Installed short shifter, now not returning to center
 

Ok, so i installed my short shifter today, (was a pain in the ass cuz i had to replace that huge lower boot with the 4 bolts in it (was rotted to shit), but when i had it all apart i looked into the neck of the transmission shifter hole, and inside i see a square peice of metal, with a hole in it (for the shifter ball), and a bar of metal (spring maybe) sitting over it, slightly to the driver side... the whole asembly would move pivot back and forth easily, and didnt seem to be sprung at all.

My origional shifter, would spring back to center from 1st and 2nd, (with a slight resitance to bring it over to the left to get to those gears) and a greater resistance to get it over to 5th and reverse. Now, there is still a sprung resistance for 5th and reverse, and coming from those gears the shifter centers, however it does not center when coming from 1st and 2nd.

However, when i push it lightly from center to 1st / 2nd i feel a bit of resistance, and when i push it back to center, i feel reistance, but it is about half of what is required to push it over to 1/2 in the first place.

Also, after pushing from center to 1/2 and releasing it seem's to slightly move back towards center, but then stops.... im thinking that it might just be the added resistance of the new shifter bushings not being all that fluid yet, but im not sure.

What are other peoples thoughts on this, preferably those who have installed short shifters in a car with working return springs.

Btw, the short shifter I installed was the mazdatrix one, and i have a 91 vert

The spring is too long, maybe.

When I replaced my shifter bushings, it took a few days of use before the shifter would spring back like it use to. Give it a few days to wear in and it should be back to normal.

ok, i just hope i didnt break anything when i put it in... cuz well, that would suck

what do other peoples shifter towers look like when they pull the shifter out... im just wondering if i didnt do anything i was supposed to when i put it in... i just kinda pressed ths shifer in there, seemed to click into place

My shifter does that. I bought the car from some guy who took out the bushings because he liked the "feel" of total looseness. When I replaced the bushings I found the shifter to not know the difference between being lined up with first / second and third / fourth when in neutral. Normal cars stickshifts seem to center on the 3/4 neutral zone but my FC's will settle there or in the 1/2 zone. It makes shifting harder because I can't just pop the stick out of second and automatically have it ready to stick into third; I have to manually put the shift knob into proper alignment with third for it to get in.

:confused:

i have the same problem, mine was when i pulled the shifter out, i broke the spring that hold the shifter ball in its place, cant figure out how to change that darn spring. The only thing i can think of is pulling out the tranny.

with the broken spring, does your still spring back from 5th and reverse?

cuz the guy at mazdatrix i talked to on the phone said it was all one spring that did both... sounded a lil odd to me though

There are three springs:
The one you can see just holds tension on the bottom of the lever to reduce the harmonic buzz at certain revs.
http://208.62.166.66/guest/pics/shift.jpg

The other two that center the lever are assembled in the tail housing.
http://208.62.166.66/guest/Shop_Manu...ft springs.JPG

Since they worked before they will again when the new bushings break in.

i have the SAME exact problem after i installed my short shifter!! it's kinda a pain but i'm getting used to it now. it's still 100x better than the sloppy stock shifter. it still pops back from 5th or reverse so i think it's the one spring on the other side that is worn out.

-jet-

would there be any way to test if those springs were ok by trying to move the square block of metal (that the lower ball of the shifter sits into) when the shifter itself is removed?

Actually using the shift lever is the best way to check it.

By the way - Is there any oil in that chamber?

yes, i know what everything looks like in there because i went and removed as much of the old oil as i could before fililng it with new oil (im anal like that :) )

As you can see, it's pretty simple.
The spring & plunger shown on the bottom of the illustration is the 5-R resistance.
The spring & ball on the right is the 1-2 resistance.
It has to be missing parts or too much friction somewhere?

my short shifter doesn't offer resistance between 1/2 and 3/4 but does on 5/R.

I like it that way.

It pops back to neutral on all gears

when i first installed it- it would pop back to the middle neutral at first but then it's like i stated earlier now. I much rather the way it is now once u get use to it. So i never bothered to look at the springs.