Last night I was driving my friend home. During the trip, I noticed that all my Odd gears felt weird when I shifted into them. It felt like it wasn't going into gear but when I let out the clutch it was in gear. Next we stopped at the local Blockbuster to rent a movie. When trying to back out of the spot I was in, it would not go into reverse. My reverse lights were on but it was just making a grinding noise. Reverse finally engaged and we were off. I was very upset because of all the people at the movie store pointing and laughing. Next we went on a long straight where the speed limit was 55. Going the speed limit I went to downshift out of 4th to 3rd to slow down for a stop sign. To my horror all of my Odd gears were gone. It wouldn't shift into any of them. So I drove home in 2nd and 4th. I have a Hurst shifter, and i checked to see if all the bolts were tight on it and they were. Also now with the car off it freely shifts into all the even gears without the clutch. What do yall think the problem is? :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

 

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/zerothread?id=579904

 

I don't think it is the Hurst, because i only have about 1500 miles on my Hurst. My hardtop has 48,000 miles on it, and only 5,000 are mine. Also at the track my car was forced into reverse at 120mph (NOT BY ME!). Reverse didn't engage but my reverse lights flashed.

 

Some of the gears have components in common. A sequential failure of the gears in not uncommom. You are going to need a major rebuild.

 

When you said you checked the bolts on the Hurst, which did you check? Make sure you check the front & back stop screws before you do anything else. My friend's Vette w/Hurst did the exact thing you are describing so give it a shot.

 

I am no mechanic, as you will soon deduce, but here is a thought...
I had a similary problem, though at the time if I double clutched it and worked it back and forth into the gears it would finally go with a good "cha-chunk" This was almost exclusively for 1st and revers especially, though third was clunky.

To make a long story short, this was after the dealership had to replace all the synchs and my third gear under warranty, this problem ended up being the ?bushing?collar? something or other around where the shifter met the tranny (someone clarify).

Good luck!
If worse comes to worse, you could look at this as a chance to upgrade to an M12?

 

Jimmman,

Please be fair - and more informative. I'm sure right now you are pretty ticked at Hurst because you feel like they caused your tranny failure and someone at a dealership has got you convinced that this is the case.

BUT, in order to be fair and informative - is that exactly how your tranny failed? These trannies fail, with or without Hurst (or any other aftermarket) shifters in them, and trying to blame every trans failure on an aftermarket shifter is not a reasonable assumption.

Now, if this is exactly how your trans failed, then that is useful info. But at least let us know that is a similar failure and not just "hey I had a Hurst and mine broke too."

Your thread doesn't seem to show the mode of failure, but the first sentence says, "I had an earlier post in regard to sticking in 4th gear with hurst shifter but got little to know response from the forum."

That doesn't SEEM to be the same to me.

TIA,

 

:iagree: Check the throw stop screws before going further ! I had mine rattle into a position where they were starting to obstruct the odd numbered gears after only a couple of hundred miles after fitment. I readjusted them but this time put the Loctite on the threads and have had no problem in 15,000 miles since.

 

Tom thought I was fair with photos and all. No the dealer did not insist on the aftermarket shifter and was very fair about it. In fact they replaced the stock one before the inspector came. My concern is that others might have to go though this. I’ve always been an OEM guy do to far too many unqualified experts out there that led the unsuspecting to the water but are no were to be found when things don’t go right. I get sucked into this, what seems far to often. If you were to believe all the threads on this forum one would think this is the worst car on the planet. My God they even complain that the seats aren’t comfortable enough.

It looked like on first inspection that the throw length was different but that came out inconclusive. What concerns me is that when trying to put it back together again they could not get the Hurst to hold it in 6th and 2nd gear. I was there with them and there is an eccentric adjustment on the interface between the shifter housing and main frame. They and I worked over 4 hours trying to get the Hurst to work when the stock worked no matter what position the damn thing was in. Now think about this, can one honestly think that if that position is that critical and I will witness it, that the factory could find the sweat spot every time. What this means is that it could stress the very part that the photo shows. Again we are not talking about a guy that drives only on weekends for 5000 miles a year I can do that in a month. This all started as per the photos and it not wanting to leave 4th gear do to two broken pieces on the sync gear. Now the stock works fine and the Hurst does not. When comparing the two to be perfectly honest with you and setting egos aside the stock is smother and faster, sorry but that's the way it is. Now the Hurst people as in my statement per the phone call sounded strange to me. They weren't much help in the beginning with the shifter rattle but are very decisive now in wanting it back. I personally feel I will never see this unit again as it will disappear. The conversation got very short when I mentioned the amount of miles I drive, which led to my concern with them.

 

I had this problem but it was 2nd, 4th, & 6th.

First, remove the stop bolts altogether. Tremec's website has a FAQ section. The first question is about after market shifters. They say that after market shifters are fine as long as there are no stop bolts. The trans is built with internal stops. Stop bolts will do nothing but cause problems.

