yeah i took them out i have one of the shift fork rods out already. i just dont understand why there is even a shift fork and sleeve on the top all i see that it does is engage the input to the shaft. maybe to put in true neutral.

That shift fork engages the low range, it will also shift into neutral and
high range.

In high range it locks the input to the shaft that runs all the way through
the T-case and to the output where the driveshaft slides in, in low range
it disconnects the long shaft from the input and powers the gear cluster
that is in the front of the T-case, goes through those reduction gears and
then transfers the power to the long output shaft, giving you low range.

You will notice the low range gears all turn, and is probably what you didn't
get with the front/top shift shaft and fork, but the low range gears are always
rotating in the T-case, every day just cruising down the road in high 2wd they
are turning, that's why I went to a lighter weight T-case voodoo juice to reduce
drag and improve fuel mileage

Wild

then why doesnt my front drive shaft turn if the low gears are all turning all the time.they are just free spinning on bearings which i think would not do much against the power. there is two different  shift forks what does the top one do. my understanding is the top shift fork is always engaged to the front input and the second fork puts it in 4high 2high then 4low.
 is that correct? BAck to my original question what would cause a grinding noise when putting the transmission in any gear and trying move forward. it is like it slips out of gear or just never goes in all the way into the gear. could it be a bad clutch if it happened while i was driving. feels like it just fell out of gear. it has made the grinding in every gear at sometime. so it is not gear specific. it has to be before or after where the power transfer is slipping and grinding.

The shift fork in the back/rear is the 2wd/4wd shifter, the front is high/low
shifter, and yes the cluster of gears are on bearings, at least on the short
shaft, the other gear on the long shaft gets locked onto that shaft when
you shift into low.

I bet you have a bad engagement dog, and just a little rounding will cause
the grinding you hear, this is from being run low on oil, at least that's what
happened to mine

ok so i got the top shift fork to shift up and down, but i dont understand how it can turn the shaft when it isnt in the right position. it doesnt contact the input teeth. so does it work?

There are two options here, I could show you how it works,
and I can try to explain it to you, but you need to understand
how the T-case works or it will be a mystery to you, so I would
suggest you purchase a new (used) T-case to solve your problem.

Short of that I really need to get a closeup look at the parts to
determine if there is some damage to your parts, and if there
is, you still need the replacement parts, and a used T-case is going
to cost about the same as the parts you need to buy

Wild

what type of gear oil goes into the tranny and the transfer case?

I made up a batch of slippery voodoo juice for the T-case, should work
equally well in a trans, 1 part Mobil1Synthetic ATF and 1 part Lucas synthetic
gear oil aditive, this makes a nice light slippery lube that is yellow metal friendly

Wild 

I just use standard 80-90w.  I tried running synthetic in my Tracker's transmission but it's a little to worn out and the lighter oil made the lack of good syncro's that much more noticeable.  I couldn't shift properly until the transmission warmed up.  So I went back to the straight 80-90 and have been happy ever since.