Brandtwood shifter Gate movement

Does anyone have any thoughts on how you could extend the gate throw on a Brandtwood shifter that was built for an Audi 5000?

I took a risk and purchased one through Fran. Why a risk? Quite simply as many of you know I have a Audi 01X and needed a solution. I heard from another forum member that he had used one on his 01E and appears to shift well. Allied to that, as I have a GTD I need a slim shifter to go in the dog-leg area (the Corolla mechaism is too wide and interferes with the tank)

To me it appears that I need approximately 13/16 of gate shift between the reverse gate through to 5/6, and the throw being produced on the shifter currently is approx 1/16th too short.

Any options or thoughts from people? Some I have thought of are:

1/ A mechnism at the selector end to amplify the shift movement

2a/ My own build shifter
2b/ A rod/cable hybrid - and the the reason I say that is due to the selector shaft beingon the wrong side for a right hand drive car

Thanks
Brett
 
There are a few things that you can do to increase the stroke on the left right of the shifter box, but first you need to make sure you really have it adjusted correctly. I thought I was not getting enough stroke but what I found was that there was a bolt on the part attached to the sector shaft on the transaxle that was striking the transmission case and preventing the sector shaft from engaging 5th and reverse. I trimmed that bolt and solved the problem.

To increase the stroke if it really is the problem there are a few things that you need to do. The first is to look to see what is limiting the stroke. There are a number of heim joints in the shifter box that can strike different objects in the box. A little grinding in the right spots could clear up that interference. Another thing that can be done is to add some washers under one of the ball studs for one of the heims to give more stroke. If you look at the shifter handle, it is hinged at the base to allow fore and aft motion. That hinge is attached to a piece of flat brass bar that pivots to allow the shifter to move left and right. There is a brass rod welded to the brass bar with a ball stud on the end. Put a few washers under that ball stud to allow more motion. This will not accomplish anything if the heims are what is binding.

I actually had the weld attaching the brass rod and brass bar together fail on mine so I had to rebuild that part of my box. This is all hard to visualize but I do not have any good pictures of the shifter.
 
Last edited:
Below is a crude sketch of the shifter. Add washers where the arrow is pointing. The hiems that attached to that ball stud are the ones that you may need to clearance to prevent them from fouling on things in the box.
 

Attachments

  • shifter.JPG
    shifter.JPG
    13.3 KB · Views: 236

Randy V

Moderator-Admin
Staff member
Admin
Lifetime Supporter
I'm not exactly crazy about the Brandwood shifter but from what I can tell it beats the alternatives if you want a center shift system. I ended up needed to make modifications to mine to work properly with my G50/03. I've not driven it yet - but it should work pretty well.. If you check my build page GT-FORTY.COM you will see some of what I needed to do to get the geometry right..

Note - This shifter was made for the G50/01 which is slightly (less than an inch) shorter than my modified G50/03.
 
All,
Thank you for assiatnce in the thread and privately. As we all know sometimes one thing during the build can get us all down and irrationality cuts in and you can't seem to see a way through.

Needless to say I am getting there. Having had to make a new bracket to suit the 01X, and I also think I may need to flip the fore/aft control arm; but the main thing is I can get all the 6 gears and reverse engaging. What a great BDay present for Monday - YIPPEE!

Brett
 

Attachments

  • DSC02002.jpg
    DSC02002.jpg
    49.5 KB · Views: 307
Back
Top