BarryK

hi guys
I'm getting the car ready for the trip to Carlisle and one issue that has plagued me since I bought the car and i'm tired of it is the shifter rattle.

I have the hurst shifter with the chrome t-handle that looks like the stock shifter but it rattles like CRAZY when cruising on the highway and is BY FAR the loudest and most annoying noise and vibration to deal with while driving. It doesn't help that at highway sppeds my rpm's are pretty high because of the 4.11 rear gears the car has. It even overwhelms the volume of the sidepipes!
Between the shifter rattle and the overhead dome light rattle it's enough after an hour to want to stick an icepick thru your eyeball right into your brain to make the noise stop.......

I did a search on "shifter rattle" but the results I found seem to all be for the stock shifter.

Any suggestions on how to best eliminate or at least reduce the amount of rattle I get out of this shifter? ANY help is greatly appreciated!!

wmf62

strange, Hurst shifters are pretty solid and spring loaded. i don't know what to suggest, maybe it's just worn out; do you have the steel or nylon bushings in your linkage.

i used to get so aggravated with my old Muncie stock shifter rattling, that i would take my shoe off and hang the shoe over it (stops the rattle... )
Bill

BarryK

Bill
I have no clue what type of bushings are on it.

Of course I can stop the rattle by holding onto the shifter while driving but I understand that is not good for the syncro's on the tranny to do that not to mention the vibration in from the shifter gets tiresome very quickly that way

Glenn"Mr.Blue"Smith

I would guess it's not so much a shifter problem as it is a balance problem in the driveline (trans tailshaft or driveshaft) I'd bet that if you had the trans checked you will find a bent tail shaft or worn bearing on the tailshaft or that driveshaft has a bad U joint or lost a weight. Balancing the shaft is a cheap enough problem to fix I'd give that a try first. As was said, the Hurst is usually a 'tight ' shifter. Hope this gives you some food for thought. Hope it's not the trans! That's a pain and expensive to fix. Good luck. Glenn

BarryK

Gee, you are just full of good news aren't you glenn!

wmf62

with Glenn; the high driveshaft rpms necessitated by your 4.11 rear gear will make any wear, slop or imbalance that much more noticeable . i had a 65 once-upon-a-time that used to wear tailshaft bushings out. finally had a new driveshaft made.

btw, i wouldn't like to have to hold it all the time (i'm still am fond of the 'shoe' method...)

GUSTO14

Barry,

It seems all you need is a little something that will hold the lever tight and absorb the vibration at the same time. How about one of these...


Lowe's and Home Depot both carry very small diameter ones (the thickness of a pencil) that can easily be wrapped around the shaft and clipped to something to add a little tension. You probably have one lying around the garage. Try it inside the cabin first to see if it will do the job, then if it works, you can probably go underneath the car and attach it from below to accomplish the same thing.

I agree it is somewhat of an interim thing until you find the source of the vibration and eliminate it... of course the shoe trick will probably work too...

Good luck and I'll be looking for you at Carlisle to hear how the trip went... GUSTO

magicv8

Are you sure it's the shifter and not the linkage rods. I use old forged gm linkage rods on my Hurst shifter - not those wimpy things that they sell now.

I pack the pivots with washers to eliminate all end play and insert the GM spring loaded "Q" clips. That should even tighten wimp rods.

My old (bought used) Hurst makes no noise whatsoever after rebuilding 2 noisy GM shifters to no avail.

BarryK

Dave
I'm pretty sure it's the shifter. at highway cruising speeds it's vibrating like crazy.

I just took it somewhat apart and this is what I found:
unscrew the **** and there is a spring sitting on top of the T-handle sleeve part. remove the spring and the t-handle sleeve part slides off the main shifter shaft. under the t-handle sleeve is a small split nylon "bushing or sleeve".
That's all there is too it. I think that the spring is only to allow the t-handle to be lifted to pretend like it's a "real" type shifter although it's actually functionless and does nothing when you lift the t-handle of course as to put it in reverse you need to push down on the whole shifter.
I think the rattle is coming from the t-handle sleeve part simply vibrating against the main shaft - chrome against steel.

