Elantra won't engage reverse
 

2004 Hyundai Elantra 5 speed Manual. it is not easy to engage the car into reverse.

The shifter does go into reverse gear. Backup light would also be on. But the car just won't move backward. Sometimes I have to try dozens of times for it to engage reverse. After lots of trial and error, I found out if I put the shifter into 3rd gear first and immediately into reverse, the car would engage reverse a lot easier. It feels like by doing this way, when I move the shifter into reverse, it actually "click" something and the car would engage reverse properly..
I have took the car to a mechanics and he replaced the shifter bushings. But it doesn't help with the issue. I still need to put the shifter into 3rd then reverse gear to get the car move backward.

Some people told me that the transmission might be bad and need to be replaced int the future. I just feel like it is not the case. I believe it should be the shifter system.

I am wondering if this might happen to any of you guys before. Or if you might have experience what might be the cause of the difficulty in engage reverse. Thank you

@laofan what ended up resolving this?

The above post is from May 2018 and they may not be checking the forum .

I would suspect there was a problem with the shift forks or synchros inside the trans. Harder than correcting that problem is getting the trans out and in.