Stuck in 1st gear

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chrgdrt

chrgdrt

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Richmond, Mi
Driving home yesterday as I went to pass a slow moving truck I went for 2nd gear and nothing, coasted to the side of the road. Put it in 2nd and car would not budge, no 3rd or 4th, only 1st. Drove home (about 5 miles) in 1st ugh. When I got home I had reverse and first, parked it to cool off.
Later went out to put the car on the lift and the shifter would not come out of 1st. Disconnected the linkage and the shift lever still won’t come out of 1st, definitely something internal. I know the trans has to come out but my question is, is it worth it or even possible to remove the side cover with the trans still in the car(67 A body)? I’m not sure there’s enough room to remove it with the shift forks and all. BTW this is my first manual car in a while, I’ve done plenty of auto,s just not familiar with all the tricks for a manual.
Looking forward to any advice
 
I cannot imagine a "common problem" that would cause this. You may know that 4th (if this is a 4 speed and not an overdrive) is just a coupling, you could strip most of the parts out of the box and 4th would still operate.

I think I would pull the side plate and have a look. Did you really "reef" on the shifter to get it to move, or did it feel somewhat normal?
 
67Dart273 said:
I cannot imagine a "common problem" that would cause this. You may know that 4th (if this is a 4 speed and not an overdrive) is just a coupling, you could strip most of the parts out of the box and 4th would still operate.( I couldn't get the shifter to go to 4th)

I think I would pull the side plate and have a look. Did you really "reef" on the shifter to get it to move, or did it feel somewhat normal?
Click to expand...
Oh I reefed on it! it felt welded to first. have some chores to due and will get back at it later.
 
my brothers duster did that, fresh rebuilt engine, trans, and shifter, every time i rev it up in 1st gear and tried to shift in 2nd it would lock up tried for two day ujusting the shifter no luck purchase a new hurst shifter perfect been 3 years no problem, when i laid under the car watching my brother shift from 1st to 2nd i could see the reverse lever move and that caused the lock up, dis connect the reverse rod and move the lever to neutral should free it up good luck with it.
 
Later model trans has "interlock" levers in the side cover. Try removing the side cover first to inspect these levers.
 
It's definitely either in the shifter or the interlock in the side cover. If you disconnected the lever and can't pull it out of 1st (you were moving the driveshaft when operating the lever, right?) pretty much only leaves the side cover, unless it's a catastrophic failure in the trans (unlikely)
 
I had the same problem on mine, the rear main bearing was smoked. It would allow so much fore and aft play in the main shaft that the synchronizers were going too far past the strut keys and locking it out. If you pull the side cover check main shaft endplay.
 
It’s the earlier detent style and I did notice that the shifter seemed to be traveling a bit further on the shifts, the shifter was contacting the opening on the reverse, first and third shift. Something was wearing/ moving. Planning on pulling the side cover this evening
 
If the linkage is poo, the trans wont fully come out of gear and won’t go into another. Try disconnecting the trans linkage but keep the tab, put the shifter in Neutral and then make sure the two levers, and reverse are disengaged then see how close or loose the linkages are.
 
Linkage disconnected from shifter, still won’t come out of first, I’m pretty sure it’s internal, just not sure what.
The real pisser is I had the engine & trans out to paint the engine compartment, regasket the engine and paint it but didn’t bother to go thru the trans cuz it was working ok.

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If you had taken the shift levers off the trans, to disconnect the shifter, it's possible to push the side-cover shifter shafts into the trans (like when you hug the trans when you lift/remove it) - allowing the interlock to drop the spring/ball bearing into the trans.
I can't remember the result (missing detent), - but I'd look there, - side-cover/interlock.
 
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Side cover off, detent ball still in place. Hard to see much inside with the exhaust pipe right there. Took a couple of pics.

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IMO
the trans overshifted into whatever gear it' stuck in, allowing the struts to pop out from under the slider. When this happens, the brass ring is allowed to rotate. When that happens, the struts no longer have a window to return to, and there you sit.
It is possible to rotate the window in the brass back to where it belongs, and gently, one by one, nudge the struts back into the slider......... unless the energizer springs also got misaligned.
But IDK if it is possible to do this with the trans installed, cuz you can't really see what yur doing.
The thing is that if it does it once, it will do it again.
You have to prevent overshifting.
How you do that is different between the two covers, but should actually be done at the shifter mechanism.
But the real question is why you felt the need to shift it so violently.

