Any reason why my shifter would be difficult to move around to gears and especially hard to move to the right to get towards 5th and reverse? Let me add we have not yet started the car since the tranny swap. Should I start it up and let it run fluid through first before shifting around? Maybe to break things in??

The story below explains everything in detail, if you want to skip that, here are the main points:
- 6 speed to shep built 5 speed swap.
- did shifter bushings, front mount, exedy triple, and short shifter at same time.
- Shifter is hard to move around the gearbox, especially towards 5th and reverse.
- gear (gate) selector squeaks when shifting to the right towards 5th and reverse.
- did a lot of searching already on evom to eliminate possible solution, but still nothing.
- Please help!

Story:
Ok, so I have an 06 MR. I am ready to go big power so I decided to ditch the 6 speed. Bought a never used shep 5 speed tranny + conversion parts from an evom member. I also bought a exedy triple, shifter bushings (base and under hood), works short throw, and blox front mount. Did the swap with a friend of mine who is a certified tech in my garage on jack stands. For guidance, we used the evomoto clutch swap write up. We got everything done and back together after 3 weeks (had to wait on some parts from mitsubishi). Went to sit in the car and before the first start up I decided to shift the transmission through the gears. Well, the shifter is really difficult to move around and through the gears. I have to give it quite a bit of force to get into gear. The shifter it especially difficult to move to the right towdars 5th and reverse and even more so to get into those gears. I did some researching and trouble shouting based off my research. I double check the new bushing being greased, I made sure the reverse sensor was not over tightened and the appropriate washer was used. Even put the stock (brand new) shifter bushings back in and no change. I checked the bolts on the shifter housing to make sure I did not over tighten them. One thing I did notice was when I manually push down on the gear (gate) selector to the position 5th and reverse would be, it makes a squeaking noise. And I find it more difficult to manually push the gear selector to the 5th/rev position than to the 1st/2nd position. I did research on evom and eleiminated some possible issues. Still need a fix. The car is still on 4 jackstands for 3 weeks now, desperate to be driven.

Any idea what could be the problem?

Should I start the car, move around in first and let fluid move around and see if that helps?

Could the gear/gate selector be bent?

Possible short shifter issue?

I will be calling shep this week to discuss the issue and maybe he can help.

Thank you all!

 

Probably need to warm the transmission fluid and it'll shift smoother. I'd check the linkage underneath and make sure it's not binding or rubbing on anything as well.

 

Definitely drive the car and let the transmission circulate the fluid.

It is normal for it to be difficult to move between gears when the car is not moving. This is because none of the parts are rotating, which allows them to line up correctly.

Drive the car, then make your observation if there is a problem beyond that. You will notice that the transmission will get smoother over time.

If you have issues with the shifter make sure that your selector levers are not bent. This is where your shifter cables attach to the transmission. I have past experience with bending one of the levers while installing my transmission. It caused first gear to pop out under load.

 

it took a while for my shep transmission to be broken in, like a year

 

thank you for the advice so far

Here is a video of the gear selector noise i was talking about, you can hear the squeak when it goes doewn (towards 5th/reverse).
CLICK IMAGE BELOW

 

I kinda figured it would be difficult, but man its REALLY difficult, so I under estimated it I guess.

 

I will start the car up and get the transmission coated with fluid and see if things get better. I will report back

 

Disconnect your cables at the trans. and see if that helps. If not it is your components inside your car.

 

ok I disconnected the cables and it does make it easy to move the shifter. Now I need to check to make sure that when the shift cables are not hitting anything when connected. I read something on another thread about the cables needs room to move around and if they get binded by something it will not shift smoothly.

 

I did the same swap on my Evo. Did you change the cables?

 

yes, i have all new 5 speed stuff swapped over

 

I also have a Shep trans. and all the five speed components. Short Shifter does require more pressure. Possibly cables are not in good shape.

 

that would suck is the cables are bad, because they came from shep still in the mitsubishi wrapping. If that is the case I would need to buy new ones. It would be hard to go back on shep for that.

 

I thought the cables were used. I am sure they are ok.

 

Everything is brand new basically except some clutch components. I bought a twin disk with a triple rebuild kit.