Someone please tell me its not like this. I found this nightmare installation on a forum posted a while back. If this is how its going to be I'll be having it done. Read on:

My experience Installing the B&M C4 ZF (6 speed) shifter
Well, I read as much info as I could on this shifter. I kind of expected that dropping the exhaust and "knocking the pin" out of the old shifter would be the worst of it. I guess I expected about 3 hours (once I got the exhaust dropped).

1. Jacked up the car.

2. Drop the stock exhaust.

3. Removing the stock shifter: (what they didn't tell you in the directions) You have to use vice grips to get the "wedge" out of the shifter ****. Put a screwdriver in the grips and pound upward with a hammer and it will come right out. Forget the needle nose pliers the directions tell you to use. Its hopeless.
When you go under the car to knock the pin out of the shifter shaft remember to clean the boot first so you stay halfway clean. Then clip the boot with vice grips gently and tie the vice grips to something so the shift shaft is constantly exposed. This helps a LOT.
You have to put the shifter in 3rd gear (or neutral I believe) to see the shift pin. If you have it in 4th it stays hidden. When the retaining ring pops off it seems to disappear. First I thought it flew to parts unknown. Then I was convinced it went inside the $4,000 tranny. By moving the shifter back and forth it finally rode out on the shift shaft. I thought I had found god when I realized I didn't have to take apart my transmission!!!!
I had to use a sledge hammer on the drift to knock the pin out. It was really hard to hold it in place and pounding on that $4,000 transmission makes you very nervous. This was a tough job under that car. Real bad especially when using a 6 inch drift. I fashioned others with a grinder but they bent. Finally you get smart and start the pounding with a giant drift. Then once it moves you can use one that fits entirely inside the hole to finish the job.
Now the pin got driven out and disappeared! So, at this time I had a lost retaining ring AND a lost pin. Low and behold the pin stayed attached to the shift shaft and came out with the shifter. The retaining ring finally revealed itself a few moments later.

4. Preparing the new shifter:
I used a grinder to detach the old shifter from the shift shaft.
Then, surprise, surprise. Where the old shifter connected with a plain, faced, lubed surface, you have to connect to the new shifter with a "6 mm roll pin". The shift shaft is like a miniature drive shaft. EXACT LOOK ALIKES. And the directions say to attach the new shifter by driving a PRESS FIT pin into the bearing surfaces???? How could this be? Directions are clear though and I guess they knew movement would not be restricted by doing this. I am to find out later that this pin will restrict the lateral operation of the shifter (when in neutral).
On top of that the main pin (at the bottom of the shifter called "lower
bushing") that is going to accept the shift shaft and the "roll pin" has an awfully loose fit. Much looser than the old shifter. Its supposed to accept 0-rings though. Even weirder there are 4 o-rings. You would expect them to seal the 2 "tines" of the fork at the bottom of the shifter with some grease inbetween. . But when you insert the part the two inner seals pass through the tines and hang in no man's land between the two tines. So what about a grease seal? Forget that. Are these teflon rings means to ease friction? If that's the case why do two hang inside the tines doing nothing? I suspect this part is
machined incorrectly and that all four seals should perform some function. Probably "two to a tine" (with grease held between the seals). THAT would make sense. Something is wrong here.
ok, so you pound the **** out of the "roll pin" to get this whole questionable setup to attach to the bottom of the shift arm. High friction roll pin, with a loose lower bearing, and two seals adrift in no man's land. Oh, this put me in a good mood! I wanted to modify it right then and there but I need this car sometime this year and figured it would at least hold up for a few years.

5. Installing the new shifter:
Slips in ok. But remember that the notch on the shifter must face rearward! Don't screw this up. Be careful because there is a lot of work ahead of you. My shifter would not slip into the shift box without grinding down the brass bearings a bit. Remember not to lose your shims and to utilize them to take up all slack around then nylon bushings.
Get under the car and repin the shift shaft to the tranny. Start pounding with the sledge again. Only it goes in fairly easy. But when it seats it takes a few good pound to make it flush. Then slide the clip back over the pin. Its tight and nerve racking but it does clip on by some miracle.
Things are very, very tight down there.Don't snap off shift shaft!
Now install the reverse lockout. But, I ponder, and wonder, how the hell is this going to work? I mean, I am really perplexed. So you find out the it does NOT have a reverse lockout. Its got a tensioner that rubs against the side making it harder to go in reverse (cause you have to compress an additional spring to do it). But that's it. There is no reverse lockout!
So now you adjust everything correctly (the reverse "lockout") and check everything is smooth. Put the inner boot on. It would not seat on the left side for me. I finally decided to cut one of the interior plastic struts out of the way on the left side of the shifter. This is a big chunk of plastic that is about 1 inch wide and 14 inches long but it was impossible to seat the boot (and completely impossible to tell if it was seated or not) without this mod. So, I got the drill out and cut it out. The boot went on easily now and I could tell it was seated. This
modification does not show once everything is put back together. And who needs road noise and carbon monoxide entering the car? I wanted that boot SEATED.
The rest is uneventful (except that the red zip tie for the under car boot is too small to get on without going mad). Use your own.

