Help with converting Column to Floor Shifter

[Tacfire11]

Does anyone have any suggestions or pictures of converting their Column shift to a floor shifter.  I'm installing buckets, and have a console.  I want to loose the console shift arm, and figure installing and running the cable for the floor console shifter is proably straight forward.  The normal issues of running the Neutral Safety, and Reverse backup lights wires will probably be pretty straight forward as well. 

So I guess my question, what the best way to remove the Column lever and gear selector cap from the Column.  Appreciate all the  help.

Thanks...

[440Demon]

buy a manual trans column like I did or
do like Andy(crazy68dart) I think is his name.
and modify your column.
He has pics in the gallery of his.

[74swinger]

I cut off the gear selector window and filed in the hole with a two part epoxy (Cold Weld) material.  Primed and painted that part.  The other cover is the gear lever housing, and I did the same thing (cold weld and paint).  Fill in some holes and it will be fine.

Worked good, looks good but keep some things in mind..........

You MUST epoxy and lock the two housings above together on assembly.  Don't forget to get rid of the steering wheel lock as well.  If you get rid of the plate and the wheel lock spring arm, you won't have the wheel lock up on you when you go over a bump.  Trying to maintain the steering wheel lock would be a nightmare ann I have no idea how you could get it to work AND look good at the same time.

Auto columns are cheap, so if you screw up, get another on and try again.

Oops.... almost forgot.  You need to machine a bearing housing for the bottom of the column when you remove the linkage tube.  No big deal if you work in a machine shop with machinists that like you and don't want to "work for the man".

Not hard, little bit of time, and you need some enginuity to make it look right.

[DartStorm]

Hey 74swinger,

How well does that Cold Weld work?  Did you fill the whole area you cut away or did you fill most of it with a filler plate?  Seems like the Cold Weld alone would be brittle and could break off.   Don't know; never used it.
I thought for sure I'd have to weld a patch....somehow, but nice to see another option.
Got any photos of your work?  I saw crazy68dart's pix and they look great.

[70 Dustpan]

You can just swap the top head parts on your column. I've done this on many of them before, not hard at all. What year is your column from?

[68dodge]

I cut off the gear selector window and filed in the hole with a two part epoxy (Cold Weld) material.  Primed and painted that part.  The other cover is the gear lever housing, and I did the same thing (cold weld and paint).  Fill in some holes and it will be fine.

Worked good, looks good but keep some things in mind..........

You MUST epoxy and lock the two housings above together on assembly.  Don't forget to get rid of the steering wheel lock as well.  If you get rid of the plate and the wheel lock spring arm, you won't have the wheel lock up on you when you go over a bump.  Trying to maintain the steering wheel lock would be a nightmare ann I have no idea how you could get it to work AND look good at the same time.

Auto columns are cheap, so if you screw up, get another on and try again.

Oops.... almost forgot.  You need to machine a bearing housing for the bottom of the column when you remove the linkage tube.  No big deal if you work in a machine shop with machinists that like you and don't want to "work for the man".

Not hard, little bit of time, and you need some enginuity to make it look right.

I used fberglass and a light coat of filler. Came out very nice.

[fourspeed]

Here are some photos to let you know what you're in for: http://www.fourbarrel.com/steeringcolumn.html

[74swinger]

Hey 74swinger,

How well does that Cold Weld work?  Did you fill the whole area you cut away or did you fill most of it with a filler plate?  Seems like the Cold Weld alone would be brittle and could break off.   Don't know; never used it.
I thought for sure I'd have to weld a patch....somehow, but nice to see another option.
Got any photos of your work?  I saw crazy68dart's pix and they look great.

Can't weld on that pot metal material.  Not possible.  Cold weld (or any metallic two part epoxy) is not more brittle than the pot metal housing.  There's no stress on this stuff anyway.  It is easy to dent though.  Fibreglass would work great as well, but I wasn't set-up to do that.

Unfortunately, I don't have photos of the build-up for this.  Not hard to do though.  The hard part is the bearing holder for the bottom of the shaft (near the coupling).  I had a special holder made up for a common off-the-shelf bearing.  This way, you can through out the shift column tube.  Looks like it always belongs.  Can send a drawing of the dims if you through me your e-mail address. 

The only expensive piece is the adaptor for a PS to manual gearbox I did, but that is another post......