E30 late trans in early car shifter issues: Grassroots Motorsports forum: Grassroots Motorsports Magazine

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July 26, 2010 4:57 p.m. OldGray320i None

Good afternoon fine people.

Have any e30 owners out there experienced way sloppy shifter issues after swaping in a later trans to an early car?

It had the sheet metal shifter plate, "new" trans required the aluminum carrier.

All new nuts, bolts, bushings, if-it-could-be-replaced-it-was parts, and not only does the shifter have ridiculous amounts of play in it, the gating is a bit off. Reverse pretty much hits the console.

Could this be anything but the transmission itself?

Car drives fine, no issues going in to gear except occasionally finding the wrong gate due to the sloppiness.

Any help is appreciated.

Cheers.
July 26, 2010 8:13 p.m. Ian_F Reader

I only have my car to go by, and when I bought it the shifter bushings were very worn, so I also replaced everything that could be replaced as well as adding a Z3 lever. I still wouldn't call the shifter "percise". Searching on the various E30 forums have found similar experiences.
July 27, 2010 3:47 p.m. OldGray320i New Reader

Indeed, I would in no way characterize the shifting as "precise" but, it's about two to three times as bad as it was before I swapped.

There's about 3" of movement side to side, while it's in gear.

Anybody else have that much play?
July 28, 2010 6:53 a.m. Ian F Dork

Hmm... no... mine was about that bad before I replaced the bushings...
July 28, 2010 8:16 a.m. JeremyB New Reader

There are two main pieces that cause this wear. The knuckle that attaches to the end of the transmission and the shifter itself.

The knuckle is impossibly hard to remove because of the circular spring clip around it. Once you move it out of the way, then you have to push the pin out to get the knuckle off the end of the transmission. Its best to just buy a new knuckle to replace the worn one (if you have a lathe, you could always make a bronze bushing to replace the plastic that wears out).

The shifter is pretty easy to get out, but you'll find the plastic bushing wears out in these as well. The bushing isn't replaceable, so its best to buy a new shifter. As Ian mentions, the one from a Z3 4 cylinder model works nice.
July 28, 2010 10:54 a.m. WilberM3 Reader

did you replace the shift lever with one from the new car's model? the pivot ball may be in the wrong location on the shaft causing it to have significantly more top side movement, which could hit the console and feel super sloppy.

you say everything's replaced, but ive seen a new selector rod not fit nice and tight in the bottom of a new shift lever and even the knuckle on the back of the trans' selector shaft. if you can get eyes on the linkages and have someone put it in gear and wiggle sideways you may be able to see where stuff is moving, though i'd be surprised if that new-but-poor fit alone causes 3" lateral play.

my e30 challenge car (1990, all stock parts except for rebuilt short-shift lever) has probably 1.5" or so in gear but it still feels reasonably positive mechanically.

do you have a list of parts replaced?
July 28, 2010 1:20 p.m. Ian F Dork

I agree. #14 in the pic above was a royal PITA to replace and is probably the most important part as well. I have about 1.5" of play as well and when it finally annoys be enough, I'll splurge for the complete UUC w/ DSSR set-up... This is naturally the most expensive shifter sold but also seems to be the only one that attempts to address the design faults of the OE shifter. I practically lost it when I felt the amount of play between the selector arm (#11) and the "new" #14 part. The car sat for another 2 days before my temper had subsided enough for me to reassemble everything. I was pissed...
July 28, 2010 1:31 p.m. pigeon HalfDork

The E30 I owned for 2 weeks earlier this month had a one year old BavAuto short shifter in it. The shifts were very short and precise and there was virtually no slop in it anywhere. I don't know what else the PO replaced when he did the shifter but I was truly impressed with the result.
July 29, 2010 12:01 p.m. OldGray320i New Reader

WilberM3 wrote:

did you replace the shift lever with one from the new car's model? the pivot ball may be in the wrong location on the shaft causing it to have significantly more top side movement, which could hit the console and feel super sloppy.

you say everything's replaced, but ive seen a new selector rod not fit nice and tight in the bottom of a new shift lever and even the knuckle on the back of the trans' selector shaft. if you can get eyes on the linkages and have someone put it in gear and wiggle sideways you may be able to see where stuff is moving, though i'd be surprised if that new-but-poor fit alone causes 3" lateral play.

my e30 challenge car (1990, all stock parts except for rebuilt short-shift lever) has probably 1.5" or so in gear but it still feels reasonably positive mechanically.

do you have a list of parts replaced?

I had a shop do the work (always been reputable guys, gone there for years), but I wish I'd done myself - it's my daily driver and I thought it faster/easier to have it done (turns out time wise - I'd be no worse off...).

I'll need to fully review list of parts, but apparently everything but the aluminum shift stick is new.

The genesis of the problem was in where the gates were placing relative to the console/tunnel opening. The gear pattern was wide to one side or another, and they've tried every possible configuration of selector rods, installation of components, etc... to get the gear pattern centered.

They presumed worn components as part of the problem and replaced, figuring it would tighten and center. Since they were working on a lift, I would think that they'd see any abnormal play.

One thing I've noticed in the last day or two is that the "springload" to hit the reverse detent is on the wrong side - i.e. there's extra gear lever resistance pushing to the #5 gear side, when that should be for reverse. But it seems to me that shouldn't be a cause for really sloppy gear lever action - gear pattern placement maybe, but not shifter action.

Before 3rd gear fried and the trans was replaced, shifter play was around an 1" to 1.5" - normal for a lot of cars.

I'll check the parts list and really tie it down. It seems to me that given all new parts, this should not be an issue. How horribly wrong can a shifter installation go?
July 29, 2010 12:10 p.m. minimac SuperDork

OldGray320i wrote:

It seems to me that given all new parts, this should not be an issue. How horribly wrong can a shifter installation go?

Apparently, very horribly wrong. If it's a reputable shop, take it back and tell them it's wrong. Period. There isn't a BMW trans/shifter that should be that bad.You said a mouthful when you said they tried all combinations of arms,linkages,etc. There in lies the key.