tmcao55

I have a 2007 TSX 6MT with 13k on it and was wondering if any other 6MT owners are having problems with 1st gear? My first gear up until now has been smooth, but now it is starting to develop notchyness and the shift lever just doesnt go in smooth like i can feel it binding against somthing. This happens when im in a very slight roll downhill almost all the time and about 50% of shifts into first gear. It seems to happen more with the A/C on for some reason.

Before I bring it into the dealer for them to tell me nothing is wrong, Is there a way that the shifting mechanism can be adjusted? I took a look and it wasnt like any other cars i've owned (civic and maxima) There are no linkage bars directly to the transmission, but 2 cables i believe.

Tranny experts please chime in!

ThirdLane

No problem with notchiness. Maybe your problem is that your car is moving when you're shifting inti first.

CiViCKiDD

I've only got 4k miles on my '08, no notchiness here. Hopefully I won't get the famous 3rd gear notchiness my '99 civic developed...

nj2pa2nc

no problems with my 06 with almost 54,000 miles.

tmcao55

Isnt it ok to be moving very slowly? Does everyone here stop before they shift into first?

wisdumb2oof

it seems to me that 1st gear is a little too sesnsitive. if i'm rolling, even just a little, i'll usually just throw it in 2nd, at least in my 07. sometimes i wonder if these cars even need 6 gears w barely over 200 horses

tmcao55

Do you have the same issue as me with 1st gear? how many miles on your car?


I think these cars benefit from 6 gears with only 200hp, it helps extract the most power out of it with the short gears.

getelevated

No problems with my 06 with 33K on it. It slides right in and revs easy. In past cars I might use 1st while rolling very slowly, but with this tranny and gearing the only time I ever use 1st is from a dead stop. The gears are so low that 2nd will easily take care of anything other than a start from zero.

If you're having trouble getting it in the gate you could slip into 2nd and then up to 1st. That always did the trick with a couple of older cars I had. If you continue to have issues and it stays "notchy" it should be looked at while its under warranty...don't want to pay for anything in that transmission if it's not.

aaronng

Yes, you should stop. Otherwise, you can blip the throttle a little when in neutral with your foot off the clutch pedal, then shift into 1st gear.

hunterk1

Sometimes my 1st gear is a little stiff to get into, but it's always been that way so I don't see it as being bad.

Top fuel dragsters, which develop > 6000hp, have two gears IIRC. They don't need more, because their powerband is... well, everywhere.

A small 4-banger with a power band up high (read: K24) needs as many gears as possible to keep it in its best power range.

Really, any car can benefit from more gears - for example, a continuously variable transmission is great in the sense that it can accelerate a car while keeping the motor at its peak torque... it's just strange to experience, since we're all used to hearing (and feeling) the engine go through the rev range.

ThirdLane

I always try to be stopped when shifting into first. If not, I always double clutch into it when I'm downshifting. BTW I have 22K miles on my 2007 PWP 6MT

wisdumb2oof

i have about 12,000 miles on my car . i guess i've just been used to driving a 5 speed for so long its been taking more than a while to get used to a smooth transition from 1st to 2nd consistently. ...like its way sensitive.

zguy95135

Yea the DBW and the low gearing in first can make it really jerky if you're not really smooth on the throttle.

stevezilla

I've never tried to put in first while rolling. I only use 1st from a stop, otherwise, I use 2nd.

wackura

Are you aware of the gate that closes off the first gear position when the car is in motion to prevent people from accidently destroying their cars and killing themselves? It sound like maybe you are manhandling the shifter and trying to push the lever into first while the gate is closed or only partialy open.

LukeaTron

WHAT?! There is no gate. Some cars have one on reverse but I don't know if the TSX does. The resistance you feel is the counter shaft spinning much, much faster than the input shaft (which is stationary if the clutch has been pushed in long enough). The splines that lock the gears together cannot even begin to mesh with one side moving so much faster than the other. If you keep pressure on the shifter the synchros will eventually cause the two halves to sync up and you'll be able to slide it into gear. This will not make the transmission happy in the long term though.

As others have mentioned, double clutch or just use second. First is a really high ratio in this car and it's hard to double clutch it smoothly as a result. The only place I ever double clutch is the absurdly steep hill behind my house. I have to drop from second to first for a 180 degree bend. Otherwise I just drop it into second and feather the clutch a bit.

aaronng

Not true. There is no gate. Let me show you my gearbox going into 1st gear when the car is moving at 30mph.

wisdumb2oof

i know it won't let you go from 6th to reverse.

tmcao55

Im not manhandling the car. Any manual car should be able to go into first from a very slight roll. Im going at most 5-10 mph

tmcao55

I started to only put it in first when the car is stopped. Pretty much solved the problem however once in a while it is still not smooth from a stop. I guess this is normal.

