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Well, I spent the last four hours doing my DIY short shifter project and I just got done testing her out. Awesome!!!
I plan to put up a page on my website with photos. In the meantime all you fathers looking for something special to do on Father's Day here's the text breakdown.
You'll need a manual shifter and housing from the junk yard. I just happened to have one laying around.
Dissassemble the whole thing:
-Remove the three torx screws holding the shifter in the housing. Toss the screws, you won't need 'em.
-Pull the retaining pin that holds the lower ball to the shifter, and remove the lower ball.
-Pull off the shifter knob.
-Measure how long the reverse-lockout pin protrudes and write it down somewhere. Unscrew the reverse-lockout pin at the base of the shifter. It is threaded to a rod that runs up the shifter to the reverse handle and shift boot.
-Take out the reverse lockout pin and spring and take off the shifter boot and reverse handle.
-On the sides of the shifter mounting flange there are two slots where the plastic center portion snaps into the flange. Put a big screwdriver in the slot and push the tabs out of the grooves. Now you can remove the mounting flange and the plastic fitting from the shifter. What your left with is a shaft with a ball welded to it.
Now we modify:
-You'll notice that the ball has a little pin sticking out of it. With a sharpie mark the shaft where this pin is for alignment later. We will be removing the ball and you want to make sure you put it back the same way.
-Mark the shaft 1" above the ball. We'll be moving the top of the ball to this mark.
-Grind the welds down flush with the top of the ball and the shaft. Don't overgrind. You should be able to remove the ball by putting the shifter loosly in a bench vice balanced on the ball, weld-side down. Give the shaft a little tap and the ball should come loose. Don't pound the crap out of the end of the shaft! If a little tap doesn't do it you need to do a little more grinding to remove the weld.
-Once the ball is removed, get the rest of the weld off the shaft. I put my shaft in a lathe and it was easy to clean up.
-Now's a good time to check the straightness of the shaft as well. Roll it on a table and see if it is bent. Likely it is from forcing the long-throw shift into first, third and fifth. Straighten it if it is bent.
-We'll be mounting the ball to the shaft with a set screw. The set screw I used was about an 1/8" diameter by 3/8" long (not sure of that, just got what they had at the hardware store) and used an alan key to set it. You should get a set screw that is just maybe 3/64" longer than the thickness of the ball from the inner wall to the outer edge.
-Drill a hole for the set screw through the ball at the midline directly across from the little nubby pin. Tap the hole to accept the set screw.
-Align the ball with the two marks you made on the shaft earlier. The top of the ball up 1" from it's original position, and the alignment pin on the ball aligned as it was originally.
-Screw in the set screw until it makes a mark on the shaft. Back it out and remove the ball.
-Drill a little cavity where the set screw marked the shaft so that the set screw seats securely.
-When you screw the set screw in snugly it should be flush with the outside of the ball. You don't want it inset and you don't want it protruding. If it is inset, get a longer set screw. If it is protruding, Grind some off the inner end until it seats flush. Put some thread-loc on the screw and set it for good.
-Put the shifter back together. Be sure you screw the reverse-lockout pin back to it's original measurement.
Well, we've moved the fulcrum of the shifter up one inch. Easy, right? Now we need to move the mounting point up one inch as well.
-Dissassemble the junk yard shift housing. Save the two long philips head screws which hold the steel plate to the underside of the shift housing. You'll need another just like them as well.
-Cut the circular shift mounting point off the housing. I cut off about an inch to play it safe. You can use a band saw, or a recip saw and a vice.
-Cut or grind away all the excess crap from around the round portion of the housing. LEAVE THE SCREW MOUNTING POINTS!
-If you look at the UNDERSIDE of the piece you cut off, toward the center opening you'll see a flat area. Sand, cut or grind away all the excess crap till you hit the flat area. What you should end up with is just the circular mounting flange with the screw mounting points. It should be a little under 3/4" thick.
-Drill out the screw holes in the flange just large enough for the large screws you salvaged when you took the housing apart to pass through. If you make the holes too large things will get sloppy.
-Now we get creative. Get a 1 1/2" PVC pipe coupler. If you notice, it is the same diameter as the circular part of the flange. Cut a piece off to use as a spacer so that from the top of the shift mount in your car to the top of the shift mount you just made is 1". The same distance you moved the ball up the shaft. It should end up being a little over 1/4" thick.
-Take the PVC spacer and place it on top of the flange and mark the screw points. If you notice, the outside of the pipe overlaps the screw holes. You'll need to grind some small grooves in the PVC so that the mounting screws can pass by on the outside of it. Don't overgrind, the screws should fit snugly in the grooves when the screws pass from the new flange to the old flange. Again, we don't want things getting sloppy.
Remove the shifter from your car by removing the three torx screws. Keep them and the shifter in case you ever need to return the car to stock.
Mount the new short shifter using the pvc spacer, the mounting flange you created and the long screws you salvaged from the shifter housing. Conveniently they are the same size and thread and just the right length!!
Check to see that you can get into all gears, including reverse. You'll notice an immediate difference. Everything is much more solid feeling, no more slop. The diameter of the shift area is decreased substantially. This is especially important to guys like me with long legs who need to move the seat back to comfortably depress the clutch, but have to lean forward for 1st, 3rd, and 5th. The height of the shifter is the same as OEM--looks absolutely stock. Shifting with a short shifter feels like you are driving an up-to-date sportscar.
posted by 68.232.25...
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