Is there any way to remove the shifter housing (the section on the top of the tranny held on by four bolts), without removing the complete tail housing?

If not, how difficult is it to remove and then reinstall the tail housing with the tranny in the car?
Thanks

 

It comes off with the extension housing.
The selector rod runs through both.

Download & print want you need,

My link to the PDF file for the tranny.

It's on page 5.

The extension housing is tricky enough to remove with the tranny on the bench.
To get to it you still have to pull the exhaust & drive shaft.
This is one case where the Haynes manual is more helpfull than the Mazda manual.

You can try it, but allow time to pull the tranny if you get stonewalled.

What are you trying to fix??

 

My guess would be he's trying to replace that funky shifter spring.

 

You can do that by feel with everything in place.

 

Some ham fisted mechanic who worked on the car before I bought it, snapped off two of the three bolts that hold down the shifter from the inside. You know, the part that is metal on the bottom and has the small rubber boot that fits tightly over the shifter.
I tried drilling them out and it didn't go well. I could still try and tap them out, but I think it is going to be difficult.

So, what you are saying is that it is going to be very difficult to try and remove the tail housing without pulling the entire tranny. I can do that, I would just like to do this the easiest way possible.
BTW, I have both the Haynes and FSM. I am pretty handy with the car. I have had trannies out, just never pulled one apart before.

 

If you could pull the part the shifter tower sits in, then I could pull just the housing. It is held in place by a roll pin. But, you can't get to the other side of the pin to drive it out.

 

It's not that hard. Pretty much just follow the FSM.

There is one thing it doesn't tell you. When you begin to reassemble everything, make sure the shifter heads are ALL in the middle position. Each shifter head can be in one of three postions: in | middle | out. Here's a pic of what I'm talking about.



Then when you have everything assembled, make sure you can shift into each gear and that neutral works. When in neutral, you should be able to spin the input shaft and hold the output shaft fixed. Always good to do a functional checkout before you stick it back in the car.

I know it looks intimidating but surely you can do it--just go for it.

HTH,

Scott

 

So that is with the whole tranny pulled though right?

 

Really? It looked to me like it wrapped around the shift rod thing (forgive me, I don't know the real names of some of the parts) so you'd have to drive out the roll pin holding the cube shaped part on (where the ball of the shifter goes.)
I had a hard time the other day removing it from a trashed trans I have in my basement... You kinda have to twist it a little. I don't know if you have room to do that on-car.

 

Yea I've been thinking this would be pretty hard to do with the tranny still in the car--if it is even possible at all. I'd drop the tranny and have some room to work on it--should be pretty straighforward from there.

And when I removed the split pin from the square receiver inside the shift control box, it was a major PITA, ended up drilling it out.

While you're at it go ahead and replace the front/rear seals, and shifter bushings. And hey, if you need a new clutch...

 

Yea, there is the problem exactly. Where do you stop? Why pull the tranny and not replace the clutch?