5th gear grind cured by short shifter!!!
 

No joke! My 94 had the typical 5th grind. It wasn't really bad, but it was there. I changed the tranny and diff oil to full synthetic Mobil 1 last weekend, and it got better, but it would still do it if I tried to shit at a normal stride. Anyhow, my short shifter came in late last week, and I installed it last night. I took it out for a test drive, really liked it, but never got it out of third. I didn't really think about it while I was driving to work this morning, but I got onto a road where we have a 50MPH speed limit. I will normally run around 55-60 in fifth to keep up with traffic, and this morning I put it into to fifth slowly like always. People wre driving especially shitty this morning, and at one point in my frustrations I blew past some cars and put it into fifth fast, knowing it would grind. It didn't!!! I thought no way, so I got back into fourth, shifted up quickly again, still no grinding. I tried again and again and still no grinding! I am so stoked! I'll keep an eye on it, but it makes me wonder if some cars have bushings or shift lever components that are worn out that initially make the tranny start grinding and just eventually wear out the synchro so it does it no matter what. Gotta say though, I'm pretty happy right now

Hope my newly acquired B&M does the same for me lol.

Good stuff, glad you found an unknown temporary solution.

Have you noticed a slight increase in effort to put the shifter into gear?

I drove some friends cars with short shifter and found this to be an issue that i could not deal with, which is why i still have a stock shifter still

I think you'll find the issue is not fixed. If it helps avoid the grind that's great and it helps but a broken synchro is still broken.

This.

ITs like putting a scotch tape on your glasses lense to keep it attached to the frame.

It functional but its still broken lol

The grind wasnt too too bad on this car. Really more of a scratch than anything. I know the problem is not fixed, but if it quit grinding it makes me think that I'm not doing any MORE damage. My previous two FC's both had grinding 5th's, one of them very bad, when I bought them. A friend in the transmission business recommended putting a heavier weight oil in along with Lucas Transmission Treatment. The way he explained it to me was that when you moved the lever into gear, the spinning shaft spun the synchro which made it slip into the gear easily. He said that with a good quality oil that was heavier in there, the shaft had a better time spinning the synchro up to speed, and it would lessen or eliminate the grinding altogether. Whether thats how it works or not, I have decreased and eliminated the grinding of gears in three of my RX-7s now. I will rebuild this tranny this coming spring, but for now its quiet and shifts nice.

That's cool, man!

That didn't work for me. I missed 3rd a couple of times at the drag strip and after that my 5th gear started grinding. I bought a short throw the next day, but it didn't take away any of my grinding issues. That was a year a go - I avoid the grinding into 5th by double clutching 5th and how I push it into 5th.

Maybe the shifter was so worn he was just missing 5th every time. A while back I had a grind in 5th that would come and go depending on wind direction.

^Good possibility

Are these still available?