Sticking in 1st. Hard time putting it in neutral

[TheBr0ken]

My son and I purchased a '72 Super Beetle as a winter project. The previous owner had an issue where he was stuck in 1st gear. He removed the engine and trans so he could send the transmission out for repair assuming there was something wrong with it. The repair never happened and I purchased the Beetle with the engine and trans out. What I'm assuming happens was that there was a bad shift from 1st and instead of going into 2nd the hockey stick jumped to the 3-4 shift rail without fully bringing the 1-2 rail back to neutral position and the 1-2 rail sucked back into 1st essentially trapping him in 1st gear while the hockey stick was in the 3-4 rail. We purchased a new gussetted hockey stick and new nose cone bushings/seals. The problem is that it's still having issues coming out of 1st. Sometimes it goes from 1 to 2 easily, other times it's stuck in 1st. I have to remove the fill plug to pop it out of 1st into neutral. This is all being done with the trans out. When I originally drained it I got maybe a cup of gear lube out of it. Looking into the fill plug hole I do not see any missing teeth in the synchro's.

Not sure what could be causing 1st to stick engaged and not allow me to put it in neutral. Any idea would be appreciated.

[Bruce]

Pull the nose cone off and look at the heads of the 3 shift rods. Measure the slots of all 3. I suspect the slot on the 1-2 shift rod is bent open a bit.
The slots should be 10.0mm. The tip of the hockey stick should be at least 9.6mm.
If you find the slot is bent open more than 10.0mm, place an M8 nut under the lower jaw and carefully tap the top to bring the dimension down to 10.0mm
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[TheBr0ken]

[goober]

A loose or broken shift fork?