For some time my '92 244 (non-turbo, M47 transmission) has shifted into the lower gears with some difficulty. A friend suggested I renew the gearbox lube, which I did months ago, and later we shot a tube of molydisulphite (?) into the mix. Neither remedied the problem. This past Saturday this friend and I put a new clutch disk, cover, release bearing and pilot bearing in the Volvo, thinking that might correct the problem. In fact, with the new parts installed the tranny wouldn't let me shift into any gear. Adjusting the clutch cable had not effect.

We actually dropped and installed the tranny three times: once to install the new parts, again when an op check revealed that the problem had gotten worse, and a third time when we realized we'd forgotten to install a ring on the tranny input shaft.

My buddy, who's actually the brains and brawn in this operation, says that the clutch is grabbing. He's going to talk to some mechanic friends and see what they say, and hopefully get some good advise.

We actually made matters worse by, we think, dinging what the Haynes manual calls the ignition timing sender. The sender sits just above the flywheel. We think we whacked it when installing the tranny. The first sign of trouble was a difficult start and idle after the third tranny drop and re-install. (With the ignition timing sender removed the engine wouldn't turn over at all.) (The engine ran fine following the first operation, when we drove around in 1st gear on a test drive.)

Any advice would be appreciated.

Stu Craig