99 cougar 5 speed hard to shift into gears

[justthe6]

hi i have a 99 cougar with the 2.5 v6 and a 5 speed manual trans with 94 k miles. I havent owned the car very long but, it has been hard to shift into gears. It's easier when i am at low rpm/speed, but once i get going and try to upshift most of the time i have to force the stick to go into a gear. It never grinds whenever i have to do this nor does it slip.. its just really weird and annoying. Also it gets worse when i am driving and i try to downshift, it is practically impossible to get it to go into a lower gear but still it doesnt grind or anything. Putting it into neutral and pumping the clutch a dozen times doesnt seem to really be doing much for it either most of the time. If i am sitting at a stop and try to shift it through the gears it will shift fine with no problem, but that is really the only time it does. I was just wondering if anyone out there had the same issues or knew how to fix this problem. If you have any ideas i would love to hear them. thanks in advance.

[Davescort97]

First, check the fluid level in the master clutch reservoir. If it is full then you need to bleed the air out of the system at the slave cylinder down by the bell housing. If this doesn't help it the synchronizers inside the transmission need to be replaced. To rule this out double clutch it and see if it shifts easily. If you don't know how to double clutch you do this. Push in the clutch. Shift to neutral. Let the clutch out. Shift into gear you want and let the clutch out again. This will get the speed of the engine matched up with the speed of the gears inside the transmission. If it shifts all right the synchros in the tranny are bad and need to be replaced. Before you do this double clutching make sure the slave cylinder has been bled and has gotten all the air out of the system.

[justthe6]

hey thanks for the advise. i tried to bleed the slave cylinder right at the top of the tranny where the bleeder valve was, it didnt fix the hard shifting. The clutch resivour was full as well. I didnt have any grinding when going into the gears, it was just hard to get it to go into a gear. I went ahead and pulled the tranny out with the help of my friend and we discovered that the clutch disc was shot and half of it had disenigrated off of the metal plate part itself. we replaced the disc, pressure plate and slave and now it drives like a champ. thanks again for your help.