No more (gear)sticking around!

Today was another glorious hot and sunny day, one of many in this rare but well accepted heatwave here in the UK.

And, what better thing to do on such a day than to crawl about on hard stony ground under a large camper-van trying to set the gear stick in to a better position since when we first got the van (1st and reverse were not easily accessed).

Well it wasn't a straightforward processes and more like trial and error.

Luckily I had Kelly here to help me with the gear stick positioning.

With all the gear linkages back in place (see earlier posts) it was just a case of getting the gear stick into a position where all gears are easily accessible (a good idea that).

This is how I did it.

I loosened and lifted up and out the way the finger stop that is on the gear stick to prevent accidental engagement of reverse gear.

I loosened the control arm clamp from the front of the main shift rod.

I then scooted under the mid section of the van at the back of the gearbox and gripped the shift rod where the rear control arm sits on the gearbox arm. I twisted it anticlockwise so the arm went up, and then pushed to the front of the van. This is reverse position.

I then switched on the ignition lights to check the reverse light was on, to confirm.

Then I went to the front of the van and tilted the control arm a few mm to the drivers side and then checked the position of the gearstick.

As I knew that the whole gear pattern of the stick was originally too far to the left (making reverse & 1st gear difficult to engage) this is why I moved the control arm to the right.

This tilt position adjusts the position of the far left and far right of neutral.

I tightened up the clamp.

Then went and tested the gear positions from the drivers seat.

Kelly stood at the back of the van and again with ignition lights on I pushed the gear into reverse gear. It was definitely more to the right than previously and this is a good thing.

It went into reverse fine, and into 2nd and 4th well too, BUT it hit out when trying the bottom gear positions (1st 3rd 5th).

Now the adjustment was to move the gearstick forward and to move the control arm on the shift rod forward or backwards.

I loosened the control clamp after putting the van gear now into 2nd position.

Kelly helped gently put forward pressure on the gearstick as I loosened the clamp below and tapped with a hammer on the control arm to slide it forward more, once she confirmed it moved a few mm I then re-clamped the arm.

This process did take about 6 attempts but I carefully kept the 'tilt' position the same as this was better, so it was just forward and backwards adjustments.

Lastly I put the finger stop clamp back into a position that would stop reverse gear unless the stick was pressed down.

It was to be at a slight diagonal position and was a bit fiddly but eventually it went into a position that worked.

So I finally left it when I was happy with the gear positions, even though 2nd and 4th kinda hit the dash when the gears are engaged, the fact they easily engage and mainly that 1st and reverse are better now means that I am happy to leave it here.

So with everything tightened I put the gear stick boot and other bits back into place and cable tied the boots under the gearstick.

I started her up and gave her a few laps around the lock up to check that she was easily drivable now and all was fine.

Hugely relieved that I got it all back working better than before. Got a VW show in a few weeks so well happy to have this issue now all sorted.

Beers all round.

And now I can enjoy the sun rather than hide from it :-)