I'll have to check that bushing your talking about.
Very cold and snowy in Southeast Montana right now.
I believe the shifter on my BA10 has a metal ring with 3 screw that I have to take out and then pull the shifter handle.
If I can't find something bad with the shifter.I'll have to drag it 80 miles to town.
My transmission guy said he waiting.
My freind had the 1989 Jeep with the BA10 and he switched to a AX15 and you guys are right you have to switch to the matching transfer case.

Thanks!~John

 

Thanks for all the help. Still haven't pulled the shifter cane because it's been so cold out.
Did bring in my tools tonight to warm them up.
You know the 1st time I pulled the trans was for the same reason...trans in 1st gear and shifter feels like it is in neutral. 5-90 what are some other things you can check when I pull the shifter? I can't magazine you can see much threw the hole in the top of the trans where the shifter handle goes. I am hoping the handle is bad, so I can get back to driving the Jeep soon...it's more fun to drive than an automatic. Thanks! John

 

Been a while but I finally got my 89 Cherokee back from the trans place.
He said nothing is wrong with the shifter or bushing.
He said that it was something to do with the synchronizers and that in my BA-10 /5 speed they are made out of aluminum, not brass, like some people thought.
The guy said that he thought that if he put Redline NS (non-slip) GL5, about $22./qt., that it would shift better. It doesn't seem like it to me, even my 67 Dodge 4 speed shifts smoother. Also I still hear some kind of bearing noise.
John

 

Try running 10W-30 engine oil in it, that can help.

He's correct - synchronizers in the BA-10 are aluminum, not bronze (as they are in "real" gearboxen.) I know - I've torn three to bits to scrap them (typical failure mode is gear stripping in 1, 2, or R. The problem? The gears are about Rc65 - which is too hard for the application! Bear in mind that the BA-10/5 was designed for use in a RWD Peugeot passenger car - early 505? - with half the engine, about 1/2 the torque output, and about 1,000# lower kerb weight... I did a FA report for Manufacturing Materials & Processes my second trip through college - the instructor said I didn't need to go to the effort, but I had one freshly stripped & scrapped, and I was curious.) The aluminum synchronizer rings are why the BA-10/5 likes GL-5 (the AX-15 and NV3550 have bronze synchronizer rings, and will take GL-3. Using GL-5 in these transmissions will literally disintegrate the synchronzer rings, due to the added sulphur-based EP lubricants - GL specs are not reverse-compatible, like engine oil specs through API Service SM/CJ-4. Some "performance synthetics" - like Redline or Amsoil - will work with bronze, and should have "Safe for use with yellow metals" on the rear label. Immaterial for the BA-10, but good to know with the AX-15 or NV3550, once you get a replacement.)

The engine oil is of a lower viscosity, and will therefore get better permeation through the bearings, geartrain, and synchronizer rings. (It's an old hot-rodder's trick, we used to run straight 10-vis or 20-vis engine oil in the old Muncie SM420 and SM465 to reduce parasitic losses in competitions.)

Nota Bene - You don't "have to" get the replacement transfer case as well. You can source a 23-sp input gear fro Novak Adapters that will work with the early NP231 transfer case, and mate with the AX-15/NV3550 output shaft (the helix angle in the NP231 input gearset changed slightly, about 1994. Crossing the gears will usually result in excess operating noise and stripping the gear teeth.)

 

5-90, thank you!~I am one of those old hot rodders. My friends still say we are "gear heads".
Me, I found that I loved Chevy because my dad drove them and all my friends drove Fords and I was always working on them.
Got into this old Dodge 1967 D200 and supped up the 318 and turned it into a 4 wheel drive. Had that ride 27 years now same engine.
I am new to the Jeeps (about 2 years now). My 89 Cherokee was given to me by a lady traveling to Florida from Mt. It kept over heating and she gave up on it.
I got a couple grand in it now and it's been fun till my son drove it with a bad clutch master cylinder. The trans was great up till then. Thinking about buying another 89 soon. Never have done any painting, but I can see painting this Jeep. It's fun to drive and some days (when I don't go on line to Cherokee forum) I wonder what the heck I'm doing. Just have to make the best ride out of it as I can.
Thanks!~for the info. I'll see what happens with the 10-30.

 

I know this thread is kind of old but I thought I'd share this.

My friend has a Wrangler with this same crappy transmission and he had this exact same thing happen to him. Stuck in 1st but lever in neutral.

What happens is your gear selector pops out of the select lever inside the transmission. It's very hard to explain but here's my best shot.

If you pull your shifter out you'll see that tab at the very end of it. It's job is to push one of 3 rods down there. Looking down inside the hole in the top of the trans from left to right are:

Left = 5th / R lever.

Center = 3rd / 4th lever.

Right = 1st / 2nd lever.

You have to think backwards when looking down there.

Visualize, you push the shifter left and up for 1st gear which translates to right and down inside the transmisssion......


That shift tab is a crappy *** design and allows the gear selector in the trans to pop back into 1st when the tab on the lever has already fallen out of it's gate.

It took me all of 10 minutes once I had the right screwdriver and the lever removed to get his trans selectors ALL back to neutral. It's been fine since with nice, easy ginger gear selecting.

You just need to look down there and find the gate on the right that's in the down position. Push the clutch in to take any load off the gears, use a large flat head and push that selector back to the center.

Re-install shifter and be more careful and deliberate when shifting that crap *** transmission.

On a side note, I am picking up an 89 Cherokee tomorrow and have my fingers and toes crossed that it by some miracle is NOT the renault transmission. From what I understand there's a small chance it's NOT cursed with it in 1989.

Good luck to the OP.

Oh yeah, from what I can see of the shifter there's NOTHING you can replace to eliminate that from happening again.

 

Here's my best attempt at putting a graphic to what I am describing:

Looking down the hole after your shifter is out:

2
R 4 N
N N 1
5 3

**** the 2 above should be directly above the 1/n but I cannot for the life of me get this forum to leave my formatting intact.*****

The biggest and hardest obstacle is the "springey thing" that's just above the selector levers. All it does is bounce your shifter back to the 2/3 position when it's in neutral and you release it. That thing will by default center and block view of 5/R and 2/1 that you area looking for.....


In neutral it should look like this


R 4 2
N N N
5 3 1

 

Thanks!~for all the posts...there is a lot of great information here.


I had pulled my shifter out, moved things around with the biggest screw driver I could find and got the trans (BA-10/5) to start shifting again.


Took it back to my trans guy and to this day he hasn't told me exactly what was wrong with it. I have about $1600.00 with the new clutch and all.


It has real expensive trans oil in it now and it still doesn't shift real smooth.
Well I just happy it shifts and over 4 months now it hasn't locked up.


Funny they only used these manual transmissions for a short period of time.


The reason why mine failed to begin with is because the clutch master cylinder went out and my son power shifted it. I can imagine when the first time it got stuck in 1st gear he probably reefed on the stick and it still held up.


Up until that time the trans was great.
I got 165,000 miles on my engine and it probably will be the next thing to go.


jretzky

 

If fishing around in the shift tower with a screw driver got things working like normal again then there's only a couple things that could have really caused it.

1. Shifter itself worn out. What I mean is that rinkey-dink shift tab at the bottom end of your shifter worn enough to slip between shift rails resulting in stuck in gear condition.

2. The shift rails where that rinkey-dink tab sits, again worn out enough to allow the shifter dink to go where it shouldn't.

If that is all you're having trouble with then my recommendation is to shift VERY carefully and deliberately. Don't just go diagonal between gears. Move in a very deliberate H pattern and you shouldn't find yourself stuck in gear again.