Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Transaxle Shift cable end questions...

My shift cable end popped off the shift tower the other day as I seem to have found has happened to many.

Bill sent me out the replacement parts, got the old stuff off and I've got a discrepency:

Part # F7RZ-7412-AA as is referred to in many threads (the white one) is the part I needed. The discrepency lies in the design in the bushing. The one I pulled from the car looks like the one in this thread: old cable end and the cable end in the package looks like the one from this thread: new cable end

As you can see (as long as you're not on dial up lol) the old one that came off the car is a basic rubber bushing with a hole. The new one is a rubber bushing with a small metal "disc" in the center where the pin on the shift tower should go through. It appears it should attatch in the same manner, but I don't want to destroy that part and be down one car any longer. Any insight out there?

Thanks-

whats up yeah i had the same thing happen to me a month ago my bushing actually blew out from it being old. i got the part number for the end piece of the shift cable. the bushing part i mean.. was like 7 bucks at ford. what i did is just toke off the end piece and connect the new one. i think that the metal disc in there should work but my new one didnt have one. but the end of the shift cable is a pain in the a**s to take off. thats just what i did hopefully that will help somehow

phil

My question is how will the new cable end work with the design of the different bushing? As you found, the "pin" on the shift tower goes through the busing and the bushing clamps around that little groove near the top of the pin. From what I can tell, it looks like the metal disc should be removed, but, again, I'm not too enthusiastic about dismantling a brand new part.

The part # I ordered and recieved is the same as I have seen in NUMEROUS other threads....

FYI, I had to take my good little friend Mr. Dremel to get the old cable end off

Well, I've done some more searching around and ran across this thread and it seems to have confused me even further as I ordered the EXACT part numbers listed in the thread by bigMoneyRacing. Perhaps it is possible that the earliest style cable end is NO LONGER available and the part number F7RZ-7412-AA now corresponds to the cable end for the Focus tower...........?

I'm at a loss at this point. Perhaps some bohdineering is in order.

If indeed the part number is correct, but the part doesn't match, then is was mislabeled. The Focus style, which is what it sounds like you got, has a different part number. So you might try to see if the dealer can get the part that should have come with that part number.

The other options would be to replace the entire cable set, swap to a Focus shift tower and get the other cable end needed at the same time, or, see if you can figure out how to put the Focus style attaching pins on your shift tower.

Big Jim, I found a recent post of yours which is actually what I referenced for the part #. I assume you got the correct part with that #...?

If so, looks like I need to give ol' Billy J. a phone call on Monday....:)

For the time being, I'll probably just use a washer 'n' zip tie.