Hydro tranny 3rd and 5th not working

[Gforcefd]

Okay I got the engine and tranny all done in, pedal and clutch working, yes I have some pictures for you all.

Problem 1: is I can't seem to get it to shift into 3rd and 5th. I thought I tested all the gears before I pulled the engine and tranny from the wrecked protege, but can't remember anymore.

Is it possible my shifter linkage rod, that goes from the shifter to the transmission is either to long or short? I thought I cut it right, but maybe not.

I can get it to go into all gears but 3rd and 5th. Kind of seems like it won't click all the way forward. It just pops out of gear when I let off the clutch.

Problem 2: The Clutch pedal is extremely hard, I know that air in the line would make it feel spungy, so why would it be really hard? Kinked steal line maybe? Also maybe the fact that the plunger rod is so much further down on the pedals arm compaired to in the protege, my leverage action might be impaired. Any other ideas? It does work fine though, just really really hard

Any help would, well.... help....

BTW: Yeah the car gave me a good feeling down low when I rolled it out.

[muscle_Car1]

Yeah sounds like the bar is th wrong size. As for making a clutch pedal hard I dont know on a festy retrofit.

[Tim]

The really stiff clutch pedal is normal on a hydraulic transmission. I've been in 3 Festivas with hydraulic clutches and they're all really stiff.

[Gforcefd]

Yeah Idealsociety pointed out that since my pushrod is located so much closer to my foot, then it was on the protege setup that there is alot less leverage. I worry about it ripping through the firewall eventually though...

I also noticed that my shifter is hitting the pivot point lip that is just above the floor of the car, you know that piece that holds the ball joint. I guess my rod is too long..... wait that can't be right ;-)

[IdealSociety]

yeah mine has always been really stiff, there might be a way to redo it and make it not so bad, but i havent thought of a way yet.


... god this thread sounds sick.

[B6T]

The really stiff clutch pedal is normal on a hydraulic transmission. I've been in 3 Festivas with hydraulic clutches and they're all really stiff.

My Protege has a hydraulic transmission... which is actually the same one people swap into Festiva, and the pedal is the softest out of all my cars. The fact that all three Festivas have stiff pedals might be due to the fact that Festivas never came with a hydro transmission and don't have the proper linkage and linkage geometry pushing on the master cylinder.

[Gforcefd]

yeah that is the whole point fred, because we move the pivot point down to the "half way point" of the pedal compaired to probably the 5/6th spot on the protege pedal it really messes with the geometry.

[FestYboy]

well, then there's your answer.... drill a new plunger rod location on the pedal. before you do that though make sure the pedal travel is suficient to opperate the clutch. after that, you shouldn't need any other adjustment as the hydro unit is self adjusting.

[Gforcefd]

yep and since I answered my own question, I really didn't need the commentary ;-) However it isn't as simple as drilling a new hole for the pivot point of th plunger rod, because we would have to move the whole master cylinder up higher, it can not go up to much higher because it has a gravity feed off from the brake fluid resiviour :-)

[FestYboy]

and you can't rig a seperate resivior? or perhaps use a different master that has it's own res.? another solution is to have the master mounted at a downward angle so that the rod still travels straight and you can keep the grav feed from the brake res.? i hope this makes sense, because it looks right in my brain.