This is NOT a common problem with the A833, so yours is "special"; and will need a careful inspection..
My record for pulling that box on a 4-post hoist is 17 minutes and includes dropping the exhaust pipes and the GearVendor. And I wasn't actually in a big hurry, and it could be done in less time.
No alcohol was involved.

OOPs I see yur faster than me.....
 
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I have never seen a 1-2 slider like that in an A833. What I mean is, that does not look like a factory slider. No matter. But then I haven't had mine out since 2004, lol.

But it looks like your brass is still indexed right, yahoo. So all you gotta do is put a slight pressure on the slider, in the direction towards which you want to go, then with a small screwdriver or similar tool, nudge them back in, one by one.
 
If you have a detent ball, then you have an early side-cover. Pre-1971.
See if you can engage two gears, simultaneously. That would be bad and means the interlock pin is missing or way too short. If you can just move the second lever a tiny amount with the first lever shifted into any gear, that is probably normal, That interlock pin is supposed to prevent over-shifting , in addition to preventing selection of two gears at once. The pin has to be in there
Unless you have a shifter with shift stops on it ... like the Hurst Competition Plus. But you still have to adjust those.... lol.
 
Well I think I have it fixed, l was able to get the 1/2 slider in neutral position, I installed the side cover and verified shifting thru each gear, my concern is that the output shaft will not turn when in neutral unless the clutch is depressed. Shouldn’t I be able to turn it?

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Check for wear on the shifting forks. If they need replacing, the steel ones are better.
 
chrgdrt said:
Shouldn’t I be able to turn it?
Click to expand...
Yes you should.
What has happened is this; with all your slamming, the brass is now jammed onto the brake cone of whatever gear is on the same synchronizer as the one that was stuck in gear. When this happens to me, I pry the brass back gently until it snaps off, before I put the cover back on.
Don't worry, your engine has more than enough power to kick it off. Just put it into third and let the clutch out slowly, this will unstick the brass. As soon as the car moves, yur done; just go back to first and all will be well.

BTW
shifting the A833 thru the gears with the engine off, is NOT a good idea. This action often pushes a brass-ring up on a cone, and locks it there. By itself this is not that bad. But if you get one of them stuck that way, then with the next gear that you select the clutching teeth may not line up with a slider, and so, the slider will not move into full engagement. If you don't know what is going on inside there, the automatic response is to back up and slam harder. If it goes in you're a happy guy. If it doesn't, you are gonna wonder what is going on and if the trans is any good.
IMO this is abusive, proves nothing, and is hard on every metal bit between the shifter and the brass.
This may even happen while you are cruising around, and come to a stop with the clutch pedal down. With enough time, and proper free-play, the clutch disc may stop spinning, and with it, everything it drives. If the driveshaft also has stopped spinning, now you might find the slider teeth, again butted up to the clutch teeth of First gear, and the thing won't go in. You might get the urge to just slam on the stick, but that is the wrong response. The correct response is to just let the clutch pedal up a tad, to get things turning again and break the brass free from the cone, put the pedal back down, then try again before the guts stop spinning.
The other thing you can do is to downshift into First gear just before rolling to a stop. With the brakes on and the driveshaft not rotating, you can now put it into neutral, and everything should remain lined up and ready to go.
 
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There must be something else going on in there, I want to say thanks for all the help so far but this thing is still messed up. It now drives in neutral along with first and third, second it binds up and will stall the motor if I let the clutch all the way out.
Time to pull the trans and have a good look inside
 
If the engine wants to stall, it can only be because two gears have been selected simultaneously, which could mean that one of them is seized to the mainshaft.
The gear that actually still works must be seized or just not outshifting. In this case there will be no neutral, it will continue to drive in the same gear.
As for driving in other selected gears, it may be that your shifter is just not goinig thru the neutral gate, but more likely that one of the forks is just not properly installed.
In any case, you should be able to figure it out by removing the cover.
Finally, it is possible but difficult, to reinstall the cover with one of the forks not correctly installed.
 
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Turns out the first gear snap ring was missing allowing it to float a bit and eventually it stayed engaged as I went to second causing the bind then it seized on the mainshaft. So for parts, new mainshaft, first and second gears and synchros. Also steel shift forks, oh yea and the rear bearing was smoked.
 
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