![]() Not going to look back on this job! What a PITA. ![]() This missing bearing might be why 5th gear disappeared. There was a rubber washer in the kit I got. ![]() Is that lever called the "shift adjustment pin" in post #16 of this thread? I didn't know what the little right angle lever was for so I pulled the tower off separately. I stuck my magnet way down inside trany and nothing came back with it. There was no sign of the old bearings or cage when I opened it. It was in there so good the tacks would break off and take some race with them. Nothing to grab so I tacked some welds to the inside. Might get an answer to my rubber washer question.ĭamn that was just as nasty as some of the pics I've seen. The adventure continues here at Forgotten Fiberglass.I posted some of this in my first TDI project thread.īut it seems like the info would be better placed here. Hope you enjoyed the story, and remember gang… Great thanks goes to Mike Wittman for sharing this “how-to” article – something he has used as a reference on how to convert a column shifter to a floor shifter since the magazine article came out in 1960. We had some challenges because this car is actually a mid-engine car with the shifting mechanism in front of the engine/transmission, but this involved just a reversing of the mechanism described in this article.īut the good news was that we followed this article and the shifting mechanism worked – and is period correct for installation in a 50s type sports car build. Great friend and master fabricator Ben Emerson converted a column shifter to a floor shifter as part of the restoration of our 1937 Gougeon Streamliner. And with that you’ve got yourself a stick that’s slick, quick, terrific. The unit may be positioned further forward or back simply by using a u-clamp that corresponds to the girth of the tailshaft at the desired bolt-up point.įor neater appearance in the driver’s compartment, a rubber bellows starter pedal boot – such as on a Chevrolet truck – can be slipped over the stick and positioned on the floor mat. One of the desirable features of this conversion is that the stick is centered on the tunnel, thus allowing plenty of room for the driver’s legs. When the unit is finally installed, a small section of the floorboard is removed to permit the stick to travel without obstruction. The clevis permits correct positioning of arms so that the shift selector pin will travel from first-reverse arm to second-third arm without binding. When making shift rods to connect shift arms with selector arms, us 3/8 inch cold rolled rod and use an adjustable clevis. To prevent the unit from slipping on the tapered tailshaft housing, an angle bracket welded to the u-bolt clamp is anchored by the transmission-tailshaft bolt. When purchasing the assembly, make sure it is complete as shown in Photo 1. Also, needed are a hacksaw, welding equipment and a 3 or 3 and ½ inch U-clamp, depending on where the floorshift assembly is to be mounted on the transmission tail shaft. What’s more the stint should prove especially appealing to rodders whose funds are more limited than their energy.Īny post-’40 Ford column shift assembly – readily available from the local junk yard – can be used for the conversion. The Charlotte, Michigan mechanic has come up with a neat floor shift setup made to fit any column shift car with two selector arms on the transmission. Hine’s latest brainchild is, to be sure, a good bet. When Oliver Hine isn’t building a rod (R&R, April 1959), “Hine’s Varieties”) or off copping a Best-in-Show trophy somewhere, you can bet your fan belt he’s probably up to one of his old tricks – namely, conjuring up a new adaptation that will serve rodders in good stead. What could an enterprising young man do to get what he wanted? Well that’s the right question to ask, and today’s article shows you exactly how this problem was solved. But yet a more common train of thought was that you were making your car more “sporty” – exactly what the sports car was meant to be if you were building it from scratch.īut the bulk of Ford parts available were post 1940 with column shifters. So in a way, if you wanted a floor shifter for your sports car, you were making your car seem “older” and not necessarily more modern. In fact, if you were using Ford components, they had changed from floor shifting transmissions to column shifting transmissions in 1940. If you were building a car in the mid 1950s, the current “state of the art” was a column shifter. It’s interesting to look back and think about what was “old” and what was “modern” in the 50s.
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