...and it was a pretty lame one at that.
After a few hours of wheeling with a friend (in his Bronco), we finally came to a flat dirt road and I figured this would be a good time to teach my son how to drive a manual.
I put it in 4 low and he had an easy time with it.
I decided to put it in 2 high to make him work harder. We did everything correctly.
Stopped the Jeep.
Put it in neutral.
Put the transfer case into 2 high.
No grinding, popping, or anything else strange.
All I had was neutral in the transfer case.
The guy I was wheeling with also happens to be a mechanic so he slid under to take a look.
It turns out that a plastic grommet that holds the shift cable in place had broken so, a pair of zip ties later and I was able to get 4 High (enough to get me off the trail) and then 2 High (to get me home.)
It is a $2.00 piece so I ordered 10 of them.
Lessons?
1: Always carry zip ties
2: Never wheel alone
3: Don't panic.
Could this newb bother someone for a pic of said grommet location and/or zip tie fix? Itd be too embarrassing to have this happen on the trail and not know this simple cheap fix!
Sounds like you had a minor mishap. I wonder if anyone sells something better to replace this weak part?
Good thing it was a cheap and easy fix. One of my first trail carnage tails from a little over 20 years ago involves a 1989 YJ , a tank trap, a much younger me, too much skinny pedal, a bent front bumper and a mangled leaf spring shackle. I had to cut a section of a leaf spring with a hack saw and hand drill holes in it to fashion a temporary shackle to get me home. Live and learn - now I carry a cordless drill when I wheel and never seem to need it.
On my last two JKs I have gone from 4hi to 4lo and back again countless times at a dead stop. I think that sometimes it may be easier if you're rolling a bit, but there is no reason it can't be done at a dead stop.
We cut a rear brake line this year in Moab, on a Sunday, 30 miles from town. I sealed it the best I could with Gorilla tape and half a dozen zip ties I to stem the loss of fluid then topped off the reservoir, then headed to town, manually shifting the auto to compression brake and using the e-brake as needed. We got to town to find no one that was open had a Jeep brake line but the great crew at O'Reillys opened every brake line box they had until we found a reasonable fitting match and I bolted it on. The next day, a holiday, we found that Moab 4X4 Outpost was open. In 90 minutes they snuck our Jeep in to the front of the line and had us back on the road with the right brake line. Awesome guys there!
For the future I need to find some fitting/caps that can close out that corner of the brake system to keep in the spares box. When we got back home I made sure that there was a spare brake line that I could use front or rear if need be in the Jeep box!
So no technical explanation why right? It's not a rolling vs stopped thing. It's gonna grind if the teeth aren't aligned. Forcing it is when the plastic bushing breaks, or as in the OPs circumstance it just happened to break without forcing it. You can roll at 1-3 as long as you like thinking that's the way it "has to be done." Rolling doesn't keep the bushing from breaking. You can slip it into 4L without grinding easily without hurting a thing.
Not every time, which was my point. If the truck is not moving and the gears are aligned just right so that they don't engage nicely, that won't change if the truck is not moving. It may only happen one time out of twenty, but it does happen.
Guys,
The plastic bushing breaks because it is plastic.
It rests very close to the transmission (heat) and after a while, the heat simply makes it brittle.
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