Great, and thanks Gomez for the DIY on the sifter, it will be on my garage PC while I do the install later today.

 

Don't forget to remove the green fluffy stuff. Don't screw the shift **** down too tight after re-assembly. Undo the screws counterclockwise!! Be careful not to drip oil on your seats. Take your time.

Cheers.

 

even when you take your time..45 minute job...

 

I don't remember if anyone got number two. I do know that I stopped putting numbers on them after #12 or so. Just no flat surfaces to write on.

Wait...............Philodox got #2. Number 1 was different in that it followed Mazdaspeed design with the spacer under the 4 bolt tower. That was a pain to install and raised the lever 10mm. It also doubled the gaskets that can leak because you installed them and disturbed the factory seal. Then there is the extended dowel pins which is not the best design.

Therefore we redesigned the whole thing after number one. It was and is on a local car. A one off and we don't care much about it.

I'm not going to tell you how we eliminated the 10mm spacer plate, just say it's magic. BTW we have the exact same reduction as Mazdaspeed within a % or two. I think ours is more reduction. Then of course there's feel, we don't need to go into that because everyone on this thread knows it.

Funny thing is how hard we had to work on the Honda S2000 guys to convince them that we could improve the factory feel. I finally told them I would not bother to make it. Then we made nine prototypes and put them out there. Changed their minds. It's amazing how much the magazines have convinced everyone that the S2k had the worlds best shifting gearbox and they all got defensive about it. They told me to go read the magazines.

 

Install was a breeze, less than 45 minutes didn't break any tabs and the shifter is as good as people say. The only thing was my leather boot didn't have any green fluffy stuff? Maybe my first batch (5/03) didn't come with it??

 

That's one we haven't seen before. My car was built 6/03 and it had one.

I think yours was just someone went to lunch early.
Or they knew it was you who would get the car and hates you.

 

i just want to point out somehting about the increase in noise.

you had a long stick attached to a machine that vibrates at a certain frequency. the stick is made out of various materials- metal and some form of plastic. you are quite used to this noise as you hear it every day.

you take that one out and you attach a shorter stick. now you have a shorter length plus its made of a different materials. so the frequency of the vibration is now changed. of course its going to sound different. its like striking two different size tuning forks or turning a tuning peg on a guitar. you get a different sound. live with it for a little while and you'll be used to it.

 

Not really where we're at Charlie.

Richards shifter is the same length as the original (give or take a bees dick). The original shifter incorporates a rubber isolator that dampens noise transmitted up the shaft. Without that isolator, the Axial Flow shifter is at a slight disadvantage, noise wise. The factory shifter is almost silent.

The noise minimisation methods we've come across effectively overcome this problem. Not having the isolator gives the Axial Flow shifter one characteristic that everyone loves....the rifle bolt type action.

The snick-snick factor, I call it...

 

yeah.. my leather boot never came with the green stuff either.. ive looked, and there is deffintly nothing green the first time i took apart the console, and there wasnt anything when i put it back

 

you people with no green stuff need to get to the dealers... damn one more problem with are car....

i bet ya bluesky has not green stuff.

beers

 

So, just to clarify before my install. You should remove the "green fluffy stuff" that acts as an insulator for the factory shifter to REDUCE the noise with the RP/AFE shifter?

Just a little confused about the logic of removing insulation to reduce noise. Seems like this would increase noise??

 

It works, why argue? I really never understood either.

Just consider that it was discovered by people down under where everything is backwards.
They call the place "Oz" and I think they have yellow brick roads.
There's a guy named "Gomez Adams" with a butler named "Lurch".
He tests his shifter installs with a stand alone hand he keeps in a box.
I rely on him to give me only the truth about the shifter, yet he lies about a check every month that he claims he never gets.

So don't feel confused by something so simple as a green fuzy thing. Besides it is easy to try it both ways for your own A/B testing.

 

It's not that I don't beleive it, it just seems strange to remove insulation to reduce noise.

 

its noise from vibrational contact. remove it no vibration transmitted. im not bothered by the"noise" so i havent removed mine yet

 

In 2004, I started a thread to encourage Richard Paul to build a short shifter for the RX-8. Here is a link to that thread....

https://www.rx8club.com/series-i-aftermarket-performance-modifications-23/rp-short-shifter-get-queue-42601/

The following is from post 498 in that thread:

So, remove the green fluff, don't do the **** up too tight, leave a small gap between the **** and the faux leather shift boot and see how that goes for you. The green fluff isn't there for noise reduction, the isolator in the original shifter does that. The green fluff is there to pad out the shift boot and reduce the wrinkles. Purely cosmetic, IMO.

Cheers

 

I ordered an RP Short-Shifter thru PayPal over two months ago and have not heard anything since. Is this the normal delay everyone else is seeing?

Thanks,
Darrell

 

uh, no

 

I received an email concerning this matter just 2 days ago. Like you say, it's 2 months after the fact. We've been searching our shipping confirmation files and we have found the shipping label carbon in the ledger. Therefore we know it was shipped. However at this late date it's impossible to find the US postal receipt. We only keep those for 1 month.
Since our policy falls short of responding to delivery failures with this extended time. I'll bite the bullit on this and send you another one. This time if you don't get it in one week, contact me.

 

What sort of customer service is this? Sooooo unrealistically good???

RP - I think the world needs more business like yours.

Still enjoying the shifter after so many track days I think it is about 15 now.

 

Great...thanks. Do you send out tracking numbers when you ship?

 

no kidding.

 

How far of a gap should you leave between the **** and the leather boot? Does the tightness of the **** (or the positioning on the threads up/down) have any effect on performance of the shifter?

 

I'm sure when Gomez gets up he will tell you. However I think he may have comments on it in his DIY. I think there is no rule for how much gap there is, just snug the **** down, don't tighten it until it screams.
Don't forget to remove the green fuzzy thing.

 

Send him mine it should be comeing back to you Thusday.

 

Q1....1/8" is sufficient.

Q2....too loose, and the **** will rotate in your hand while shifting. Not good.