Okay, so now I'm thinking I will take the rods off the tranny and find neutral the way you described. But then that leaves me wondering, when I find the transmission's neutral, when I hook the rods back up then wouldn't the gear stick be out of neutral?
Do you mean by the gear stick? If so then no, I left that part completely alone, the only thing I did was take the rods and their connectors off on the transmission side, one at a time.