Anyone know what this attachment to my shifter does?

[swbstudios]

I haven't seen one of these before, round device attached to my 915 shifter. Any idea what it is? Thanks

[7783911]

Spring tension?

[911pcars]

Does your shifter provide a spring-like resistance from neutral into 1st and 2nd gear? If so, it looks like a fabricated housing to apply tension to the lever. Does it work?

Sherwood

[Mike Andrew]

Plus 1 on spring tension for 1 & 2. I have a similar (in function) device in my parts bin. Given by a pal who made them for an aftermarket source as a side income for his machine shop. I have never installed it so have no idea how well it works.

[Walt Fricke]

Side to side motion of the shift lever involves the cross pin (on which the front to back motion pivots) moving up or down. Porsche put springs controlling the up motion on the left side of the shift tower in order to require extra oomph with your right hand when shifting into 5th or reverse.

Alas, it took until what - the 993s? - for Porsche to do this. So our SCs and 3.2s don't have the shift lever when in the neutral position naturally sitting in the 3/4 plane. It can bounce around between 1/2 or 3/4 if you just pull into neutral and let go.

There are several aftermarket setups (my recommendation is always the Seine - cheapest, works as well as any) which "center" the shifter in the 3/4 plane, which is a huge improvement and greatly helps avoid the money shift. All of these have a spring which pushes down on the right side of the cross pin (Seine and Robotek include a longer cross pin to allow this to happen).

The puzzling attachment here has to, somehow, press down on the cross pin.

But it might work a little differently. The cross pin is held in a fore and aft carrier. The carrier is pivoted fore and aft, so as you move the shift lever side to side the carrier moves. If a spring loaded plunger pressed against the lower part of the carrier from the position shown, that would introduce the centering force Porsche neglected. Maybe just a coil spring centered on the fore/aft pivot pin would do the job, though that would increase the force needed to get into 5/R.

Why don't you just take it apart and post pictures? My guess is that the set screw is how the tension is set, so just mark/measure where things are set, then loosen it and see if the cap part will pull out. Or you could remove the whole housing.

[swbstudios]

Great suggestions-I'll see about taking a peek inside. I do know that the shifter feels stiffer than normal.