b & m hammer shifter - tranmission cable problem

kalvick

Founding Member
Jun 29, 2001
352
8
39
Norwalk, CT
Hey guys,

I installed the B&M hammer shifter last summer, and one of the problems was that the transmission cable linkage is just a tad too short. when the car's shifter is in park, the tranmission is just barely in park. Like its just barely over the line between being in park and being in reverse.

recently when i am driving, say 70mph, my car is around 2000rpms. when i Floor it and come back to 70 my car is around 3000rpms. and it wont ever go back down. I did not shift the car, but i think the car slipped between drive and 2nd gear. if i come to a complete stop, and put the car into 1st, then 2nd, then back into D. the car will go back to 70mph and stay around 2000rpm. but if i floor it from 70 and let off the throttle the car will never go back to 70 at 2000rpms. it will always stay at 3000 until i cycle the shifter again.


i think what i need to do is dremmel out the cable linkage to give me a bit of play so the car is really into park. and then the gears R, N, D , 2, and 1 are always in the right gear and not really on the line between 2 gears, has anyone had experience with this phenomenon? what did you do to correct it.


transmissioncable.jpg


above you can see my crappy ms paint picture. in part 1. you see the blue transmission cable being stretched when its in park. the park should be about 5 more degrees to the left to be truly in park. but the cable is not long enough.

my plan is to take the cable in picture 2 and to dremel out the loop a little bit on the inner side and end up with a cable that looks like picture 3.


does this make sense? should i do this, or should i buy another cable? what do you recommend. I literally need about 1 or 2 centimeters of slack and i think the dremmel will do it.
 
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Normally you disconnect the cable at the transmission. Put the shifter in neutral. then move the lever or crank arm on the transmission, into neutral. Put them together and tighten the nut, and all should be good.
 
Had one installed on my car the other day. My builder said the same thing that the cable was to tight and he could not shift down to first. He bent the linkage on the shifter and now mostly everything is ok. I notice somtimes she won't go into O/D but all the other gears seem to work without an issue .
 
I never had a problem installing mine. Like MaxedGT said, put the trans in neutral with the old (stock) shifter, detach the cable, install the b&m, put the b&m in neutral, crawl under the car, hook the cable back up again.
 
thats what I did, but the cable isnt long enough to get it to go back to park.

what I did was push the transmission assembly all the way forward to park. and put the shifter into park. then I put the cable on. the problem is that the cable pulls back on the transmission assembly just a very small ammount because its not long enough.

right now the car just barely sits in park. i have to nudge the shifter a bit before i start the car to make sure its in park so the car starts.

i think my only option is to dremmel out the loop to get that extra couple of centimeters of clearance. ugg im just not looking forward to this. specially if I mess up. i will have to shell out $50+ bucks for a new transmission cable and be back at square one.

but just to make sure the cable i would need in case of a messup is XR3Z-7E395-AA right? that would fit an 01 gt auto?
 
Can you move the cable mounting bracket at the shifter, or is there an adjuster at the shifter end. As skupking you might have to bend the bracket at the shifter. Or move the cable mounting bracket by elongating the holes or bending the bracket at the transmission end. these are just things to look at. You need to move the cable at either end somehow. Most cables have an adjustment at one of the ends, to adjust the outer cable jacket position.
 
He's right that it's too short, I have to start the car in neutral because it wont acknowledge me being in park to start the car. Kinda nice since no one can drive my car, but let me know if the dremeling works. I had thought of the same thing.
 
Well its kinda nice to know that someone with your expertise with transmissions is having the same issue.

I know I can order a new cable if I screw up, so now I just have to jack the car up on the weekend and do it with the dremmel.
 
sorry to bring this thread back to life, but i was wondering...did you ever fix your problem with the cable? I just bought on for my 2003 mustang and i have the same problem with the tranny not going all the way into park. I also have noticed that when i up shift sometimes the shifter will skip a gear (when im in 2nd ill up shift and it will push my tranny into Nuetral instead of D) I am not sure if this is because i need to keep adjusting my cable or what.
 
I ended up not dremmeling but had a machine shop custom make me a piece.
trans-how.jpg

I rode around like that for a while. it was perfectly fine, but I was unhappy with it being it was a hacked together fix and I wanted perfect. I ended up ultimately taking it to a performance shop and had them make a new end piece physically connected to the existing cable.
 
ok thanks ill just take it to a sho and have it done right. Do you have any recomendations on where i should go? and if you dont mind me asking how much was the labor? This thing is a pain, i dont understand why it works perfect for some mustangs but some just dont work.