Hey Rich,

It's been a long time since I ran a Hurst Competition Plus shifter. Brings back some memories. Hurst used to sell a performance bushing set for these shifters. IIRC the shifter comes with plastic linkage bushings that are prone to wear. When the bushings wear they can cause hard shifting and/or the linkage to hang. The performance bushing set replaces the plastic bushings with steel bushings. If you have the linkage aligned correctly, stops set correct, and are still having issues it might be worthwhile to try and find/install the steel linkage bushings.

HTH...

 

Kjett,
I plan on getting some steel bushings as soon as I can get to a place that has them, but this is a NEW shifter and although it has the plasic (nylon?) bushings, I would think they should be tight enough to not yet cause any undue sloppiness. I think the problem is in the transition from the 1-2 lever to the 3-4 lever, and that sould be in the adjustment. But I'm all ears for any advice.
Thanks,
Rich

 

Hey Rich,

Sorry, I didn't realize the shifter was new. Also, I think you are correct that the bushings are nylon, not plastic. That said, the bushings are not likely the cause of the problem, but I still think they are a good upgrade for you to consider down the road. The kit you need is called a "pit pack" and is made by Hurst:

http://store.standardtransmission.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWCATS&Category=120

I'm sure there are other suppliers available.

I never used the plastic alignment tool that came with the shifter. I used to use a drill bit (don't recall the exact size, was either 1/8" or 1/4") instead of the plastic tool. Try readjusting the linkage using a drill bit. You should probably set the shifter stops before making final adjustments to the linkage.

Sorry I can't help any more. It's been a long time since I used that style shifter and the manual transmission I'm now using has internal linkage.

Good luck.

 

I set mine up with the plastic tool. It took a couple of "fine adjustments". But once it was set, it has been flawless for a few years now. Mind you this was also on a fresh rebuild too. How old many miles on your trans since rebuild?

I presume you have double checked that everything is correctly aligned otherwise, tight, and in th correct orientation. All I can sya is try a fine adjustment of one turn or two of the connections on the rods at the shifter.

 

You'll find that a half turn here, or there will make all the difference. I had a comp plus in My old Chevelle, I finally got it set up, it took some time, but it was worth it. And I would do the steel bushing's as soon as You can get Them.

 

Ron, the trans has just as many miles since the rebuild as the new shifter, about 100 or less. The only thing I have changed is to shorten the trans case levers to get a shorter throw on the shifter (I doubt that has an effect on the 2-3 shift and I plan on posting pix of the mod. later on). I think yours and Dave's suggestions for playing with the rod adjustment is the way to go. My thought is to shorten up the 1-2 rod slightly to make sure it is completely disengaged before moving the 3-4 rod.
Thenks,
Rich

 

Cool, let us know if that made any difference.

 

I'll add to what I said. One of My problem's also was that the "dogs" would loosen up, and cause a problem there as well. If I remember right, I cleaned it all really well with some brake clean, found some good washer's, and star locks, and some of the longer brass nuts. Then on to the adjustment's.

After that I got a Mr Gasket V-Gate, that's when I really started to bust Transmission's.

 

OK, here's what I've done so far. Readjusted and rechecked the shifter with a 1/4" steel rod, reset the stops. So the shifter is set to factory recommendations. Take it out on the road, easy shift, no problem. Harder shift, just fine, then slam in a hard shift to second and go for third and it's still in second. Problem still there. Back to the garage (keeping my test runs real close to home now). When I put it back up on jack stands and had my right hand man (um, I mean woman, my wife) get in to push on the shifter while I looked underneath, I could see that the shifter had made it through the neutral gate and was starting to push the third gear rod, BUT, the 1-2 lever was still in second gear! So the shifter is not pulling the trans out of second gear before attempting to shift into third. Any ideas why? should I be tightening up on the 1-2 rod adjustment? Keep in mind that I shortened the levers on the trans 1/2" to shorten the shifter throw. This may be causing the problem and if I have to un-modify it back to original, I will, but if the adjustment is the culprit, I'd rather try that way first.
One more thing I noticed, when my wife was trying to push the shifter forward (and the third gear lever was trying to move the 3-4 rod) I could see a lot of twisting of the adjusting button inside the nylon bushing. It was pulling against the spring clip and angling in the hole. That doesn't seem like a very positive action to me, unless the design is to soften movement to the trans. I would think the steel bushngs (which I haven't gotten yet) might make this less severe.
Thanks,
Rich

 

Put the levers back to stock. Until you are sure you are trouble shooting one thing you are kinda chasing your tail. The key to any troubleshooting thing is change one thing at a time. Then you will know that is not the issue.

How much is it twisting? If you added a shim washer would that help? I have heard the steel washers are better - but I still have the pastic ones in that I installed with the new shifter back in '02, zero problems.

Muncies shifters have a connecting strut that goes to the cross member, you don't still have that on there someway I trust...

 

Hey Ron, thanks for the reply. Yes, that makes sense, I could change it back to stock (this is a Hurst shifter, nothing muncie, since it was a TH350 up to a month ago). The shifter was working fine with the stock lever setup and if I return it to that arrangement, readjust my stops, align the shifter levers, I would imagine it should work well as it did before. So I've been trying to work with the current arrangement to see if it can work. If I can't do it, it'll have to go back to the original way and I'll just have to assume something in the geometry resulting from the mod was just not agreeing with the shifter/trans.
Thanks,
Rich