Robin O'Donnell

Recently bought an '87 Turbo. Prior to the issues, it did have a lot of play in the shift lever. While going down the road a few days ago, I downshifted aggressively from 5th to 3rd, heard a momentary gear grind, a bang, and the shift lever detached itself from the transmission. The car remained in neutral until I was able to push down on the shifter and force it into third to limp it home.

The plastic bushing at the end of the shift linkage had shattered. I assume it was degraded, which caused the lever play and possibly the mis-shift. I replaced it, and reinstalled the shift linkage, and now the car will not shift into 5th or reverse, whether the engine is on or off. I was able to force the transmission into 5th using a dowel, a vice, and a huge amount of force once, but the shifter will not move it int 5th or reverse. The car shifts and drives normally in other gears.

Any ideas of what is going on?

Skully

If you try to put the shifter in fifth or reverse, does it go in but not drive the gear? Does it try to grind when you do it, or it just wont go in at all.

I currently have a z32 trans apart, from what I have read, they are pretty similar. There must be something messed up internally. Here is a picture of the 5th and reverse gears and shifter forks. You won't know until you tear it apart.

1 is reverse fork, 2 is fifth gear fork.

You can see that the 5th fork, has a notch (yellow circle), so if (Green) is broken you wont get either gears. I would drop and take it apart if you are comfortable, if not, source out a working transmission.


You could also see if there is anything messed up once you pop the cover off the shifter assembly. There is a little gated plate underneath to help guide into gears, maybe its bent or broken. Either way disassembly seems to be in your future.