Date: Sun, 09 May 2004 09:42:13 -0400 From: Hans Lellelid <hplnospam> Subject: Re: gear shifter broke!
Hi, > In article <u7Ekc.36526$f_5.5000nospamread01>, hplnospam spouted forth > into alt.autos.saab... > >>Has anyone had anything like this happen? I'm thinking of trying to >>find a piece in a salvage yard, but if this piece just gets brittle and >>snaps with age I might be better off trying to find a new one. >> > > Not happened to me, but I have heard of it before, only once, and when > at parking speed, in a busy street, trying to switch from 1st to reverse > and back again. Well, I am a bit surprised at the new design (91-93/4) of the shifter. I ordered the replacement shifter from saabsite and it also had these couple welds that held the shifter rod to the metal ball. Thankfully I was able to just assemble and drop the replacement it in where I pulled the other one out (in neutral). It does work now, although in general the shifting is now a lot firmer / more resistance (it used to be fairly effortless to switch gears, except when it didn't want to actually go into gear). At first I thought that it wasn't sufficiently greased, so I added more grease (perhaps its the fact that I used general purpose lithium grease?). Since it seems to work fine, I'm not really worried about the resistance -- figure it's probably partly needing to wear in a bit (and I'm getting used to it) and partly the fact that rubber parts had all corroded on the old shifter & as a result there was a lot more play. I'm just impressed at how easy it is to replace the shifter. After reading about short-throw installation in other cars, I can say that I'm glad this happened on a Saab 900. Hans