Manual transmission issues

P

Pony

New Member
Joined
Feb 4, 2021
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15
Location
Houston
Hey y'all, was wondering if I could get some help narrowing down what might be happening with the jeep lately

First the specs
2000 Wrangler Sport
4.0L I6
5-speed manual
164k miles

So 4-5 days when coming home from a job I started running into some issues. I was at a stop light, at a complete stop in neutral and when the light turned green and I go to put it into 1st I get blocked out of the gear. No grinding or anything, it just blocks me from moving the shifter into gear, much like it will if you're going above 5-10 mph and you try to shift down into 1st to keep you from over revving the engine by accident. It took maybe 20-30 seconds of struggling with it and it finally let me in.
At this time I'm almost completely out of gas, so I go to the nearest gas station. While I'm coasting through the parking lot I have it in 1st with the clutch pedal pushed in and I noticed that the transmission is trying to catch, pulling me forward a bit. Only briefly and not much, but noticeably.
I get filled up, make my way home, and when I pulled into my parking spot I noticed a noise coming from the engine area. It was a high pitched, squealing chirpy kind of sound. Its not constant, but comes on and off every few seconds and only when the clutch pedal is pushed in.

The first issue with the blocked gear only happened that initial time, the engine catching while the pedal was pushed in has happened a few times in the past few days, but the noise has been happening constantly when going in and out of 1st gear.

I've been trying to do some research and it sounds like maybe one of the bearings is going out? I try to do basic maintenance on my own, but I'm worried this is going to be out of my capability to fix myself and would like to have a basic idea of whats happening before going to a mechanic and getting taken for a ride.

Thanks in advance
 
Sounds like the pilot bearing is failing. When the pilot bearing starts to fail the input shaft will continue to rotate even when the clutch pedal is pressed in.
 
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Your clutch is not completely disengaging when you push the clutch pedal. The noise you describe could be the throwout bearing.

Either way, my first move would be to replace the clutch master/slave assembly with a Mopar replacement and see where you end up. They typically need replaced eventually and it's the easiest & cheapest thing to replace that could be causing your primary issue.

If that doesn't fix it, it could be the clutch or something with the transmission. In either of those cases, you need to pull the trans and take a look.

I personally have not heard of any pilot bearing failures causing what you describe but it's possible.
 
Definitely sounds like a master/slave cyl assembly issue to me. I would buy a new pre-bled mopar unit. If it isn't that, then you have a physical clutch issue. Not sure about the noise, could be the throwout bearing on its way out. Personally have never heard of a pilot bearing causing any sort of issues really. When a pilot bearing goes bad you usually would get some whirring noise but no real change in clutch behavior as far as I am aware.
 
Not to scare you too much, but those symptoms are a lot like when my NV3550 died. It sounded and acted a bit like a throwout bearing (which was replaced), however in the end the gears on the input shaft and the cluster shaft ate themselves.
 
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