I have a 97 sportsman 500 with a IV transmission. It will shift fine in high/reverse, but not into Low Range.
When I use pliers on the shift linkage on transmission it will move and feels like it is up against a spring and will spring back to normal location once I remove the pressure.
I'm guessing that the shift fork is not moving, locked up or something of the sort. And the spring pressure is from the shift shaft springs?
are my assumptions right?
I've tried rotating the input shaft and tires, thinking it might have been bound up.. but no luck.
Shifts fine in HI/REV and input controls output as it should.

Any ideas how to free this up without a complete tear down..

Oil is in the trans at a good level. but could have had water in it at some time in its life and caused a rust shifter?

I picked up the entire wheeler for $400, so I don't know the history.

Maybe a few good licks with a rubber mallet?

thanks

 

Try with the rear wheels raised and in neutral. Then while turning the wheels slowly see if low gear locks in using vice grips on the belcrank. If it won't lock in gear but the belcrank springs back then could be a dog gear or shaft problem. Even simple things like a circlip that jumped its groove can cause engagement problems. A lot of work to tear one down,but guess that's why you got it for 400 bucks. Normally these gear cases were the strongest on any Polaris but the po could have really jammed hard trying to get it in low causing the problem. Hope you don't have to tear it down but sounds like it unless it's stuck somehow and you can free it. At this point don't think you're going to hurt it any more if you use a dead blow on the belcrank. Might just help.

 

Thanks for the advice. I had already tried spinning the rear wheels to see if that would help free up the dog gears, etc...
I gave it a few good hits on the input shaft and it started shifting in low like it should.
Not sure what the issue was.
But now that it is working right. it almost felt like it was locked into low all the time or the shift rod was not properly aligned with the fork?
Now I have the Fork and dog gear clicking sound going in and out of Low and then at the end of going into low movement there is that spring feeling.. from the old style shift rod design.
Before I had no fork and dog gear click.. only that spring feeling..

anyways, thanks for the advice.. nothing like a little friendly tap to get things moving again..

 

Also try adjusting the linkage. Have it in neutral and loosen the lock nuts on the ball ends at the shift box levers. Remove the 10mm nuts holding the ball ends to the shift levers and remove the linkage.While still in neutral,no tension on the shift box,see if there is a lot of play back and forth. If there is that could be part of the problem.Adjust the ball ends to where they drop straight into the linkage arms with no resistance or pull. Tighten the ball end lock nuts,replace the 2 10mm nuts. This may help on shifting. I've had plenty of machines come in that I've had to adjust linkage when customers would lock them in gear.

 

All of my testing was done without the shifter connected just using pliers to move the trans links. I knew to get that out of the way for testing due to linkage adjust issues.
I've got it all back and adjusted and seems to be working. I'll have to do some more final adjustments once the bike is running. Right now if I manually spin the input shaft everything goes into gear like it should, without spinning the shaft it will sometime slip out.