I still dont think it is normal for it not being able to go in smooth at 5-10mph, i've been driving the same way since i got the car and its been smooth up until now.

LukeaTron

If you're really concerned, change the transmission oil and filter the old stuff. If there's any bits of metal in, to the dealer with ye, post haste. Might as well put the GM synchromesh back in while you're at it. It's supposed to make the transmission considerably smoother, which would be to say, like ultra smooth butter.

rb1

Slight roll, yes. The car should shift smoothly into 1st.

5 mph isn't really a slight roll, though, and 10 certainly isn't. The recommended 1-2 shift point when normally accelerating is 12 mph, so putting the car in 1st at 10 mph isn't a good idea as a general practice.

Per your original post, yes even cable shifters can be adjusted, but if the car drops smoothly into gear when you are stopped or almost stopped and hesitates only if going slightly faster, then the gate adjustment

rb1

^^^^^^^^

Oops...

... is probably fine.

ThirdLane

There's no gate per say but the car locks you out of first gear above a certain speed when you're trying to downshift into first. Try to downshift into 1st from 2nd or 3rd doing above 25mph. Transmission won't let you.

LukeaTron

I am aware of this, hence the lengthy description of why that's happening.

wackura

If this is true then why does the resistance against entering the first gear when moving over 10 mph (or so) feel like a solid obstacle? Wouldn't what you're describing cause an audible gear grinding that could be felt through the shifter?

LukeaTron

It's because of how much lower 1st is than the other gears. It helps to know a bit about how the transmission is put together internally. The counter shaft is always connected to the wheels while the drive shaft is not connected to anything when the clutch is pressed. Each gear has cog on one shaft that is always locked to that shaft while the cog it meshes with can slide laterally on the other shaft. The free spinning cog has splines on its internal radius that match splines on the shaft. The two cogs that make up each gear are always spinning together (this is why it's called a synchronized transmission).

When you want to engage a particular gear, the linkage moves the shift forks which slide the free gear over to engage the splines on the cog and on the shaft. Once they are engaged the free gear is locked to the shaft so any rotation on one shaft is transfered to the other via the cogs at whatever ratio the sizes of those cogs dictates. The drive shaft, when the clutch is fully engaged is spinning at engine RPM while the counter shaft is spinning at the RPM of the wheels divided by the ratio of the final drive. Now it's important that only a single gear be engaged at once or one gear would be trying to spin the shafts at one relative speed while the other tried to spin them at a different speed. Something would have to give since the same solid steel shaft has a strong desire to be spinning at the same rate on both ends.

So since all the gears are always meshed, when you're in 6th cruising down the highway at 70 mph, the free cog of 1st gear is whirring away at something ridiculous like 25,000 rpm. This is ok though because it's just spinning on a big fat ball bearing half submersed in oil. To get the splines on the shaft and on the cog to engage, the cog and shaft must be spinning at the same rate. To aid this, there are small clutch packs between the cogs and a plate which is fixed to the shaft. These are your synchros. When you start pushing the stick into gear, the clutch plates are pressed together and start trying to get the cog and shaft spinning at the same speed. Since the counter shaft is always connected to the wheels, it's always the drive shaft which has to change speeds. Until the drive shaft is sped up sufficiently (or slowed down when shifting up), the clutches are slipping against each other and generating heat from all the friction. The drive shaft has all the momentum of the shaft itself, the gears fixed to it as well as their free counter parts on the other shaft and friction plate of the clutch which need to be accelerated.

First gear has a high ratio so a lot of acceleration has to occur. If the car has much speed at all it may beyond the synchros holding ability to accomplish. If you keep pressure on the shifter long enough it might be able to spin the drive shaft up or it might burn up the synchro. If the cog and the shaft are so far out of whack, the ends of the splines on the cog will not be able to slip in between the ends of splines on the shaft. It will feel like a solid barrier at the shifter. That sort of grinding feeling you get sometimes when shifting sloppily is the splines starting to go together than popping back out over and over again. This will only happen if the two halves are close in RPM. Sometimes you'll get a clunk feeling when you slide it into a gear. This is because the synchros haven't had enough time to fully sync up the up the two halves but the splines happened to slip together anyway.

Phew, so there you have it. There is no device that's built into the transmission to stop you from shifting into too low of a gear. It's just a natural byproduct of how the transmission works. You could always force it to engage with enough pressure but I hope at this point you can understand why that would not be a good idea. Especially if you were to then let out the clutch.

tmcao55

To clarify, the shifter cables do not need to be adjusted right?

tmcao55

Do you repair transmissions or something because it seems you know what you're talking about? Is it normal to get a clunk feeling when you slide into first gear at a stop? Sometimes in the morning when i put the car in first gear at a stop it goes clunk lightly and the car actually jumps forward a little. What are your thoughts on that?

