just threw down a bunch of $$ to have a shop rebuild the manual trans in my 87 runner, after deciding it wasnt a job i wanted to tackle, and i didnt want to put in a used trans and have that go in 20k.

i'm not so sure i had the right shop do the job...

i knew the bearings were going, they convinced me to replace some forks, gears, and i also had them do the clutch while they were in there, the whole thing set me back $2k.

bearing noise is gone, but now after the rebuilt, it does not feel, "smooth" between gears.

with the clutch fully depressed, about halfway through the motion of shifting from the neutral position of the stick up into a gear position, there is a noticable, (usually somewhat slight) hang-up about halfway up as it slides into gear. if i feather it up into a gear, it begins to grind. its fine as long as you just shift in forceful continuous motion from neutral, but still is a somewhat irritating grabbing vs a nice smooth shift.

should i just live with it, or is this grabbiness a faulty rebuild, and potentially future headaches?

The shop warrantees their work supposedly, so i'm considering trying to get them to make attempt #2 at rebuilding a nice smooth shifter.

thoughts?

 

I think for the most part that's normal. New syncros do not function smooth at all until they break in.

Check the oil level in the trans just to be on the safe side.