17.5 hp Yard Man Model- 13AN771G729 42" Not going into Forward

[Pinckney12]

My mower has slowly been getting harder to get into forward gear since last fall. Now the R-N-F shift lever clanks when trying to shift forward but doesn't engage. When it started getting bad I could put pressure downward on the lever and it would go nicely into gear. On the rare occasion it goes into forward gear, engaging the mower blades disengages the shifter.
Reverse works fine.
What makes this more than an obvious transmission problem is that I had this happen 5 years ago when the mower was < 2 years old. The mechanic called me after an hour or so saying it just needed a minor adjustment to the tranny linkage. Thing ran like new since then.The symptoms now are EXACTLY the same but the new mechanics are at a loss other than telling me to try a new ($1500) transmission.
I can't be the only person this has happened to .
Anybody out there have the same issue and do you know how to fix it?

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[ILENGINE]

Possibly a bent shift fork in the tranny. If the guy wants $1500 to change the tranny he is ripping you off bigtime. The tranny list for $328.70 even at $100 an hour it should still be under $600.