Second, the mechanism that the shifter bolts to has some adjustment. For this reason the stock shifter has a neutral alingment pin. Since it is not mentioned in the instruction sheets for the aftermarket shifters, it is usually thrown out with the stock shifter. Hopefully, you kept it. To use it, put it in the holeat the front of the shift mechanism. It goes thru and into the shifter shaft. This is neutral, meaning that there is an equal amount of distance for the shifter to move both fore and aft. If this is not where your current neutral is or if the shifter does not move freely thru the gates from left to right, then look for the clamp at the back of the mechanism that attaches the shifter shaft to the shift arm that goes back to the trans. If I remember correctly, there is a #45 torx head screw for tightening the clamp. Loosen the clamp, put the neutral pin back in and tighten the clamp. There is a torque spec for this screw, but basically give it everything you've got because if it moves at all you will be having the same problem again.

I am not saying that this is a cure-all. You may still have syncro or shift arm problems problems. It did work for me for a while. Eventually my trans did need to be rebuilt. The root cause was a lot of really hard shifting (drag racing and powershifting).

It's worth a try.

 

Please don't misunderstand, I don't have a problem with your other thread. I just think it would be a good idea to be cautious about pointing to every tranny failure on a car with an aftermarket shifter as being caused by the shifter.

First let me say that I have a Hurst and I'm NOT entirely happy with it. It is noisy as heck. BUT I can't give it up because it is a far more reliable shifter when it comes to drag racing. I don't have to worry about missing third, and the throws are shorter.

However, the fact is that Hurst has hundreds of thousands, if not more, shifters installed on all sorts of transmissions out there. I had one on my previous car, a 93 Cobra, for 50,000+ miles without incident.

Your post is the first I have EVER heard blaming a Hurst shifter for a transmission failure. I'm not saying it isn't possible, but I am saying that to start pointing everyone with a tranny failure to that possible cause is probably incorrect. Once again, I don't even think your mode of failure resembled the original posters...

I guess I am pretty lost here. The Hurst shifter is mounted in place by four bolts that are threaded into the transmission case. There is not much to a shifter. It is a lever that pulls and pushes the transmission rods. According to everything I have read, the M6/12 transmissions have their own stops, so there shouldn't be much the shifter can do to fail the transmission. Perhaps if it wasn't allowing the gear to fully engage because someone grossly misadjusted the stops, but otherwise I don't see how it could cause a failure.

Which is not at all like the failure in this thread.

That should be figurable if the tranny is out. Maybe even if it is in the car. ALL the Hurst shifter does is move the shifter rods. If it isn't moving them properly, you should be able to see why.

Well, stock is quieter and "smoother" but it is far less precise, longer and most importantly to most of us who have one, the Hurst has centering springs that push the shifter to the 3-4 gate by default which tremendously reduces the risk of missing the 2-3 shift. If you aren't racing, ever, then keep it stock. If nothing else, you won't deal with the rattle noises that the direct connection of the Hurst relays to the cockpit.

I'm curious about that as well, but it could also point to a failure of their unit in some way, which would not affect 99% of those running a Hurst shifter - again, trying to blame aftermarket shifters for every failure isn't a logical conclusion at this point.

I hope you get things sorted out, but I am far more suspicious of the tranny itself.

 

Problem solved! Thanks for all your help! It was the stop screw on the Hurst

 

Tom my initial replay was a reference to a thread relative to, not engaging two gears. As you can see by his findings it was the adjustment on the Hurst. We thought that also but the stops are not used and still can’t consistently stay in 2nd and 6th. I don't think I directly blamed Hurst other than there were concerns as to the failure. I will not just recommend and than back away and let others follow blindly, if it is the Hurst so be it and if it’s not so be it also but at least let people be aware. This forum is almost to the level of GM bashing and not sure why most of these guys even buy the Corvette. I’ve owned them for nearly 30 years and the only real problems are those self induced by either my stupidity or following the advise of others.

 

What about the stop screw? Had it fallen out, become misadjusted? What? What? :confused:

 

The stop screws adjust themselves inward.

 

Yes the stop screw had worked its way inward. But all good now, thanks to you guys! :party:

 

As of right now, I switched back to the stock shifter. I have not decided if i will put the Hurst back in. Had a lot of fun driving her today though. :auto: :steering:


[Modified by BHulsey, 4:12 AM 6/23/2003]

 

I had this *exact* same problem when I first installed my Hurst. One of the stop screws had shimmied down to prevent me from getting 1/3/5/R. It'd be the *very* first thing I would check.

 

Man wipe the juice off your leg and put that hurst back in :thumbs: ! It's the best mod I've done, and I'm sure any comprable short shifter would be. Don't let these goofballs scare you away. Either remove the shift stops all the way (I did) or just use loctite and properly adjust them. My Cobra had a B&M ripper with stops. They saved the shift forks in the crappy stock tranny. With the stock shifter and hard poopieing you'd over-extend the gears and bend forks left and right. The vette doesn't need stops, but the stock shifter blows. :cheers:

 

So is it safe to run the Hurst with the stops removed?