I was pulling out of a parking lot in my 98 S70 today (manual transmission) when I realized that something is wrong with the tranny. The shift quality has been very good since I got it in May, but now it's nearly impossible to get it into 2nd, 3rd, or 4th gear. The problem seems to have happend all at once, because it was fine when I drove into the parking lot 20 minutes earlier. Trying to shift normally requires a ridiculous amount of effort to get it into gear. Double clutching seems to help, though. I don't think it's the clutch of the linkage because I can row right through all gears with the car running at a standstill. I drove it straight home once I noticed the problem (about 20 minutes on secondary roads) and I'm not willing to drive it anywhere but to the mechanic in this condition.

So the question is this: has this happened to anyone else? Another stupid and expensive FWD problem? Any idea how to fix it? I'm going to call the mechanic in the morning to see what he thinks but I'd love to hear any input from you all. Thanks in advance for any and all advice.

Tim

P.S.- On the bright side, we still have the old 740 that I used to drive. 18 years and one accident old and it's still an absolute tank. Not exactly refined, but it's had fewer problems than any other car my family has ever owned.
--
Tim Smith 98 S70, 74k mi.