Gollum Posted January 19, 2005 Share Posted January 19, 2005 Ok... this is kinda weird, and for a long time I was like "ask the guys at hybridz, they'll know" and so finally i'm getting around to it. My first ZX (80) liked to grind going into 2nd. Either when I was accelerating hard and was shifting above about 3k or so and when using 2nd you deccelerate hard coming from like anything above 2500 in 3rd. Now the shifter from my new ZX (81) was twisting due to lack of rubber where the shifter mounts. So I took the shifter from my 80' and it does the same thing. Now, i switched it over before I had my exhast done so the revs never really went above 2k (open headers) so I don't know if the old shifter did this or not. I should have kept them both around. So, is this common in ZX cars? Or do I have a lemon of a shifter? If would give me an excuse to get a short shifter, but if it's not going to fix it than that's a waste of 70 bucks for me right now since money is tight. Anyways, any help would be appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjfawke Posted January 19, 2005 Share Posted January 19, 2005 What do you mean by "twisting"? And what rubber are you referring to? The 'B' series box in a 280ZX has a gearstick with two nylon bushes in the hole in the gearstick, and a nylon cup on the end. These are the only non-metal parts involved in the geartick mechanism, and are the only parts which wear. On the 'A' series gearbox used rubber bushes for the gearstick... As for your second gear problem - the syncro is rooted. This is a common problem with gearboxes - second gear gets the most use. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted January 19, 2005 Share Posted January 19, 2005 What do you mean by "twisting"? And what rubber are you referring to? The 'B' series box in a 280ZX has a gearstick with two nylon bushes in the hole in the gearstick' date=' and a nylon cup on the end. These are the only non-metal parts involved in the geartick mechanism, and are the only parts which wear. On the 'A' series gearbox used rubber bushes for the gearstick... As for your second gear problem - the syncro is rooted. This is a common problem with gearboxes - second gear gets the most use.[/quote'] Some ZX's came with this really funky looking shifter setup that's about an inch by an inch by 1/2 inch and it has 2 wedges driven together by springs. I think they're plastic not rubber though. My best guess is that its there to stop vibration, but it never looked like an "upgrade" to me and it looked like it had a lot of slop. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
datsunlover Posted January 19, 2005 Share Posted January 19, 2005 ALL of my 280zx cars had this problem, and two of them did it in 3rd as well. It seams to be a comon 'wear' thing with the Z 5 gears. Most 5.0 stangs ended up the same way, ussualy in less time too as ppl tend to uh... thrash them a bit more. I'd say it's your tranny. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gollum Posted January 20, 2005 Author Share Posted January 20, 2005 ok, yea now that I think about it they where nylon. They're just the little bushings that mount the shifter into place. By twisting i mean one you were in say, first, the shifter could rotate about 20 degrees each direction. This was due to lack of the nylon bushings. So, is this problem fixible? Or do I basically have to either replace the tranny and/or rebuild it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ww Posted January 21, 2005 Share Posted January 21, 2005 If you're grinding gears (any of them) your tranny needs a rebuild. How many miles do you have on it. After it's rebuilt, run synthetic MTF in it and you should get a smoother shift and probably more mileage out of it than before. The synthetic did wonders for my T5 which is one of the notchiest trannies this side of Kia. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gollum Posted January 23, 2005 Author Share Posted January 23, 2005 well, the grinding isn't that bad. If I don't shift hard (like downshifting into 2nd at 40mph) that it's fine. No grind. The engine is only 28k miles, but I think the tranny might have been swapped from an older engine, seeing as the guy I bought it from had another project Z who lied about what what missing from the car. With the state they left the car in i'm possitive they didn't change the motor, not a single thing they took off they did well. Like the overflow tank being taken out and not a single hose plugged, or the steering wheel taken apart and with nothing missing... like they took it apart for jollies. I got the feeling that if the motor had been swapped none of the guages would work from lack of electrical fallow through. That being said the only explaination to the tranny grinding is VERY exessive misuse for what few miles there are, or they swapped it out to use the practically new one. Are there ANY other explainations? Low tranny fluid? This car had been sitting from QUITE some time. I don't know what that could do to a tranny. It's not a BIG problem, but something that i'll want to fix if i'm to invest much money into this motor. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.