Car is a 1995 Z28.

Just did a big overhall on the car. Rebuilt bottom end, le2, cam, spec stage 2 clutch, machined flywheel, etc.

Put her all back together and car started right up, sounds great too. Only problem is the car won't go into gear when the motor is running (will go when car is off though)

I bled the hydraulics with a mity vac and still no luck.

I had it towed to the shop since I dont have enough room to drop a tranny.

I get a phone call and he tells me he thinks the throw out bearing was installed incorrectly because the fork isnt as tight as it should be and the hydraulic system appears to be working correctly. I give him the go ahead to drop the tranny and have a look.

He calls me back and tells me he thinks the fork, throw out bearing and pp are destroyed because "he has never seen a pp where the fins go that way". I ask him not to do anything because I had a working clutch and pp at home that I know was working when I replaced it, so we could compare when I got off work. I happen to have a picture of the pp pre install for reference:





This looks correct to me...

So I go up there show him my old pp and clutch (that I know worked correctly) and we "determine" that fins were correct (rolls eyes) and that the t.o.b. was on the right way. The first thing I noticed was that the clip that holds the t.o.b was bent to ****. Now I don't think that he bent it when he took it off because that would be kinda difficult.

I asked him if the clip was bent when he removed it or it was off the bearing when he dropped the tranny. He tells me that it was off and sitting at the bottom of the case. We take the clip off the old setup and reattach the bearing to the PP. I am happy because I think this solves our problem, but I still have no answer about what caused it to bend and fall in the first place.

So my question is...is it possible that when I tried to slide the fork on it caught the clip and bent it a little dislodging the t.o.b, which in turn caused my "wont go into gear" problem?

He seemed to think that it was unlikely. His question was what keeps the fork from falling off the T/O bearing. I didn't have an answer. I thought it just naturally had two positions in and out. I dont recall messing with the pivot bolt during the removal or install of the motor. Perhaps that is the cause? Is it possible the clutch fork is bad and won't stick on the bearing?

Anyone have any input?

 

It sounds like your mechanic is unfamiliar with pull-style clutches. Not really his fault, they're not exactly common.

It's quite possible some trivial mistake when installing the trans is now costing you big time. I accidentally left a TOB off a car at work. Luckily I caught my mistake while I was still installing bellhousing bolts, didn't cost a lot of time.

It's pretty obvious at this point that your clutch is not releasing; all you can really do is put things back together and check step by step to make sure everything is doing it's job. Judging by your description I would say that something definitely went wrong between the fork and TOB.