Re: Shift linkage.

[gnt@nhm.ac.uk (Graham Thackrah)]

Dear Mike,

Sorry this may get to you too late but when some friends and myself replaced
the gearbox on an 80 sport recently the rod from the gear lever fastened to
the linkage on the box by means of a sleeve. If you loosen the sleeve and
rotate the rod connected to the gearshift, or even use the leverage of the
gearshift itself, to the right, so rotating the rod in the sleeve with
respect to the box end, then you will cure the excessive left throw of the
lever. In a similar way you can pull the gearlever backwards (carefully to
prevent the rod pulling out of the sleeve, it is a close inteference fit) to
cure the excessive forward throw required to change gear.

What I would watch out for would be possible failure of the pivot point of
the linkage attached to the gearbox. There is a kind of rose jointed linkage
there and it may be this that has caused the rest of the linkage to give a
strange shift pattern. ALternatively it may be that the sleeve has losoened
over the years and it just needs adjusting back again and tightening up to
solve the problem.

Hope it goes ok,

Graham.