I bought my car a little over 2 months ago, its a '99 coupe with a 6 speed. It has a little over 70K miles. I don't know the service history of the car so thats where we can start lol...

I replaced my trans and diff fluid yesterday with royal purple, hoping to correct my problem I have been having. It is a little smoother, but it isn't any better with grinding.

This is the problem: I'll give you several examples.

1. I'll be sitting at a red light with my car in nuetral, feet relaxed. the light turns green. I quickly push the clutch to the floor, and shoot for 1st. GRIND...but it will slip in to gear. eventually.

2. Ill be cruising through town or whatever casually shifting through the gears. All the sudden (pick any gear you want to put here) it will GRIND...and eventually slip in to gear.

3. Sometimes hunting reverse it will grind and then pop in.

4. I have been planning on taking the car to the drag strip to make a few passes and see what it runs. Not if it keeps doing this mess. 3 times now I have been accelerating very hard in first gear with high rpm's, similar to what I would do if I were making a pass, and when I shoot for second...GRIND.

Now, I can be sitting at a red light or whatever with the car stopped, and push the clutch to the floor. I will slowly try to put the shifter into 1st. Ok, so it won't pop in to gear, BUT, if slowly lift my clutch up off the floor, after about a half inch or 1 inch of movement it pops right in.


What in the world is causing this??? I have been told my synchronizers are going out, I have been told I have an alignment issue with the shift linkage, and I have also been told that my clutch may not be fully disengaging. I have ordered a MGW shifter to replace the stock unit, and according to a tech over there, he said that if it is a synchro going out, it will only make the problem more noticeable. This broke my heart, because I was honestly hoping that if I spent that money on a shifter, it would clear up this crap. So I just said OK, I can check the alignment, and all while I have the shifter out. If it still acts up when I put it back in, I'll know it prolly is the synchros or the clutch.

I hate to know that something is wrong with the trans, especially after just buying the car, but if there is, oh well. I guess I'll just fix it. What do you all think is the issue here???

Thanks--sorry for the long post but I am at my whitts end with this GRINDING.

 

Same thing happened to me after running Mobil 1 Synthetic for 50,000 miles. You have paper blocker rings (until 2001), not all synthetic oils are compatible. Switch trans fluid to Amsoil ATF or ATD, mine stopped grinding immediately. Now 12,000 miles later (at 112,000 total miles) it is still okay.

Actually mine was only grinding when going into 6th gear, I responded to your title BEFORE reading your post.

 

Change out your clutch master cyl fluid. It might help some

 

Bill, what if you changed out the fluid before? Mine only does it going into second gear at WOT, and sometimes when downshifting into second and punching it simultaneously. Sorry to hijack, but I didn't get many responses in my thread.

 

Try putting some LUCAS oil stabiliser in the gearbox. This stuff is awsome and will put a film on the gears and synchros and help with the lubrication combined with a good quality gear oil you cant go wrong, i have used this stuff before a few time and swear by it.
Don't worry about the directions on the bottle put half a bottle straight in and drive the car for a day or so and you will notice smoother gear changes and probably no more crunching.

 

If you have good fluid in the master cyl, good fluid in the trans,,,,your looking at internal issues: weak synchros, etc. Try VET-005 recommendations.

BC

 

I would be very surprised if all your synchros are going at the same time. Get into your service manual, and start checking things out. Check to make sure the shifter is not loose, and adjusted correctly. Inspect the master cylinder and fluid condition. Get underneath the car and see if it's leaking from the inspection cover. Plenty of things to check before freaking out.

 

I think I will try changing the fluid in the tranny first. Is it hard to do with a 6 speed car?

 

slowtealz28- no it isn't hard. I'ts a PITA for me because I don't have a lift. I have to jack my car up and support it in my driveway. The drain plug for the trans is the small square plug in the tail of the trans pointing sideways. A 3/8" ratchet driver will loosen that. I can't remember right off, but it seems like the side fill plug is too. Drain the fluid, put new in. The rear end is a 3/8" hex drive plug (once again if I remember correctly) one on the bottom (drain) and one on the back like if you are looking at the back of the car (fill). Biggest thing for me was going to the parts house to get a small pump, because you have to pump it in. there is no way to get either the trans or diff bottles of fluid high enough to get the fluid in.

As far as changing the clutch fluid, would bleeding all the old out serve this purpose? I know there is a lot involved in bleeding the clutch as far as removing stuff in order to get to it. What exactly has to be removed for me to get to the bleeder screw???

 

You don't necessarily need to bleed the clutch. I just swapped mine out w/a syringe, then refilled... pumped clutch, repeated process about 5 more times until it was clear. After that it is just all about maintaining the fluid so it doesn't get dark.

 

Was about to say to try this. Or maybe something is wrong with your shifter... I know theres a way to re-align it. Maybe try that if cleaning up the clutch fluid doesn't help.

 

Always do the shifter alignment first. Its quick and easy to do. If you are still having issues past that, then all of the other's suggestions apply.

 

I know that everyone's been on this clear fluid craze lately but what they probably don't realize is that there was a TSB for that symptom. Something about the rubber seals causing discoloration and that there was nothing to be worried about.

 

Ok, two things here guys.

I have already done the fluid replacement by removing the old fluid with a turkey baster, and replacing it with new. I did that about a month ago. it made a difference for about a day but after that, it was just the same old ball game.

Also as far as fluid compatability, A tech at royal purple assured me that their synthetic fluid would work with my paper blocking rings.

As far as aligning the shifter, can someone point me in the direction of a tech article on how to do this?

 

I don't know where the article is and there is one with pictures. I can do the simple though...
Remove the center console. Remove the weather cover around the shifter. Put the shifter in neutral. On the front of the shifter mechanism, find the alignment pin which will be in the up and stored position. Push it down all the way via its guide wiggling the shifter a little to make sure it goes all the way down into the alignment hole. You should not be able to move the shifter at that point and it will be centered up. Loosen the torx bolt holding the shift rod going to the transmission. You will see it move on its own if its out of alignment. Tighten that torx screw back up, pull the alignment pin back up and make sure its all the way back into its stored position. Put her back together and take it out for a drive and see if you got lucky.

 

Sure sounds like a clutch problem to me. Do you have allot of free play?

Anything blocking the clutch pedal from going all the way to the floor?

Does the clutch pedal feel spongy? Is the fluid level up in the clutch master cylinder, like is there any in there? Is the master cylinder mounts loose?

If it isn't hydraulics, it's in the clutch pressure plate or throw out bearing (any weird noises) or the disc (any strange vibrations when you let the clutch out).

Try shifting into 2nd or 3rd when stopped before shifting into 1st or reverse, it may help until you get it sorted out. Also shift it like you weren't using the clutch to keep the damage down.