Hey all,

I hate to post a new thread, but I'm having trouble with the search engine finding anything related to what I'm looking for, so bear with me.

I have a 2004 Z06 I got in December 22. It's got 133k miles and it was bone stock. I have put some mods on so far. The relevant ones being an MGW shifter and a Tick clutch master cylinder.

My first impressions of the shifter were that it was just super stiff. I test drove one other C5 Z before buying, but that one was fairly heavily modified and the owner said it may have had a C6 Z06 tranny, but he wasn't sure. The shift feel was not the same in that car. It felt more, "normal," to me. I have been driving manuals since I learned to drive and I had a C4 vette before this one. I feel like something is wrong here, because it is just super stiff moving it left and right. Most shifters self center super easily. Everyone knows how to check if you're in neutral, by kind of jiggling the shifter left and right and allowing it to self center. In my car, you can't jiggle it back and forth at all. If you move it to the 1-2 side and let go, it rebounds a little bit, but sticks. Same if you're not moving and move it all the way past the reverse lockout on the right. It won't self-center because its just so stiff/heavy feeling.

I did the anti venom mod already and my shifter box is definitely centered because of the install shaft that MGW includes. It should also be noted that it was like this before I made any mods to the car.

I'm struggling to figure out if this is normal or not. I suspect it isn't, but I just don't really have anything to compare it to. It's also super hard to search my problem because most topics reference a "notchy" feeling shifter and recommend the anti venom mod. I don't think that's whats going on here.

Is there something in the linkage I need to check or lube? Is there possibly anyone with a manual C5 near Concord CA that I compare my shifter to? I want to figure out what's going on.
Thanks for any help you can provide.

 

Ive heard of this, I dont know if the MGM comes with different springs that u can change to help with centering. If it doesn't ignore this.

 

Going to attempt to answer your question, and provide some of my own experience.

Several years ago I went from a C6 shifter with TMOD lower box in my 2001 Z06 to a MGW shifter. For daily driving I didn't enjoy it because of the high side-to-side force required for 5/6 and reverse gates. Ended up swapping back to the C6 / TMOD setup.

I've also rebuilt all the synchros in the transmission. In that process I learned more about how the transmission centers the shifter:

• For fore/aft centering, there is a spring-loaded roller ball bearing. You can shim this out with washers (anti-venom mod) to reduce the spring preload.
• For left/right centering, there is a spring inside the transmission which handles this. This spring can wear out / lose tension over time, and replacing it essentially involves rebuilding the transmission. Last I heard that spring isn't really available, though.
  • One of the videos on Youtube I viewed for my own rebuild talks about this spring:
    You Tube
    He talks about it more again starting at 30:45.

It's possible there is something in your transmission or shifter that is binding and causing it to not return well. Might be a little difficult to diagnose... I'd start with taking out the MGW and see how smoothly it moves by itself. Perhaps the rod in the lower box just needs to be lubricated where it goes through bushings (assuming you also have the MGW lower box).

Other shifters have springs that help with shifter centering. @666lisa the MGW isn't one of the shifters which using centering springs, but I believe Hurst does, and the Hinson does something else for the sake of centering. A little info on the Hurst shifter that may be relevant in this thread.

 

Honestly, it sounds perfectly normal for a C5. I've had a couple B&Ms, a TMOD lower box, and now an MGW. 55k miles on my trans as we speak and hasn't given me a lick of trouble. They all take quite a bit of lateral force and don't jiggle around in neutral. Shifts with a decent flick of the wrist while driving, but when it's centered, it's centered and there's no "wiggle room" *(badum tssss).

 

Yes ur right about the centering spring we could not find new one anywhere. He ended up buying the cover with the spring on it from salvage yard. The guy said no guarantee but it ended up working.

 

Thank you for the help guys. I suspect that internal centering spring from the video could be a contributing factor for sure. I think at this point, I am going to try to find someone near me with a manual C5 that will let me fondle their shift-shaft to compare

 

Moved to C5 Tech.

 

The spring in that video IMO has little to do with centering force. Keep in mind that most of the aftermarket short shifters are giving up a large amount of leverage to be a "short shifter", this is what everyone wants; shorter travel between gears. Some people want the shortest throw they can get, that would be the highest reduction ratio shifters, this is also going to require the most effort to move through the gears, because your giving up the most leverage. The more reduction, the shorter the throw the less effected the stick is by the centering forces in the gearbox so it's not going to center as well as the stock shifter or any shifter with less reduction. When you do that you give up leverage and make the stick harder to move, this also makes it more "notchy". These are just my opinions, I'm sure people disagree, if anyone would like to discuss details further shoot me an email I'm always available.

My best advice is to determine if you really care if it centers like a stock shifter, there is nothing wrong with it, I'm almost certain. Remember that the stick doesn't need to be centered right to left to be in Neutral, it doesn't matter really. Make sure the lower box is greased if that's recommended by the manufacturer. If you have already done the anti-venom mod you can probably tell that that has reduced the centering force of the detent. Keep in mind the more centering force you have ie; the better it self centers, the more you have to fight against as you move through the gears, with a high reduction shifter your not doing yourself any favors increasing the force required to move through the gears. again, just my opinion, shifters are super subjective that's why there are a lot of them.

 

Frankly I'm unsure how you can say that... that spring is the ONLY thing which directly contributes to centering force for left-right motion of the shifter.

I'm running your lower box, and have been for several years now. To start with, I'm not bashing your product at all, just addressing your post.
In the case of your lower box, I noticed right away there's a good amount of resistance to the lower box shaft rotating. Since this rotation translates to left-right movement of the shifter, then of course the shifter won't center as well because there's inherent resistance to centering (particularly compared to a stock lower box).

As long as there isn't extra resistance in the upper and/or lower shifter boxes (i.e. tight spherical bearing in the upper), then the length of shifter shouldn't make a difference on the capacity for the transmission to center the shifter.

I do agree with you that the shorter the shifter travel, the more you'll be fighting the centering spring (left-right) and the detent spring (fore-aft).