Hey everyone,

So after searching and searching plus reading dr evil´s supplement pages I still do not know if my tranny is toast or not. Here is the situation..

So i had really bad bushings for the shifter linkage. A non existent firewall bushing, a sloppy castellated shifter housing Bushing too. and while driving it waiting for my new bushings to arrive. the couple bushings disintegrated. Just before they gave way it was very hard to get into 4th and 5th gear. I could get it in but would have to push really hard to get it in and pull really hard to get out. Then I could not get in those gears at at. Since I was driving on the highway I pulled off at the the next exit to figure out what was going on. thats when I found out my bushings where toast and not even there.. both sides!!

Limped it out of the gas station to try to repair it into a parking lot close by. and then had someone come out and meet me with another shift rod with new bushings pressed into it. We tried to push it to a different location and could not get it into neutral. didn´t really think anything of it since the shifter was screwed. After we installed the rod. I could not get the car outta gear even when the shifter and the shift selector was in the neutral position. I could turn the wheels but it felt like it was in gear, would not turn freely... Had us stumped..

After towing it home and after some reading, I removed the two bolts and shift selector and put the tranny into neutral. and the wheels spun freely. I have now replaced all bushings and have a nice and tight shifter. But here is the problem.. (I hope all that back story will help to figure out the problem)..

I cannot shift the tranny into 4th or 5th gear. It does not matter if the shift rod is attached or not. Manually selecting the gears from under the car with no shift rod attached cannot get those gears either... all other gears will engaged with a good "click".

Did I miss aligning something when I put the tranny into neutral? is my tranny screwed now?

Also both wheels are of the ground and no matter what gear i put it in. the wheels will turn just as freely as if the tranny is in neutral. Is this normal? I thought the engine would engage if in gear??

Pls help! and thanks

1. Both wheels off the ground is normal - unless you have a positive diff. Bet when you turn one wheel - the other wheel turns in the opposite direction. See what happens if you have some one hold the other wheel from turning.. with both wheels off the ground you are just rotating thru the diff. all straight shift cars work this way. Try it again to make sure it wont go into gear.

2. Drain the trans oil and see what comes out. If pieces of metal comes out - you got a problem.

3. 4th and 5th work off the same slider and fork inside the trans. If you had alot of grinding when trying both gears, you could have ground the snycro teeth smooth where they would not click and hold into position. Or you could have a problem with the slider or the fork but those are hard things. Easy things are too make sure the arm on the trans shift shaft does not have play - you can see this when you are trying to shift by hand under the car. The shaft should not be moving in the arm - its only held with a pin.

A hint when soliciting help:
Make sure you mention the kind of transmission you're dealing with. (Sideshift/tailshift).

If not sure, give us a clue by mentioning the year of car in question.

Sorry, it is a side shift tranny.

I did drop the oil when i took out the shift seletor, and there was not very much in the way of metal shavings on the magnet. and it never "ground" when going in or out of those two gears. I did sometimes when going into 1st. but I am sure that was because of the super sloppy shifting. Before all this happened i could find (when the shift rod was in just the right position) 4th and 5th pretty easily and smooth. sometimes not at all though. it would taek several attempts to get it just just right where it would go in smoothly. but I figured that was a combination of bushings and maybe misaligned shifter....

Sometimes things line up just right so that the dog ring teeth don't engage.
Gears - especially 4 & 5 - are typically engaged with both the engine and transmission spinning.
Find neutral, have a helper hold one rear wheel (or chock it somehow) and spin the other wheel - slowly - while trying to engage 4/5. Moving the shafts just a little may be enough to allow engagement. If so - mostly normal.
I'm unqualified to offer specific instructions as to align the shift selector bits for the individual gears (haven't worked with a sideshift). But as you may be aware, things change direction a couple of times from the shift lever to the selector shafts and it's easy to get confused about which gear is where.

But if you can't select all 3 planes directly at the transmission, something is definitely wrong...

Buy Dr. Evils video then take it apart.and fix it. It's that simple. BTW,

Tain't simple but good advice. It's time for a look inside.

Artechnika thanks so much that did it! Help one wheel and spun the other (not as easy as it sounds) and it popped into gear no prob! WHEW! thanks again! Love this place!

Was it in neutral (actually in neutral, not just out of gear) when you removed the shifter console and dumped the oil? If it was not in neutral then one of your rods is not in the right spot and can not be until you remove the console again and shift all the rods to the neutral position.

Click on my transmission rebuild link and it will go through the removal and installation of the console and placing the tranz in neutral.

Or what he said

I might have spoke to soon.... Ok so yes I did make sure as described in your rebuild notes how to put the tranny in neutral.. Did that. I could not get the wheels to spin before. When I took it out the notched were not aligned. But I did align them and then I could spin the wheel again. Now like I said I can put on all three planes the tranny in ALL gears. But when I let off the clutch even if it is in neutral. The car want to go forward??? But it can't?? Even if I press the gas it dies.. Even if I put it in gear it does the same thing. Try go go forward but can't and die??? What is that? My clutch? I am going to re-adjust my clutch today to see if that does the trick and it's just binding... But any other suggestions??

Put the back of the car in the air, with one wheel on a ramp, and the other wheel hanging in the air (and the car on jackstands on that side.)

Put the car in 5th gear.

Pull the spark plugs.

You should now be able to turn the tire in the air and move the engine through a rotation. Its not effortless, but it should not be too hard either.

If you can't, (and since we know your engine turns) its time to pull the transmission since it is bound up.

Zach