yeah my bad mechanic did have the trans weight land on the input shaft... he said it wouldnt hurt anything... i guess he was wrong. I dont know how to take a tranmission apart. i heard T56 are the hardest to take apart as well.

 

You are still not sure. The input shaft should have a lot of play in it assume its not all jammed up. This could still be a failed pressure plate.

If the front bearing failed then the grinding noise is the input gear grinding on the primary counter gear. These are very precision part and they will not survive even a single slip. I am not a T56 expert but on most transmission the primary counter gear and the counter shaft are a signal piece and that part is the single most expensive part in the transmission. It is not uncommon for the counter shaft to be 50% of the cost of a new transmission. In most cases it is not worth repairing a manual transmission that has a input bearing failure that caused grinding. It can be tuff to find counter gears used because as a general rule if the counter gear is good they the trans is repaired.

On older transmission you could let the weight of the trans on the input shaft although it is never recommended. Back in the day the bearings were through hardened and a small dent caused by the ball pushed into the race would just cause a small vibration. To save money these days bearings are case hardened. Think of it as a hard coating, now instead of a small dent you get a crack in the coating. Once a piece of the hard coating comes loose the bearing life in measured in hours.

In defense of the automotive world the case hardened bearing is harder then the through hardened bearing and will last longer if it is not damaged. Factory wheel bearings are still thorough hardened because of what pot holes do to them. Most mechanics do not know much about bearing design, I worked at a automotive bearing manufacture for 4 years

 

Lol, no not backwards. Fork behind the bearing instead of where it wants to be, fit into the channel like so.... EASY T56 clutch fork and throwout bearing questions - Third Generation F-Body Message Boards

 

I think actually had this issue on my LT1. I say think because I was able to align the fork without pulling the transmission. The slave cylinder did not have enough travel to make it work with the fork in the wrong position. I don't think he drove the car that way.

 

how did you align the fork? i will check this out as well to rule this out if it canbe done without taking out tranny.

 

With the slave cylinder out you can pull the fork away from the input shaft and then back push it in, I did this 3 or 4 times before it went in right. I really do not think you could have driven the car if it was wrong. My clutch pedal just laid on the floor. Once it is installed right and the slave is installed it can not pull back out.

 

yeah probably not... i honestly think im just out of tranny fluid, i will try that before buying master/slave cylinder.

 

Ok but just so you know bad master cylinder or low transmission fluid will not cause grinding on start up.

It depends on the sound but gear grinding will only happen in a working transmission while changing gears. Bearing grinding can be caused by low fluid but that is permanent damage to the bearings and will not be effected by adding fluid.

When a master/slave cylinder or hose goes bad you just can not push the clutch. The clutch pedal will be laying on the floor.

 

When the grinding happened i heard it near the front of the car towards the drivers side, it was like a swooshing/grinding noise. I just dont get how my bearings or clutch assembly would go bad after 700 miles of driving. So what exactly do you think is wrong with it? If its not low fluid/cylinder/master then could it be my tranny? I was going to sell the car soon,i hope its not the tranny

 

When I was shopping for clutches the internet was full of stories of china made clutches not lasting one month. I even read of failures while the people where still babying it for break in. I am a cheap guy but after reading those reviews I spent the money on the centerforce clutch. In many reviews there was very little support for the clutches, there is an assumed roll of the dice when buying them. Some work and some don't.

There still a lot of odd things that could have happened, a broken fork or a broken fork mount, a fly wheel bolt could have came loose or broken. If I could hear the sound in might help but I personally would not risk further damage. Pulling the transmission without pulling the bell housing is a pretty easy job. Once the trans is out it should be easy to figure out what is going on.