-----Original Message----- From: Wally Plumley [mailto:wplumley@bellsouth.net] Sent: Monday, September 09, 2002 11:13 PM To: 928 Subject: [928] Re: Tech Help for Linkage Problem/Paint Humor At 10:07 PM 9/9/02, B T wrote: >Apparently there is a >linkage problem with the ball under the >shifter...Any gueses as to what I am facing here The front rod that holds the bottom of the shift lever is held on the forward end by a nylon-lined cup that snaps over a ball that is welded to the top of the torque tube. The nylon lining wears out, and allows the cup to pop off of the ball. The bottom of the shift lever is then no longer held in place, making shifting rather difficult. You can get it in gear by grabbing the lever near the bottom, rotating to the 2nd/3rd slot and then shoving the entire lever forward firmly. This should get you into third gear. Third is low enough to get the car rolling, high enough to allow a reasonable speed so that you can get home/to the shop. Or, if you are on a trip, you can get under the car and pop the ball back on, and tie a rope, bungee, belt, pantyhose, etc., around the shaft to hold the cup on the ball until you get a chance to fix it. Real fun with a hot exhaust! The cup must be replaced. Part cost is less than $35 from us, more from a dealer. Don't know what book is, but it will certainly be much higher than the fifteen minutes to an hour that most shops will take, depending upon how many of these they have done before. Most shops will drop the exhaust, but a really experienced mechanic can do it by feel. 1) Jack the car so you can work safely underneath. (Optional - drop the exhaust, which may be very easy or very difficult, depending upon how corroded the bolts are.) 2) Use open-end wrench to hold tube, another to loosen lock nut on cup. 3) Unscrew cup, counting turns. 4) Transfer lock nut to new cup. 5) Screw new cup into place, trying to get it in the same place as the old one. (You can adjust the vertical position of the shift lever at this point by how far into the shaft you screw the cup.) 6) Tighten lock nut. The cup should be positioned so that the lever has free travel side-to-side with no cup binding. The forward rod runs thru a rubber-mounted bearing just forward of the lever. If you screw this bearing up, the torque tube has to be removed to replace it! You can sometimes replace the plastic ring in the bearing from the shift lever position, but it ain't easy. Well within the capabilities of the typical DIY owner, but the second time is MUCH easier! Wally Plumley 928 Specialists From: Wally Plumley [wplumley@bellsouth.net] Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2000 8:25 AM To: 928 Subject: [928] Re: Shifter cup failure modes? At 01:05 AM 11/28/00, Jim V wrote: > The shifter cup failure is usually when the thing pops right off it's >little >ball stud,a sloppy shifter is a good indication of wear. > There are also plastic bushings in the shifter handle lower end and >the shift coupling at the trans has plastic bushings in it too so there's >a couple more places to look. > Or you could just replace all of the above and get like-new action. There is one more critical part of the 5-speed shift linkage that rarely gets mentioned. Just at the front of the box housing the shift lever, bolted to the top of the torque tube, is the support bearing for the shift linkage. This bearing is a metal housing surrounding a rubber support, which surrounds a plastic ring that supports the front linkage rod. Sometimes the plastic ring will break, allowing the linkage to move around too much. Using no more than moderate force, try moving the shift lever up and down. There should be a rubbery feel, with slight movement. If the lever moves freely for 1/4", then feel rubbery, your support bearing may be gone. If you suspect that the bearing is gone, you can remove the cover plates, peel back the heavy foam rubber and just barely see the bearing around the shaft. If the plastic ring is gone, you have a problem. The support bearing is expensive ($130 - 150), but that isn't the problem. The problem is that the bearing is pretty well impossible to replace without dropping the torque tube. BUT - there may be a way out! The shift linkage tube doesn't really move very much in the bearing. It should rotate a few degrees, and move back and forth a tiny bit. Measure the linkage tube O/D, and find a thin plastic tube that is an approximate fit over the linkage tube. Cut a ring from this tube, and split it at an angle. The ring should be as wide as you can get on the shift rod. Put the split ring over the shift rod, and work it into the hole in the rubber support ring. Glue the plastic ring to the rubber support, and lubricate the shift rod. Check for lever movement - it should be tighter. Note: If you plan to replace the shifter cup, do the cup replacement before you patch the support bearing. The extra movement will help with the cup replacement. You can also check for wear or damage on the plastic bushings at the base of the shift lever WYAIT (While You Are In There). Wally Plumley 928 Specialists