6. Install the exhaust system.

....jumpin jesus. I put one in my Mustang in an hour and never went under the car. Any comments from those that know better?

 

That pretty much sums it up.

 

Said We Could Insall In 30 Min With Basic Tools And Ability... Had 3 Guys Two Of Wich Were Pros And An Entire Pro Shop At Our Disposal Install Time 6 Hours 435 1/2 Cus Words End Result Awsome Shifter.......the Ruber Boot Was The Fun Part ...

 

GET A HURST!

Ripper took my azz 7 hours to install on my day off at work,I grind 1-2 powershifting cause my timing is all off. I can't seem to get the shifing down when drag racing or practicing. Im killing my syncros trying to use it. I think I need a tranny now cause I can't time anything right anymore and its very inconsistant. I've had it for a month and daily drive it and im still not use to it.

 

It's not as bad as all that, lol. Take your time, and use your head.

I echo the Hurst comments. I have the Ripper now, but I am thinking the Hurst would of been a better choice.

 

We did four Hurst SHifters at Rex Ruby's garage in less than 8 hours. That included beers, some grinding on one exhaust system(it was being replaced with a new one and the bolts broke, so the torch and grinder came out),and a run to the parts store for something.

The instructions above are pretty much the same for the Hurst.

 

Well, I needed the ripper because its for the track (road race) and now I have it. Picked it up from the UPS store this morning. Danged if I'm going to put it in though. I'll have it done and pay. The other stuff (Drool) Hawk front and rear pads, russell bleeders, revalved Bilsteins from vette brakes, I'll put in myself.
Today at a friends we fabbed up a great harness bar. He's a great welder and it only cost me 235 dollars. I have the belts to put in too now.
Thanks for your help folks.

 

Have you driven a car with the hurst? My 1991 has a hurst and my 1996 has the ripper. I like the ripper over the hurst. The hurst is sloppy but easier to shift.

 

Easy install, by myself the Hurst took me if i remember correctly 3 hrs from beginning to pulling it out of the garage. I've also installed the B&M on another which was much harder to install and came with poor directions. I've never seen a Hurst sloppy and if it was than whoever installed it didnt use the correct amount of shims prior to tightening it up. If you wanted a looser shifter you could leave some of the shims out but most i've replaced I've used every shim I could squeeze it to make it tighter. To me B&M is just to hard to shift quickly though the gears and requires much more force. The Hurst is smoooooth... just like the golden years of muscle cars, amuch better feeling shifter. This is just my opinion though....do the install yorself , if you can put brakes on than the shifter is no harder, best upgrade you will make with either shifter. If you need help pm, or e-mail me or i'll give you my phone # if you have any questions, you can call me and i'll walk you though it like a surgeon performing surgery. Good luck G...

 

I've driven both and I prefer the Hurst, it's 1000% better than stock and much smoother than the B&M.

 

I rather the B&M over the Hurst. I don't think the install is all that bad. First one I ever put in only took a few hours, on my back with jackstands.

 

Put a Hurst in my '96. Took about 6 hrs, didn't drop the exhaust. Put one in a friends '92. Dropped the exhaust, took 3 hrs. Not a bad job.

 

The reason I chose the ripper was because for my application I need the ram type shifting for the track.(heavy force to move it). The Hurst shifters are great but IMO more of a serious street application although on the old mustang it worked very well.
The product looks good quality wise and with a billet stick shift **** a friend will fab up for me, should really help the balky stock shifter, especially when the tranny gets warm and the gears get pretty sloppy on track. I can't afford to hit second out of fifth gear. The result would be pretty catastophic

 

In an 89' vette yes,much smoother than my 95' with B&M. I guess i like it sloppy then

 

When I did my ZF Transplant for the Xfire, I had the Hurst available. Needless to say, much easier to do with trans sitting in front of you before going under the car. I think the HURST just shifts sweet. Very positive shifts, snic/snic. But smooth.