Here I go and risk embarrassing myself by posting my experience with reverse lockout. Normally I wouldn't expose myself to scrutiny, only my experience might help someone else avoid an accident, so I'll risk the flaming from the mob.
On my "one and only" 170mph run, as I was accelerating, I was shifting from 4 to 5, and the tranny let me go towards reverse, despite the reverse lock-out. Keep in mind that I don't jam the gears quickly at speed, like someone might do in a quarter mile drag. Thats a whole nuther story, but not how you should shift at high speeds. This was a high speed run, done very carefully.
(Sidenote) Viper Days, and many other road racing schools, teach you to pretend the stick is a piece of glass, and don't ever push it hard, or you will bend the forks, and possibly chip gear teeth. And if you let out the clutch in the wrong gear, you may end up going round and round. So you approach the shift cautiously, and only let out the clutch fully if you are sure you are in the right gear. Thats not so important when you are motoring around town, you can always push the clutch back in, but its especially important when you are going real fast. So this is what I was doing, just shifting real careful, almost "leisurely", if you could call it that, without much force at all.(end sidenote)
As I pushed the stick forward, towards 5th gear, I could hear/feel gears grinding very lightly. I thought it was pretty strange, because the only thing forward of 4th, and with a very light tension rightward, is 5th! I pulled the shifter back towards neutral right away, and the thought crossed my mind at that moment the reverse lockout might not be restricting the shift into reverse. I tried it again making a very determined effort to go
straight forward into 5th with negligible rightward tension, and it went into 5th on the second try. The GTS was going pretty fast, but I wasn't banging on the shifter like an excited monkey. More like an excited hyenna. But I digress....
Whats the point of all this? Only to say that at speed, the reverse lockout may not have the same restrictive ability as it does at lower speeds, or may be overpowered by the nut behind the wheel. This could be because of tranny fluid affecting the operation of internal components, as it is spun off rotating parts and gererating more hydraulic forces than usual, or maybe from the rpms on the gear shaft, also exerting some unusual force on the gear sets or reverse lockout.
I really don't know, as I have never taken a Tremec T56 apart, and am not 100% sure about its internal design. Anybody here got a real good understanding of the T56?
One thing I
do know is, when you are going real fast, (or at any time for that matter) don't let your life depend on the reverse lockout working correctly. Some of them may not function perfectly, or may be overpowered unintentionally. I have several 160mph runs, and have never had a problem with reverse lockout, or finding 5th, on any of those runs.
None of these high speed runs were done anywhere near public traffic. And I told all the rabbits in advance to stay in their holes while I was passing through.
