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Mon May 19, 2014 12:45 pm

Hey guys pretty new to the forum! I have a couple of questions and thought I would post some pictures of my toy!
First of all, it is a hard to shift mostly into first and third. Second and fourth are relatively easy. I've never adjusted the linkage in one of these so if you could point me in the right direction that would be great.
Second, it has a hydraulic clutch that I have bled, however I can still see air in the line? I don't see any leaks anywhere so I don't know what is going on. The plastic line seems kinda cheap I don't know if you guys have any recommendations?

Sorry if this in the wrong forum but I didn't know where to post. Thanks!

Mon May 19, 2014 4:16 pm

Yeah, step one will be to replace that clear rubber hose with real hydraulic line. Hydraulics work on pressure, and that line is just going to expand even once you get the air out. Obviously it needs to be bled better than that, and if you are replacing the hose you might as well replace all the fluid. The fluid in that tube looks suspiciously clear, anyway - who knows what someone who would use plastic hose would use for hydraulic fluid. (Use brake fluid.)

Mon May 19, 2014 4:44 pm

Take the shifter apart to clean and lube it. It may just have grit or rust inside.

Mon May 19, 2014 6:48 pm

Quokka42 wrote: Yeah, step one will be to replace that clear rubber hose with real hydraulic line. Hydraulics work on pressure, and that line is just going to expand even once you get the air out. Obviously it needs to be bled better than that, and if you are replacing the hose you might as well replace all the fluid. The fluid in that tube looks suspiciously clear, anyway - who knows what someone who would use plastic hose would use for hydraulic fluid. (Use brake fluid.)

I just bled the entire line with brake fluid which is why it is so clear but what do you reccomend using for the line? Braided?

Mon May 19, 2014 6:53 pm

Hydraulic hose is usually of a braided construction, or you can use stainless steel braided. The nature of hydraulics is that the line can easily see 100psi or more.

Oh, and you probably just need to adjust the shifter.

Mon May 19, 2014 7:12 pm

Quokka42 wrote: Hydraulic hose is usually of a braided construction, or you can use stainless steel braided. The nature of hydraulics is that the line can easily see 100psi or more.

Oh, and you probably just need to adjust the shifter.

Can you get that at Oreilly's or am I going to have to order it?
When you say adjust it what do I need to adjust?

Thanks

Mon May 19, 2014 7:15 pm

TrentL wrote: First of all, it is a hard to shift mostly into first and third. Second and fourth are relatively easy. I've never adjusted the linkage in one of these so if you could point me in the right direction that would be great.

Disconnect the coupler from the transaxle gear selector shaft with the small 8mm nut. Loosen the jamb nut on the shifter rod and turn the square coupler out one turn making the shift rod longer and see if this helps getting 1 & 3 gears.

Mon May 19, 2014 8:19 pm

Your shifter plate might be too far forward - that would explain why 2nd and 4th are easy to get into gear and 1st/3rd aren't. Remove the carpeting around the shifter and slightly loosen those two 13mm bolts holding the shifter to the tunnel. Move the shifter plate slightly rearward and tighten the bolts and try it. Adjust again if needed.

The way I've always adjusted the shifter plate is to loosen the bolts and move the shifter forward and backward letting the shifter plate slide - noting the travel - splitting the difference and locking it down. Seems to work nearly every time. Only time it doesn't is when the shifter coupler under the back seat is bad.

Tue May 20, 2014 6:26 pm

Alright guys so today I took it for another ride and ended up getting pissed off so I decided to see what is going on with this thing. I tried the turn out to increase the length and that didn't help. So I took everything apart and I am going to start from the bottom up on this. I don't know if I should switch to a different shifter or not I was going to ask your guy's opinions. Here is a picture of the shifter. I feel like it doesn't allow it to move farth enough left and right.

Wed May 21, 2014 11:34 am

OLD VW NUT wrote: Your shifter plate might be too far forward - that would explain why 2nd and 4th are easy to get into gear and 1st/3rd aren't. Remove the carpeting around the shifter and slightly loosen those two 13mm bolts holding the shifter to the tunnel. Move the shifter plate slightly rearward and tighten the bolts and try it. Adjust again if needed.

You think I should try a different shifter? I don't know what to do. I had to jam this one pretty hard to get it to go into first.