Who's got a short shifter?

[SVOboy]

Has anyone done this to help with their shift speeds? The throw in my mom's camry is a bit of a pain in the *** when you're accelerating lightly, and the short shifter is only like 10 shipped for my car, so I've been considering it so I could slap it in before I slapped the whole linkage in.

[thisisntjared]

i like mine, the install was cake, and you could probably put it on your linkage before you even install it.

just make sure you get one that your sure you will like(dual/single/no bend) i got the dual bend and im happy with it. its not for everyone though, my gf doesnt like the way it feels. too notchy for her, but thats also cus i threw in the stabilizer bushings with it so its very much like a rifle bolt.

[SVOboy]

I still don't understand the difference between them, to be honest. I thought it was just that the dual bend sat back further.

[philmcneal]

my friend had a 86 lude, and before it got trashed I took the knob and put it in my civic...

looks so much better but i think the real difference is you have to reach lower to shift imo

[SVOboy]

Yep, that's been the arugament made before. If I was ever going to get into some serious racing I would get a truck driver shifter, they are awesome, but if I'm going to shift through the gears in a few seconds and very close together I'm going to end up leaving my hand on the shifter.

[philmcneal]

i find if you shift way too fast than what the syncros can handle then it won't be a smooth shift at all.

[SVOboy]

Well, duh, but I don't think I'd be able to shift fast enough even with a short shifter. You'd really have to rocket it to do that. I plan on being calm about my shifting, just reducing the throw.

[GasSavers_DaX]

A true short shifter will have more lenght on the shifter below the pivot, therefore a shorter throw is required to move the shift rod the same distance. Simple trig . Only problem is that it can misalign the shift rod and cause mis-shifts. To me, a properly designed short shifter would move the pivot point up to keep the shift rod alignment.

[SVOboy]

Would not that be a difficult feat to achieve unless one were willing to go beyond a simple bolt-in affair?

[GasSavers_DaX]

Yes it would, which is why most companies just sell their shifters with more length below the pivot and not moving the pivot up.

Honda actually has it right, moving to a more efficient cable shifter mechanism in their later model cars.