Azbola

Just to chip in, I've got an 01 plate 50 odd thousand miles and I get notchy first - second.

But I've never had an actual "crunnnch", I would suggest that these are two distinct things.

I always found that the "notchiness" went away if I changed up after 4K rpm. Changing up before this, or a little bit too, well, limp wristed and it felt like the next gear was kicking back,

NeoRS

Interesting. Many posts on here echo my own experiences. I have a JDM MY99, one of the first ones to roll off the line. Particularly noticeable to me is the 1st to 2nd crunch. I was so annyoed by the gearbox I did a bit of research and found that on the early models this was a common fault, and it was something to do with the gearbox construction. If I'm not mistaken someone had even quoted a TSB for the problem to be remedied but I cannot for the life of me find any reference of it now, as my research had only been done on my old phone, I couldnt open PDFs.

I then talked to a mechanic and he said the car probably had straight cut gears...and asked if I'd ever driven a ferrari? I haven't, and he replied that most high performance vehicles don't particularly have nice feeling gearboxes, but this is all in the interest of function, and kind of the nature of the beast.

I had the gearbox oil changed a month after I got it, the shifting felt smoother, but the crunch and some notchiness remained. Annoyingly despite my request for all Honda parts they used this:-

http://www.opieoils.co.uk/p-739-castrol-sm...sion-fluid.aspx

Which after starting when cold you lift up the clutch ibn neutral and there is enough residual drive in the gearbox to move the car forwards!! As the fluid is so thick....it disappears in seconds and sometimes is not that obvious, but still an annoyance.

I like the close ratio feel, the notchiness and clunks are not ideal, but after a years ownership I now just accept this feature and ignore it. It is a bare essentials car really, designed to perform, look pretty etc....I don't even have a clock in mine, have to run it on V-power, can't drive up some driveways road etc because of the gradient as the previous owner lowered it.

So it's all just part of the quirkiness that is my car now really.

lovegroova

Compared to the Ferrari 360 I've driven, getting the S2000 into gear on a cold morning is a breeze!

loftust

2nd isn't directly down...it's down and ever so slightly to the left.

Perhaps bearing this in mind will work for you

HTH

gbduo

Meh, I just go slow and gentle in the morning with a little bit of force and it is fine. Double de-clutching sometimes helps 1st to 2nd, but most of the time I can just rev the car up to 2.5k and change on cold mornings.

Just go very slowly and the gear will slot in. Don't rush.

NeoRS

"2nd isn't directly down...it's down and ever so slightly to the left."

LOL mine is down and slightly to the right. Worth a try though OP.

RichGS2k

mine has had a few minor crunches from 2nd to 3rd as though the pedal wasn't going down far enough. i solved this by moving my floor mat and now the pedal has full movement

Madfish

Mine is a little notchy from first to second, worse in the cold of morning... I kinda live with it, double de-clutch if it really annoys as this helps a little. Once warmed though she's fine, coming from a BMW it's a completely different kind of feel, so much more direct and mechanical, jumping back in the Beemer the other day made me realise actually how much movement there was on the shift. S2000 so much nicer to drive