I'm driving a 2000 Neon Sport MTX. I was driving down a freeway like normal and coming to a stop light I found it VERY difficult to shift into first gear. I've had little blips where it was tough to shift into first gear before, but this time the gears were grinding when the clutch pedal was all the way to the floor. The clutch pedal comes up a little higher than it should off of the floor, but the clutch pads should be fine, I just bought the car from a used car lot this summer and had it checked out. I'm going to have it checked out at the shop tomorrow, but I'd like to go in there with an idea of what's wrong with it and how much this could cost me. If it's a simple enough repair I might end up doing it myself.

Edit: After thinking about it, it might just be the shift linkings. But seeing as this is my first Manual Transmission, I'll probably leave it to the pro's to diagnose and fix because I have no experience with this.

 

How hard do you drive the car?? You could have a bad 1st gear syncro or shift linkage. IF it was the clutch it would do it in all gears.[IMG][/IMG]

 

I don't drive the car overly hard, but seeing as I bought this car used, it is probably not entirely my fault. The car has a touch over 100,000 miles on it and this is the first clutch/transmission. I don't find that too awfully bad. I saved some money by buying used, so I figure I can afford to spend money on fixing it up. Even after installing a new clutch, I'll still have paid less than buying a brand new car.

 

That is very true, I don't think its the clutch though, a clutch would be in any gear, worst in 1st but in every gear. It could be that the clutch is just starting to go, but if there is a grinding I am almost 100% sure its the syncros in the transmission. Mine is going now with 140,000 miles.

 

yeah, we were talking about that a month or two ago. It was very minor when it first started, but it got really bad all of a sudden. I was thinking that it was the shift linkage to begin with. The shop is supposed to be giving me a call back later this evening, so we'll find out for sure what it is.