You will have to take off your own linkage and have a look, only because it is terribly hard to explain. Rotate the parts while its in front of you and see how it moves. On mine, if I rotate the handle up, at the halfway point, the linkage rod plate starts to move because of a metal tab that pushes on it. There is no way I can go past halfway upward without the linkage plate moving forward as well. I can move it backward freely as far as I want to, but it certainly moves the linkage plate once it is going upward. Are you sure the plate isn't open and needs to be closed back toward the lever, via the dark colored spring?