A Very Tall e9xM3 Shifter Set at 25% Reduction in Spite of its Height
The request here was simple. The Aftermarket Adjustable Shifter kept breaking. Customer coud not reach the desired 25% reduction ratio. However my customer liked the height of the shifter since it was similar to a chassis mounted job but more civilized as to noise. The Performance aspect was lacking .
We were able to build this shifter by barely reducing the diameter of our inner lever and drilling the aftermarket tall outer lever as much as possible without compromising its integrity . We also extended our lever below the pivot substantially to reach the 25% required reduction but at the same time raised the pivot point by machining a custom cartridge. The rest of the build was traditional AutoSolutions . Our selector rod and our hardened steel coupler with bronze bushings throughout. The shift arm bushings used were our higher performance grade set at 95a hardness.
What I am most proud of here is that I was able to keep the price in check and only charged the customer the cost of our standard Ultra shifter Without Arm . This I did by adapting (using a hand lathe) the inner lever to the outer lever so that both coud be used and no one off part would need to be machined. And used a blank cartridge designed for the e46M3 AutoX shifter and modified it ( Using a Hand Mill) to fit the e9xM shift Arm. Thus no costly CNC setup fee was incurred.
A Very Short F87 Shifter Set at 35% Reduction
On the Left is an OEM height 25% shifter - On the Right is a minus 25 mm shifter set at 50%
The request here was to build a f87 shifter that would deliver 50% reduction in throw and sit 1 inch lower than the OEM lever. Generally I refuse to build these shifters. I find them dangerous to shift because the left to right travel is reduced by 50% which makes the gates all bunch up. It is the perfect ask for a money shift.
But on that day I said why not? I was not bribed to build it mind you just wanted to know if I could . This one took some work . First I had to raise the pivot point so that the shifter did not feel notchy. And for a 50% shifter I had to raise it quite a bit. Unlike the tall e9xM shifter I had no suitable blanks to modify so I had to machine the pivot cartridge from scratch. Then because I had raised the pivot so much, I did not have enough material to remove in order to lower the upper section so I had to modify the upper lever by allowing the inner lever to travel through the area where the knob would attach all while maintaining some noise protection.
Finally I had to improvise to give the connection between the inner and outer lever good rigidity. I did that by replacing the soft rubber by harder Delrin but I drilled that delrin noise insulating slug like a hunk of swiss cheese so that it would have some give and so that the noise would have the least amount of material to travel across.
Surprisingly it turned out quiet. Will never do it again.