I just returned from a 900 mile trip and noticed, on two separate occasions, that I had trouble shifting (manual transmission) after extensive (several hundred mile continuous) freeway driving in overdrive.

The first time this happened it took maybe 10 seconds before I could coax it into 4th. The second time I'd just stopped (come to a dead halt) and the gears grated when I tried to select reverse. Other than those two occasions it shifted perfectly. Today I drove it 20 or so miles around town, using all gears, and it shifted perfectly.

I checked the tranny oil level and it was full.

Does this sound as though it's a clutch problem? It's still got the original clutch, BTW, now at 171,500 miles.

 

This problem got much worse on my most recent trip out to the desert. It became acute when I stopped for gas. The engine stalled when I stopped at the pump with the clutch all the way depressed. After filling her up I couldn't engage any gear when I started the engine.

I wicked some of the hydraulic fluid out of the clutch reservoir and this appears to have fixed the problem.

I suppose the reservoir was over-full and when driving through the desert the fluid expanded sufficiently to prevent the clutch from disengaging all the way.

 

Let us know if it's fixed long term.

 

Unfortunately no. It ran fine for several months and then shifting gear all of a sudden got hard again. This really happened all of a sudden. It was though a switch had been thrown that was labelled, "make it hard to shift".

Since it had 174,000 miles on all the original clutch-related hardware I decided that now was a good time to rebuild the entire clutch system.

I replaced the pilot (that was shot) and throwout (that was almost shot) bearings, the clutch itself (that was in surprisingly good condition), the master and slave cylinders and the rear main seal.

I've got everything back together now except for bleeding the clutch and reinstalling the gear shift lever. I'm going to the U.K. tomorrow for two weeks so this will have to wait until I return.

This entire eordeal was an SOB. It really was a bear to get the transmission out and then get it back in place again as it hangs up on the exhaust. I had to use a 1"X2" piece of wood to force the bellhousing past the exhaust. There was no way it was going to "slide" in and out of its own accord. I also had a really hard time lining up the transmission input shaft with the clutch and pilot bearing. In the end I effectively bench-pressed it into place with the rear end of the transmission resting on a 4"x4" block of wood (and then my knee) on the aft-supporting crossmember. This was comparatively easy. What wasn't easy was trying to jockey it into place on the jack.

This was, without a doubt, the most difficult maintenance I have ever done on any vehicle.

Happy Xmas!

Richard