Alright, so last weekend I replaced my oil pan gasket. This is for my 97 Z-28, M6. I had to lift the engine to get it in there obviously. Well I think I may have lifted the engine too high. The intake manifold never touched the cowl, so I'm really not sure. I don't even know if it's possible for it to get that high.

Anyway, it's tough to get the shifter over into reverse. It's ONLY hard to get it to reverse. Note, there's no problem actually getting it to engage the gear, it just takes a lot more force to get the shifter to the right. Strange thing though...this only started happening after I did the gasket change...but not immediately after. When I first took the car out after doing the work, I backed it out of the driveway with no problem. Later on that night is when I noticed how difficult it was to get into reverse. There's no way it could have been that tough before and me not notice.

On another note, I also noticed that when I hit the hood release, it doesn't pop up all the way like it did before. Maybe related, maybe not, but I figured I'd throw it in there.

So what do you guys think the problem might be? Did I bend some linkage somewhere? Why does it ONLY effect reverse and not any of the other 6 gears?

 

Quite possibly you pinched/cut/broke the wire that powers the reverse lock-out solenoid (this is the solenoid that blocks out reverse until/unless you are stopped or moving very, very slowly). It may or may not be related to you messing with the engine, but that's where you need to check ... although you COULD start at the fuse that controls it first!!

The hood release ... is for another thread/discussion (probably just needs to be lubed? ).

 

Hmm, I'll take that into consideration. Where is this wire located? As for the hood release...it's just weird that it started doing it after I get done working on the car. I had the front end pretty high on the stands...think the car did a little flexing and that's got something to do with it? That's my theory.

 

OK, another symptom here. Last night I started the car up with the emergency brake up. I looked on the dash and the brake light was sort of pulsating, almost flickering. When I dropped the brake lever down about halfway, it stayed on fully, as it is supposed to. However, when pulling it back to the higher position, it flickered again. That, along with the reverse situation I've told you about are some bad things I've noticed since I had the engine lifted up. There's also some strange intermittent noise from the trans, but I'll have to investigate that some more.

 

Ok, the problem is solved. I guess when I was lifting the engine/trans. I lifted it too high and had to crimp something somewhere. The engine sensor fuse under the hood was blown. Replaced the fuse and now it goes into reverse just as easily as it always did. I'm getting voltage to my MAF sensor too now so the car's running great! I just wanted to update this thread in the even that somebody else has the same problem.