I am still having trouble shifting like mentioned when I started the thread...Is there any way at all I can fix this?? Any thoughts would be great!

bump

Like I asked before...did you try bleeding the clutch?

no...how do I go about doing that and what could this help or change? Thanks for the reply! someone posted this elsewhere..could this help? Has anyone tried this?

"I am a new member. I was searching the forum to see if anybody had hard shifting problem. I recently fixed my car. It has 100000 miles on it and after several reports to the dealer, my hard shifting problem was conisdered normal. Like cold temp etc. etc..

I decided to check out the problem myself. And what I found was the bottom of the shift lever (under the car) that connects the extension bar has a bushing. I diconnected the extension bar (not the control rod) and found the shift lever was very smooth indicating a good ball joint. But the extension bar bolt was very difficult to loosen. I cleaned the bolt, applied some grease to the bushing that sits at the end of the shift lever. I re attached the shift linkages and found that my shift lever is VERY SMOOTH. I had been driving my car for about 70000 miles with that problem. Looks like my bolt/bushing got siezed long time ago.
But finally it is a night and day difference in effort to change the gears."

??

No...but I have the Kartboy bushings and shifter.

Looks like you solved the problem. The bolt that attaches the bottom of the shift lever to the change control rod has a torque setting of 12-16 ft/lbs (16-22 N/m) according to the FSM. When this bolt is too tight, as you found out, shifting is very stiff.

For a further improvement in shifting, you might consider changing to a synthetic transmission oil. I use Red Line MT-90 and found that it provides somewhat smoother shifts, particularly in cold weather, compared with the OEM mineral oil previously used.

Finally, I recommend installing the Kartboy bushings. These attach to the transmission end of the extension bar and will remove excess play from the shift mechanism and enable more precise shifts.