What I've done is take some duct tape and wrap the main shaft with it than slid the nlyon sleeve than t-handle part back on. i'm hoping that with the duct tape on there it should prevent metal to metal contact between the t-handle part and the main shaft and therefore eliminate the rattle.
After I go out for a test drive later today I'll let you know if it worked.

BarryK

gusto, can't do it - just too Bubba for me, even if I did use duct tape as described above. Besides, wouldn't having that extra pull on the shifter be bad for the tranny syncro's?

JohnZ

Yes, it will cause premature wear on the 3-4 shift fork. Wrapping tape on the plastic sleeve until the T-handle just fits down over it will stop the "buzz", and an O-ring placed between the bottom of the T-handle and the step in the shaft it sits on will also help - those two things will generally cure or reduce the buzz/rattle with the stock shifter too.

BarryK

cool, thanks John!
I guess my fix wasn't too bubba afterall.

GUSTO14

I definitely agree it's a bit Bubba...

If the bungee was attached laterally as opposed to fore & aft, it will have no effect on the syncro's. I'm talking about a bungee that is so small that it could probably only generate about 5# of pull. The main thing it would do is act to absorb the vibration. It has essentially the same effect as resting your hand on the shifter.

If however the rattle is coming from the "fake" reverse lockout (I have one of these on my '73 by the way and love it) as you've described, it probably would not quiet the rattle. It would only help if the rattle was in the shifter itself.

Good luck... GUSTO

ghostrider20

Barry -

Check your pinioin snubber bushing, there are 2 peices, a top and a bottom.

Pull the clutch, flywheel, driveshafts, and have them ballanced.

I suffered with the same problem, and did all of the above when the motor was out, not so much as tickle of vibration or noise comes from the shifter. I also shimmed up the linkage rods with thin copper washers to take out some play.

Mark

BarryK

between now and Carlisle??!! I think not!

pulling and balancing might be a goood winter project though

ghostrider20

Check the pinion snubber bushing at least, mine was shot, and I think the bulk of the vibration problem was that.

Mark

Chuck Gongloff

I HATE to bring this up, Barry, BUT...

With my 63, years ago, I had a HURST look-alike. Had buzzing episodes.

Put in a new repro 63 shifter and also had buzzing episodes.

Why? You're not going to like this.

EVERY time I had buzzing at highway crusing speeds, I traced it to an engine miss. When I corrected the fouled plug/wire, etc, and was firing on all 8 cylinders, the buzz would go away.

NOT what you wanted to hear, because I know you've been fighting a miss in your car. Chuck

BarryK

you are right Chuck, NOT what I wanted to hear..........except the miss issue i've been fighting is new for this season but the shifter rattling I've been dealing with ever since I bought the car so in this case I'd have to guess that the two aren't related.

now the balancing on the driveshaft may be an issue based on others comments, especially Marks comment that after he fixed the balance on certain parts he shifter vibration basically completely went away. Mine vibrates like crazy! Now THAT especially is something that i didn't want to hear as that may mean having to pull the driveshaft, clutch, and flywheel this winter. Than again, I may need to drop the tranny anyway to have it looked at since it likes to pop out of second gear all by itself so while the tranny is out the other parts should be easy huh?

looks like my winter projects lists is getting longer and longer, and longer......

Chuck Gongloff

You could try rotating the driveshaft 180 degrees. Easy to do. Just un-do one end (trans or diff) , rotate it, and put the U bolts back in.

IF you're going to do your trans, I'd suggest Tony. He did mine about 10 years ago. It's not that hateful to get it out. Chuck

BarryK

Tony rebuilds trannies huh? I'll have to keep him in mind. It's just the 2 1/2 hour drive there and back that is the killer.

I'm sure once I get in the middle of dropping the trans while on my back inder the car on jackstands I'll be doing some serious calculating how to afford a lift so the next time will be much easier......