auto. Prices are really keen, at between £7 and £20 for anything you may need.

It's worth checking out, particularly as there are some "gotchas" on the other 3 engine mounts too!

Just FYI: The auto mount appears to have more room between the centre rubber arm (which carries the mounting bush) and the outer rubber profile, so it imparts a greater engine "rock" back and forth during gear changes, acceleration, etc. Whatever you want to call this - "driveline shunt", or "inline jolt". You notice it on the auto transmission. It's a fairly pronounced "jolt" or "snag" when the box changes up or down. Actually, it's probably that the auto change up/down is a known quantity so the engine mount doesn't attempt to cushion the jolt too much. The manual mount has to cope with potentially greater jolts as drivers may be slamming the clutch out (fast/racing gear changes) so it has to be more robust and prevent too much rock.

Ahh that would explain why the holes were slightly off then - yes it is a manual.

That's really interesting and good to know about the other mounts too - thanks for the heads up!

SteveB wrote: ↑Thu Jul 11, 2024 9:26 am When I bought my first R8 I was a bit disappointed with how 'harsh' it felt. I replaced an engine mounting and it literally transformed the car. Hopefully you'll feel the same benefit!

I’m getting my hopes up now Steve! Really hoping it’ll finally make it a hood motorway car. At present it’s great up to 55 and noisy above. You can feel vibration through the bulkhead.

MatthewL wrote: ↑Fri Jul 12, 2024 5:43 am

SteveB wrote: ↑Thu Jul 11, 2024 9:26 am When I bought my first R8 I was a bit disappointed with how 'harsh' it felt. I replaced an engine mounting and it literally transformed the car. Hopefully you'll feel the same benefit!

I’m getting my hopes up now Steve! Really hoping it’ll finally make it a hood motorway car. At present it’s great up to 55 and noisy above. You can feel vibration through the bulkhead.

My front mount had been failing from 40K miles and I'd even taken it to several Rover garages to see if they could sort anything out. They hadn't a clue what was causing the problems. The car shook badly when idling, to the point where the glove box, front door trim and centre console all rattled badly and made the car seem so incredibly unrefined. Worse than the Escort I owned before it. It sputtered at ignition switch-off, as if the fuel line was really dirty or the distributor timing was completely off, but of course it couldn't have been the timing as it's determined automatically by the ECU. I'd shoved foam behind the door cards, modified the glove box soft-close rubber corner cones and taped anti-rattle tape around all the centre console edges to try and make it better. It was only when I actually started to learn how to dismantle the car myself that I spotted the front mount. The centre bush in the rubber arm was almost completely detached. The arm was split all the way through in several places, so it was just a collection of pieces connected together by stringy, perished rubber. I wondered how it could have got so bad so early on in the car's life. As soon as I sourced a replacement and had it fitted, all the problems went away and the car felt brand new again.

Wow! That sounds really bad. I’m surprised the garages weren’t able to help, you’d have thought somebody there would’ve had the experience to diagnose the problem.

Mine’s never been as bad as that, but it’s a 214 so presumably the mountings are a different design. I’ve never known the rubber separate or break down, but it does seem to compress quite quickly. The air gap virtually disappears and you end up with the two metal components basically resting on each other with a thin rubber ‘sandwich’ between them.

The engine unit’s still well supported so clutch judder isn’t much of an issue but you definitely notice the vibration