Clutch, transmission or my imagination?

Maintenance/Repairs
,
1

I have a 2001 Silverado pickup truck with about 90,000 miles. Shifting at low speeds is becoming a bit difficult, with an occasional clunk. As I am financially challenged, and because I appear to be limited to chain repair shops (Firestone), I’d like to have some idea of possible problems, likely fixes and appropriate costs.

2

Oops. Maybe it’s obvious to those more mechanically learned than I, but I should have stated that this is a manual transmission. I’ve driven with manual shift for some 30 years and never needed any repair to either clutch or transmission, so I’m taking that to mean I don’t abuse them.

3

What is happening when you have trouble shifting at low speeds?

Grinding noises which result from a worn clutch?
Is this the first time for this particular problem?

I’m thinking the clunk noise may be from a worn u-joint after the clutch is re-engaged.

4

You haven’t told us very much. I had a similar problem and the cause was that the self-adjusting mechanism on the clutch cable had failed. The cure was simply to replace the clutch cable, a DIY job. You may be so lucky, maybe not. Give us more details please.

Also, I might mention that the chain stores, or franchises, are seldom the cheapest. Usually there is an independent transmission shop in town whose prices are significantly lower than any franchise shop. Check around

5

Thanks for the help. If I take it in, I’ll look for a transmission place first. Here’s some more description:

This is an intermittent problem. Sometimes it shifts easily, sometimes not. The shifting problem is becoming more frequent, more than 50% of the time now, and is requiring more force from me. It’s done this for a long time, but it was formerly minor and I discovered that if I (you’re going to laugh) just pulled back my floor mat, it then shifted nicely. Thinking that a floor covering was bunching up around the clutch pedal, I inspected. It’s not, so either I imagined the mat thing or my pulling it back took enough time for the RPMs to go down.

As for the occasional noise, it’s not a grinding but a mild metallic clunk.