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With my FR-S, it's difficult not to grind the gears going from 1st to 2nd as well as 2nd to 3rd. It's as though the gearbox has no synchros. I'm not sure how these synchros were designed, but there should not be noticeable grinding with synchros (that's the whole point of having synchros). It's just frustrating at times. Often times I think it would be far better if they just put a real racing gearbox with straight-cut dog rings in this car, since it tries to behave like one except it's got some supposed "synchros" to get in the way!
Anyway, what works for me to not grind the gears and making relatively smooth shifts is to wait about half a second to a second before engaging 2nd or 3rd. The problem with this of course is that fast shifts are not possible (i.e., the gears would grind if I try to shift very fast). Another unwanted side effect is that by the time I manage to put it into 2nd or 3rd without grinding, the revs would have dropped too much, therefore I have to add more gas in order to make the shifts smooth.
With that said, I should point out that I've now put more than 2,000 miles on the car, and with the weather getting warmer, shifts seem to have gotten better. Either that or the gearbox has definitely "loosen up" due to the abuse...
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