Looked at a 68 Chevelle this weekend for a guy. It was equipped with the above shifter.
I was curious of anyone opinion on the shifter for life expectancy, effect on the tranny, for continuous street use?

Thanks for any replies.

I had one in my '67 396 and did not like it. It actually fell apart (used and abused) so I replaced it with a competion plus. It might be better for drag racing but for street, go with something else. My .02 ;)

I also had one in a 68 chevelle and I bought it brand new,never even abused it and it got to where it was hard to go in gear.And acually started falling apart .That was right around a year of use if that.I didnt even drive the car much either.I dont know why but it was junk.That is the first hurst shifter Ive heard of that was junk. :(

Well im running one on my 5 speed, if you like comforts, and this is a street car only i suggest you dont use one. If its a drag car then i guess its best to have since you cant miss a shift with one. If i wasnt going to switch tranny's in the semi-near future id get a Long 5 speed shifter for it. Your fingers take a beating driving around town a bunch with the V-Gate. Its your call

Have one in a "week end only toy"

They were first made by Mr Gasket and now sold under the Hurst name ( mine still has "Mr Gasket" stamped on some parts) I abuse it every time I drive and never had a problem related to the shifter. They do tend to mount farther back than a factory shifter.

As a every day driver maybe not the best choice but for banging gears you cant do better.

As for the falling apart issues I had the center bolt work lose once, put some loctite ( SP ?) on it and never had another problem.

I had one in a 2nd gen camaro. You have to enlarge the shifter hole a bunch for it to fit. Mostly because of the rev lever. I still have it in the attic. Only a few 1000 shifts on it.

It put a nice little callous on the first 2 fingers. They were sore for a while.
If you shift them too slow, they will kind've fall between gears and lockup the shifter. Nice theft deterent. I've seen people have trouble with a QuickSilver so a Vgate would really throw a thief for a loop.

It shouldn't be any harder than a H pattern shifter on the trans. The driver just needs to have his timing down. All they did was turn the H pattern vertical and put a real strong 3rd bias spring in it. I think a little gate is in there to prevent a 2-1 w/o picking up the t handle.

I like mine but it did fall apart. It will not work in the stock hole either. I'm going to a jerico with a long vertigate shifter and hope that last longer than the hurst.

As everyone has mentioned, make sure you keep maintenance up on them.

I sold my best friend a mid 10 sec Pro Street '68 Nova once. Tunnel ram 396 and 4 speed. He never liked my "tight" Super Shifter and found a one of these hanging on someone's wall. He stuck it in there and it worked pretty well, but the spring was week on it and occasionlly it would not drop into the 3-4 gate.

At the track one night, he launches in typical wheelsup fashion, grabs second with wheels in the air as usual for this car and then goes for third and the car literally stops in mid air it seemed. After we gathered all the pieces from the crash as he went through the fence into the pits (luckily never hit anyone!) we found that he had found first gear again on the shift! The trans literally was not in the car, the flywheel had exited the car and cut steering column etc in half. Lots more to the story.....but the point is if you are going to use one, make SURE that it is functioning perfect before you use it.

I've also run one on the street, but it's a PITA. A good Super Shifter or something is much more friendly.


JIM

I've been using one in my 65 GTO for about 5 years now. The Hurst and the Mr. Gasket models are identical. I have both. All parts interchange. Currently using the Hurst. As far as install, you can't use a factory console with it, and the hole in the floor is- BIG. You need to make a custom porch to seal out the undercar fumes and heat. But on the plus side, you won't miss any shifts with one. I've never had ANY issues with it falling apart, only bolts to tranny loosening up- loctite cured that. It will take some getting used to, but once you've got it, upshifts are positive and lightning quick when you want them, and downshifts are no slower than a conventional H-pattern such as a Comp Plus. This car is primarily a street car driven a lot, raced occasionally, and runs high 11's/117MPH N/A with a factory tripower. Vertical gates aren't for everyone, but I love mine. Remember- any girl can drive an automatic musclecar- real men shift their own gears...

If it wasn't for the big hole I'd get one too. Loved mine on the 4spd. Lots of people think it's a megashifter. :D

Yes, lots of people thinks it's a megashifter, especially mine since I put on a B&M shifter handle on it. One thing I did to mine was raise the brass knuckle about an inch to make it more comfortable. Even if I was a roadracer I would still use a vertigate shifter.

Ran one for a couple years and never had a problem with the v-gate. Never missed a gear with that shifter anyway,(plenty of times with the competion plus)it was fun. Now i'm old and automatic(manual vale body anyway)

I had one behind a big block Mopar, loved it! Steet driven, weekend warrier. Never had problems with it. I think the key to that is to keep it aligned and maintained, even though I didn't spend a lot of time working on mine after it was installed. I had no problems using it in street traffic, up or down shifts.
Bonus is it keeps all your buddies from sucessfully driving your car (anti-theft like Scott said).

I have one in my 67 wouldn't trade it for anything. I thought I had a problem with the shifter but turned out to be the clutch wasn't full disengaging. The tranny shifted fine when it was cold when the motor got hot I couldn't get it into first. when I put the car back together this spring I converted it to a pistol grip and will be putting on heim end linkage instead of the bushings

I have been considering a v-gate shifter for my Richmond 5 speed. Anyone have experiance with the Long v-gate?

It also looks like it'd need more clearance for the shift rods. The v-gate has straight rods and the H shifter has rods bent in closer to the tranny.

I want to make my decision while the floor is still cut up from the tranny install.

Tim.