Ok so hers my problem...I had a engine and trans put in my car..was all good for awhile,but then it started to get harder and harder for me to push up on the shifter to put it into 1st gear..now it wont even go into the gear..well sometimes if I shove left and up real fast and hard it will go sometimes..Now I can go out and pull up on gear select on the tranny and it will go into 1st very easy..I did notice that the part that u pull up on to shift it on the tranny looks different than the old one .. but I wounder if the cabols are streached or could it be the short shifter I have..I have the 1st ever short shifter that came out for the tibbys..It came form sharkracing back in like 99 and u had to take the shifter out and cut the plastic on the bottom of the plate that the short shifter mounts to so the cabols would move...I have owned this new since 98 when I bought it new so i know it inside and out but i cant fig this out for some reason..anyone got any ideas..Please help..I hate taking off form 2nd ...lol

 

Make sure the bolts which secure the cables to the transmission are tight. Also, you can adjust the cable ends from inside the cockpit under the shifter surround cover.

If the shifter is adjusted properly, slop will cause what you're describing. That lever is doing it's job and the mechanism at the transmission is doing it's job. The rest is the shifter mechanisim under the surround, the cables and securing devices. Check for slop anywhere when you move the lever and you'll find your problem.

 

OK so i dug a lil deeper..The cabol is doing its job..the problem is,well lets see if i can expalin it for ya..OK when u pus the shifter to the left,it pushes the cabol foward,so heres the problem,when it does this,it pulls the shifter on top of the trans down so u can push foward to put it in 1st well the nipple that does this,is not thick enougth to push it all the way down so it slips into 3ed,but if I put a screw driver under it,it will go right into 1st.so im woundering if ther is something that goes over this to make it thicker so it dont have as much slop in it...does anyone know....or any ides to make it thicker...

 

ok well this has been bothering me, sorry man but its cable not cabol

the "nipple" you're talking about sounds like the bushing that connects to the cable, you would just need to buy a new bushing

 

LOL...Sorry about the speeling..but sounds like u knew what i was gettin at..sorry it bother ya..lol..but to answer ur question,i have new bushing on it...

Ok so here i have pulled the part from the tranny and im going to try to post them on here...
this is the part that bolts to the tranny its self and pushes the fork or what ever it is,up and down so u can select the gear u want..it looks like the bottom of it is now flat....

 

So it shifts into other gears with no problems? When it's not shifting into 1st, it just slips into third instead all the time, or does it not shift at all? Might have to bleed your clutch, that's a fairly common problem, especially since you said it got worse over time. Takes about 5 minutes, search or check HMAservice.com for instruction on doing it, and could be a fairly easy fix.

 

do you have a picture of it on the car? Maybe the bushing got eaten up by a master cylinder leak?

edit: just saw the bit about new bushings, did you try what dtn said about adjusting the cables?

 

Yea i did the cable adj..and yes it will go in to every gear with the shifter except 1st. but i can go to the tranny and put the gear select down and it will slide right into 1st gear..tomorrow im going to have a weld put around it and see if that helps..OH and i know its not the cables cuz it pushes the part all the way down as far as it will go..its just not as thick as it was 10 years ago so now it wont push it part down as far as it needs to go..well im hoping for anyways...cuz i could stick a screw driver it between it to make it thicker and it worked like a charm...

 

I'm sure if coalforge saw this he'd have an answer for you, that answer would be teflon tape. The stuff that you put onto pipes to keep them from leaking. If you wrap the pin on the linkage in teflon tape, it will take up the slop and stop the movement. Now, this will wear down because of friction over time. If you switch the bushings with bearings (see DIY in the DIY section),then you would be able to use teflon tape and the bearings would rotate instead of the area against the pins.

Have you checked for slop anywhere else? By slop I mean you're moving the shifter lever, but it's not doing any productive work at the shifter linkage on the transmission.

Coal forge managed to remove ALL slop from his shifter and made a short throw shifter out of nothing but parts from his car.

He welded the pivot point closer on the up/down shifting action at the linkage on the transmission. He took up slop everywhere with teflon tape, but it has to be replaced once in a while. He also used washers below the pivot used to convert left/right to front/back under the shifter plate at the shifter lever in the cockpit. There's a bunch of other places he did work on it. He's done wonders with his shifter. If you just put some time into finding the slop and removing it, you'll get it figured out.

Post back when you get done.

 

Your shifter bushings are probably completely shot. Go into the engine bay and pop the cab les off and look at the bushings. Bet ya they need replaced.