Tail to Side Shift Conversion Rookie Options

[Jameel]

A few days ago I decided to take a closer look at my shift linkage, since my car has some serious issues. Took that rear cover off and found this: https://youtu.be/gtFysPUBIO0

I'm no engineer, but that looks nasty to me. I decided to fix it right.

So yesterday I made a trip to 914 Limited and was treated quite well by Brad and Mike. Brad and I had exchanged a couple emails and calls and since I'm less than 3 hours from Peoria, I decided to kill two birds and simply drive in. Brad was kind enough to let me drive his daily 914 to see what a side shifter felt like. Took me about 1/3 mile to decide I would do the conversion. Brad and Mike walked me through a few of the finer points of the process, but this being my first time opening up a transaxle, I figured I'd try and document as much as possible.

I've done a bunch of searches here (and at Pelican) but have not found much in terms of step-by-step. Brad's instructions were provided, and he invited me to call anytime for support, but I'll be taking pics anyway, so figured I'd start a thread.

Can anyone point me to a thread where someone has documented the process? The best I've found so far is mikedsilva's, here. I could not find others.

Sort of off topic too, but is there any way to get rid of the huge smileys window when composing a post? My composition pane is just tiny, like 1/4 the size of the smileys pane.

[Jameel]

Made some good progress this week. Got the shifter rods installed.

Greased the front shift rod where it passes through the firewall. I ended up pulling the shift rod into the tunnel to get a little grease in the bushing itself.



The rear side shift rod has a football-shaped flange on the front end (right behind joint) I learned that this was to clip the side shift boot onto. But since I'm doing the conversion I needed to cut off the flange (sorry, no pics) so the front end of the shift rod would fit into the tail shift plastic firewall housing. Once the flange gets cut off, the rubber bellows (http://shop.914rubber.com/Early-tail-shift-bellows-91442429700-70-72-91442429700.htm?categoryId=-1) got installed from the back end of the rod.



And then I put the boot on that clips to the side shift module cover.



I installed the tail shift firewall housing by pulling the rubber band toward the back of the car (while on the housing), working the housing over the steel lip on the firewall, then working the rubber band over the lip. This was a little tedious. It helped to put a small screwdriver under the band to stretch it and get it started over the lip. Then I pushed it on by working my way around the lip.



Then I greased the shifter ball at the back.



And tapped on the bushing (which I also put a little grease into)



And then pressed on the coupler until it clicked over the bushing.



I fed the shift rod through the engine bar from the back and let it ride under the chassis a little until the rear end cleared the side shift module.





Then I installed the plastic cover



Then I fed the shift rod through the cover and bushing into the module



I found it needs to go past the coupler to clear things up front



With a good amount of fiddling, I eventually got the shift rods lined up. I did need to remove the cone screws so I could get the holes lined up just right. This wasn't difficult, just tedious.



With the holes lined up at the front coupler I installed the cone screw, then did the same thing at the back end and installed the second cone screw. I had to shift the trans into a different gear to get the coupler to line up with the shift rod.



With the rods all attached, I stretched the bellows over the covers. I still need to attach the strap to the rear cover to hold it in place. I think I'm going to use some wire to hold the bellows on, unless someone here has a better idea. My car didn't come with anything here, so suggestions welcome.