Reverse Gear

[Nitrate]

1981 2000. Are you supposed to pull up on the gear shift lever to engage reverse gear? RB'

[aevansgatech]

Push down ("in") and then over to reverse

[TX82FIAT]

I don't have to push down on my 82'. Never had to pull up.

[FiatMac]

I don't have to push down on my 82'. Never had to pull up.

You have a stop that is miss-adjusted. There is a stop screw that adjusts to require that you push down on the gear shift lever (on all but the early models) in order to get into reverse. It is there to prevent inadvertent shifts into reverse. The early year models required that you pull the lever up. Someone else can chime in on the year the change was made.

[spiderdan]

The early year models required that you pull the lever up.

Agree, my 68 is a pull up.

"all AC/AS and BC/BS were pull up for reverse.
all CC/CS were push down."

From
http://t124.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=6870

[Nitrate]

Thanks everyone for the answer. Shifting into reverse much smoother now. The owners manual is not specific on that. You would think they would be. RB

[Jdewith]

Sorry for posting to a three year old thread, but this saved me a ton of unnecessary work. I was thinking I was going to need to some work replacing the reverse gear, but all I needed to do was press down. I still have to drop the trans and replace the pilot and input bearings, but no digging into the gears.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!!

[btoran]

I've learned that keeping the trans fluid filled properly helps tremendously with shifting into all gears, especially reverse. That said it's not easy with the way they engineered it and no way to monitor it except to lift the car and get dirty underneath.

[tima01864]

I have to push down into reverse and also not shift directly to 5th, Always shift to 4th first, Tranny may need some work, When I go thru this routine the gears mesh,

[DieselSpider]

Since they started putting safety interlocks on the shift levers of manual transmissions there have been basically five choices:

• Pull up
  Push Down
  Push against the spring release firm but not hard to the right
  Pull Ring
  Release Button

If it does not have a pull ring or release button and the lever is not spring loaded when you push it though neutral and towards the right then its either pull the lever up or push it down.

I used to help a wholesaler deliver cars and we knew to check for the ring, button, spring, up and then down. It becomes rather obvious after a while which one your dealing with in the current car and you don't really even have to think about it and just do it automatically.