Bombing your neck...
hey, you could think about it like that!
Steve - today is the 1st I've read about this. I can't help you with your neck / spine. But I'm guessing I'm only about an hour and a half drive. Very soon (like some time next week) I will have about a month off. During that time I may be doing some traveling to see family. But I would be more than happy to take a drive up and help in any way I can, if I'm in MI. then, with the transmission install. Add my name to the list, and let me be one of the 1st guys you may ask, since I'm just a short jump away. Once you get to know me, I think it would dispell all the negative :-{} you and Doc have stored in your harddrive (brain matter) about me.
I guess I just don't know enough about your options to have an opinion, but regardless, I hope your outcome will be great. One thing to add about some back symptoms I had for a while (and still do from time to time). When working in college, I was working for RPS (like UPS). I was lifting 75 lb. tombstones (blanks), and snowblowers (boxed) over, and over, and over this one particular day. Of course I was trying to lift with my legs as much as possible, but both were hard to do that without a lot of bending cause of the large shape of the boxes. Anyway, while lifting one or the other, something in my back moved, and everything gave way. I was able to limp out and go home, but I was out of commission for a couple days. It wasn't as bad as it first felt, or I wouldn't have been able to walk the next couple days I guess.
For a few years after that, when I would be standing straight up, and like arching my back (like when in the shower rinsing the shampoo out of my hair) I would get an instant jolt in my back like someone poked me in the lumbar with a cattle prod, and I would almost fall down. It got real bad for a while, and would happen almost anytime I was just standing up. Went to the doctors, had MRI's, they never found anything. Certainly mine wasn't as bad as yours. Yours looks dang scarey, 1 cm is huge in this case. I eventually worked mine out on my own (a long story, this reply is long enough already).
Good luck with your neck / spine. And seriously, if you need another hand for anything, let me know. I've not installed a transmission and would like to see / help in the process.
- JyRO