LukeaTron

I just really enjoy figuring out how things work. I've seen my share of transmissions but they've mostly been motorcycle transmissions which are sequential and work a little differently. I've seen enough automotive transmission parts to translate my motorcycle knowledge over.

So the lurching forward, yeah that's fine, I get the same thing. It's because the drive shaft and the stuff attached to it is still moving. First is geared low enough that the inertia of those parts can actually move the car a little. If you hold the clutch in a few seconds longer before shifting into first, the undriven parts will wind down and stop spinning and this won't happen. If it happens to stop so that the ends of the splines on the cog and the shaft are lined up with each other just right, you won't be able to put it in gear. The ends of the splines are tapered to prevent that as much as possible, the idea being that one side will spin a little bit so the gaps line up with the splines and they can slide together. It happens occasionally that they're lined up just right so you can't get it in gear though. Either letting the clutch out a bit or letting the car roll a little will spin one side enough that they can slide together.

tmcao55

That gives me a piece of mind that my car is ok.

Another question about the TSX tranny. Do the 2 shifting cables have to be adjusted over time? I would think they would stretch. Sort of like bycycle shifter cables that have to be adjusted every so often to make the gears shift smoothly.

All other manual cars i've owned have had direct rod linkages.

rb1

I had a VW with shifting problems that had a cable shifter, but adjusting the cables didn't change anything.

The adjustment procedure was beyond simple but I don't know if the TSX shifter is the same. (In this case, there were two cables -- one provided "twist" of the mechanism on top of the tranny, the other pushed the same mechanism in our out). The cables really weren't under much tension, so I doubt they stretch much.

LukeaTron

I have to agree. I doubt there is any maintenance required on the cables. They are pretty substantial cables, I doubt they could stretch enough to ever notice under normal wear and tear conditions. Anything that could cause them to stretch would likely cause a host of more serious problems in the meantime.

rb1

I could start a new thread, but maybe you could help with a related issue.

My 2nd gear has Jekyll and Hyde syndrome. By and large, it's smooth as butter. However, occasionally it resists going in and it feels like you're shifting through gravel, mostly when the car hasn't been driven in a while and it's cold outside. I've also had 2-3 full fledged grinds, mainly when downshifting after a turn.

These aren't high speed or high RPM shifts -- I've had it balk when shifting 1-2 at 2500-3000 RPM and grind when downshifting into 2 at 10 mph. I also usually shift with a couple of fingers, so I'm not forcing it with a lot of pressure either.

I can't understand what mechanism would cause this variability, unless the clutch is just sometimes not fully (dis)engaging.

Any thoughts? Dealer can't reproduce of course...

LukeaTron

Hmmm... It seems like the synchro isn't doing it's job all the way. There could be a couple reasons for this. The synchro could be burnt out but I kind of doubt that since it doesn't sound like you beat the piss out of your transmission.

The clutch might not be fully disengaging as you suggested. There could a problem with the throw out bearing, maybe some junk in there that causes it to bind occasionally. These both would be likely to show up in other gears as well though. Especially going in to first while stopped.

Two things I'd suggest to try and remedy the problem are flushing and bleeding the clutch hydraulic fluid and a flush and refill of your tranny juice. When you flush the tranny, get one of those paper paint strainers and drain the oil through it. Bits of metal would be a sign that the dealer should take a closer peek. I've heard the GM Synchromesh transmission oil is the best thing you can put back in. I plan on doing this myself sometime soon.

Other than that, all I can suggest is slowing down your 3-2 down shift to give the synchros more time to work or double clutching if you're comfortable with it. Second is a pretty big step up from third in terms of RPM. 3 through 6 are a lot closer. I don't even know if they bother putting synchros on 5 and 6 since they're so close. I know 1 and 2 have multiple clutch plates to provider more surface area and thus spread the heat out more.

rb1

Actually, I do notice variable smoothness of shifts into 5 and 6 also, but not nearly as pronounced. Of course the ratios are close.

(As far as beating the piss out of the tranny, 1-2 shifts at higher RPM have almost always been smooth. I've even V-Tec'd a half-dozen or so times in 1st. I don't do it often, but go figure)

The car has done this since day one and only has 15,000 miles on it, so I'll look into your other suggestions (maybe discuss them with the dealer first). I'm sure I can get them to repro it if I leave the car overnight on a freezing morning. It will definitely balk a few times as the car warms, but of course it will be 6 months before I can do this.

Thanks for the input!

LukeaTron

If this is only happening when it's cold, I wouldn't be too worried about it. Try the GM Synchromesh and see if it goes away.

My transmission is a good bit more clunky on the winter mornings too. The synchros are just like your brakes, they don't bite very hard till they warm up a bit.