Have a nice 1982 240D four-speed, standard sransmission (floor shifter) with about 140K miles on it. Recently experienced big problem with shifting from one gear to another. Thought it was a bad shifter and secured a replacement assembly unit which has been installed this past week. Have replaced all external bushings (except for white plastic bushing inside actual shifter unit)and everything appears to be tight...not loose. Can replace internal shifter box bushing but I don't think this is the problem.
NOW it appears after several hours of playing around with shifter that when I put the car into REVERSE, it seems to stay in that gear. When I go to a forward gear, the shifter and/or transmission does not send the transmission back into NEUTRAL but hangs in REVERSE. This makes it difficult, if not impossible, to shift into forward gears. If I don't put car in reverse, this problem does not surface and it goes just fine through all forward gears.
What has happened is that I am traveling down the road after shifting from reverse to a forward gear (first or second). But when I try to shift to third or fourth gear, the shifter simple seizes up and it will NOT go into any other gear than the one it is in. It hangs in whatever gear it is in despite efforts to place back into NEUTRAL. If I release clutch pedal, the engine konks out because it is STILL in gear.
Any thoughts or suggestions on where to look and what to get in order to try to fix this problem? Thanks.