jays8

To make a long story short i can't remove the shifter from the car. I was driving home today and noticed that it was very hard to get into 5th and 6th gear. I have had the shifter installed for about 10,000km. Then when i got home and went to back in, the shifter would not press down to get into reverse. The shifter no longer can be pushed down to get into reverse but, i can still get it into reverse, but it feels like 6th. i wanted to see if there was something wrong so i took the whole thing apart but the shifter would not come out. No matter how hard i pulled (which i shouldn't have to do) it wouldn't come out. Anyone else ever have this problem or knows what it might be? Its pissing me off!

dannobre

iTrader: (3)

There is a black cup the shifter sits in.....it is stuck under the spring that holds the "cup" up in normal driving. if you carefully turn the cup...so the spring will unwind...it will come out. You might have to turn the spring.....be careful and it will come out. I had this happen to mine...I was one of the early units..and the cups have been re-designed to be a bit bigger at the top so this doesn't happen.

Call RP and tell him what happened...he will send you a new cup if that is the problem....

If you can't fix it...come by..and I'll help you.....

jays8

i hope thats it because i tried pulling on it and it didn't budge. I hope i can fix this......and i hope its not broken..... i love this shifter.

Jay

Richard Paul

iTrader: (5)

I can't tell exactly from your discription but I think Dannobre may be right. The spring has turned around and jumped the retainer. (DazyGirl in Texas had this problem.) I havn't heard of doing it his way but it should work. If not you have to remove the retainer.
There is no other way it would stick down that I know of. Yet I havn't seen it all I'm sure. I think all of the shifters out there have the larger pivot basket it was only a very few that got out when we changed them.
The lower cup (at the very bottom) is a little different as about 80 were shipped with the Delrin lower bushing. They showed up as a problem on some cars mainly from forcefull shifting into reverse. They were replaced with a Kevlar part that has shown no problems. If you have the black lower bushing it could crack but I don't see how it would cause what you describe.

Let me know if you get it out by turning the spring and if not remove the retainer. If you have the black lower bushing let me know and I will send you the Kevlar one. Everyone is entitled to get the Kevlar replacement.

ucleadguitar

iTrader: (1)

I love my short shifter but I def wanna get my black cup replaced with the Kevlar replacement. I've been getting locked out of 3rd gear at 9k shifts from 2nd the past few weeks...wondering if it has something to do with the shifter or the tranny.

SiLVeRE8

iTrader: (8)

this same thing happens to me ocassionally... its not the shifter cause when i swapped back to stock it was still notchy, so i brought it to the dealers and they agreed that the tranny is defective.

ucleadguitar

iTrader: (1)

im 1000 miles into tranny 2...maybe they screwed it up when rebuilding it.

jays8

FYI, i got it fixed but had to take the whole retainer out and remove the spring.

Richard Paul

iTrader: (5)

This failure has nothing to do with the shift kit, it can happen with the stock one also. To prevent this see to it that the end of the spring is in the middle between tabs of the retainer. This gives it the most room to move prior to jumping the retainer. There really is no reason for it to move anyway but if it is ready to jump then being close will let it happen.

As far has been reported to us there has been around 4 or 5 of these incidents out of 700+ kits installed around the world. DazyGirl in Texas is the most documented one since another shifter owner came to the rescue and fixed it so there was talk back and forth.

None has happened localy so that I was able to see it. This is a Mazda part not our.