• Welcome to the Contour Enthusiasts Group, the best resource for the Ford Contour and Mercury Mystique.

    You can register to join the community.

shift tower bolt

svttouruofl

CEG'er
Joined
Nov 20, 2006
Messages
347
Location
Southern Indiana
Well I believe that my problem is definately the shift tower bolt sheering off. I have had a couple of people tell me that there is a How-To on this process. I have searched these forums along with the old ones and the archives and cannot find anything. This is the closest thing that I can find.

- Order the bolt (bolt p/n W702421-S309M)
- Jack up car and remove wheel so you can get to the shift cable ends and pop them off while you're down there
- Support engine and transmission
- Remove Transmission mount (3 bolts on tranny +3 on car)
- Remove shift tower bolts
- Pull shift tower out (unless your car is stuck in gear instead of neutral, in that case add 2 or so hours of cursing, pulling, and violent shaking of the shift
tower to the end of this list)
- Drill or use screw extractor to remove the part of bolt still in the tower (it's very soft )
- use threadlock and replace bolt
- Fish out bolt head (magnet on a string or a Bend-It Magnet ACE harware has them other places prob do to)
- Installation is reverse (use gasketmaker!)

Does this basically cover everything that I need to know or is there more to it than this?

Also I really need to get the car home to work on it and I know that you're not suspossed to drive it while like this, but could the car be pulled home since it is in neutral now or would it hurt it?
 
Those steps are right. If it's stuck in gear it could take more than 2 hours... and plenty more cursing. I'm not sure if I'd pull it though. Maybe a tow.
 
I'm 90% sure this just happened to my SVT - although I can get it into 3rd, neutral (which is back around where 4th should be), and 5th - if I go into "neutral" first I can shift it. My mechanic is saying that to get the shift tower off, it's going to be a few hours because he has to remove the engine mount, then to get the cables lined back up, he needs some special tool that the ford shop manual references. Is he full of it and it's time for me to find another mechanic, or am I just going to have to suck it up? Also, how to get this special tool that he is talking about?

Steven
 
if you break your shift tower bolt you will have no gears at all- the shifter will move around like a joystick. I used a grade 8 bolt to replace it when I had a ZX3 focus which broke the bolt. I covered it in threadlock and then welded the end smooth.....had no problems after that. Terry said welding wont hold up but it did for me...and I also know 1 more guy who filled+welded his tower as well and his has been mint too.
 
Terry did the shift tower mod when he rebuilt my tranny 4 years ago (and new shift forks, 2nd gear syncro, and quaife diff). I already messaged him to find out his opinion, and he thinks it might be the cable end, but he was going to pull my file and review exactly what he did and let me know this week.

Maybe one of the shift cable ends is busted then. I couldn't get the lever to the left (1-2) and neutral is where 4th should be. No reverse.
 
I'm pretty sure he has a full shop. I sent him a PM over on fordcontour.org; I'm sure you could find an email and/or phone number for him there.
 
Did anyone have a shop replace the bolt and fish out the old one?
I believe i have the same issue and my garage is full, also anyone in the north jersey area have to replace it themselves?
 
i had this exact issue with my svt contour. it was in neutral when it broke but i had to take the shift tower partially off and put it into 4th with a pair of vice grips so i could drive home as i had to work the next day and was an hour away. so once i had got home and went to fix it the car was in gear. i took the battery and battery tray out. then the intake and all intake piping along with the maf. i then had access from the top to trans mount bolts so i supported the trans and took out the mount. that gave me access to the shift tower so i unbolted that and lifted the tower a few inches. and since it was now in gear i got a pair of vice grips again and used those to shift it into the position i needed to so i could get a drill at the right angle and drilled out the broken bolt while the shift tower was still in the car. i took pictures along the way which i will post when i get them on my computer. took me 45 mins with no issues and no jacking up the car. i know this isnt the most specific but its the best way i could think of to describe it lol.
 
I bought a SVT with this issue a while back and I was able to pop the cap off on the tower and make it so the top of the tower came off of the shaft that was holding it into the trans. I tossed the old tower and installed the focus tower which doesn't have this issue.
 
but the focus sytle or focus tower can still fail and leave the mtx without any gears. its just that there isn't any bolt to fish out of the transmission.
 
Yes, that's what I was talking about. The 3 long ones threw me off a bit. I will be posting some pics of the project after it is complete to help others in the future.
 
Back
Top