My gf just picked up a 94 civic lx 4-door and its been giving some problems with shifting properly. It feels like the throttle kick-down. Basically, it has a delayed shift as if your accelerating hard. The shift will be delayed but will almost always engage once you back off the gas a bit. Also, it seems to be shifting a bit hard whenever it shifts. 1st to 2nd goes to about 4200 rpm's before it engages. Basically, I've just started to work on it and would like some insight as to what might be causing this, and what might fix it.

The transmission appears to be from a wrecking yard, and the previous owner seemed to have half-***'d the front end a bit... such as a missing caliper bolt, no cotter pins in any of the steering, 1 screw per rotor, and no axle nuts. Also, when working on it today i noticed that atleast 2 of the transmission bolts were hand-tight. I dont know what the car's history is, but the recent work they put into it seems to be thrown together by nine year olds. Atleast now I know it has practically new front end (the wheel bearings were shot beyond belief). Any help would be appreciated.. Thanks.