Pelican Parts Forums - Draft Speedometer Cable Replacement Instructions

Here are the tales of my attempt at replacing the speedometer cable in a 69. While your steps may vary here is how I went about replacing mine. I will make the assumption that you will follow all safety guidelines, as I will not address that here. This is not intended to be an all-inclusive set of directions but merely a guideline to follow. If there is much interest I can do the same for many other things I have learned while rebuilding the 911. I would appreciate any constructive feedback on this article.

Step1: Get the car in the air. I do not have the luxury of a four-point lift in my garage so I had to settle for the more traditional jack stand approach. I was able to get the car about 2 ½ feet in the air.

Step 2: Gaining access to the tunnel. To make thing easy, I removed the front center carpet, shifter, parking brake assembly and access panel to the shift linkage. Removing the carpet was simple and straight forward, just pull. The only prerequisite is to remove the shifter knob. In my case, the setscrew on the collar was broke, so I just had to pull it off. With carpet off I removed the shifter; at the base of the shifter are two 10mm bolts, which I removed. Next I removed the three 13mm bolts. I was able to pull the whole assembly straight off. While I was at it I installed a new bushing in the base of the shifter. I did not completely remove the parking brake assembly. I just removed the three 13mm bolts and slid the assembly off to the side. The last access point is the shift coupler access. This is the panel in the rear tunnel of the car and it is held in with four Phillips head screws. I also replaced the shift coupler bushings while I was at it.

Step 3: Speedometer cable at the speedometer. Removing the speedometer cable at the gauge is accomplished by losing the collar at the gauge. I was able to do it with my fingers but you may need pliers for this. Just use caution so you do not mess up the gauge. Next, I removed the grommet where the cables goes into the passenger compartment and pushed the cable through.

Step 4: Cable retainers in the tunnel. On my car the cable was held down by metal retainers that fold over the cable. These metal tabs are located on the passenger side of the tunnel by the shifter, parking brake and shift coupler. It is easy to bend the metal tabs using a small straight blade screwdriver or your fingers. I was able to bend the tabs out of the way so the cable was free. In the area of the parking brake, you have to do it by feel since I did not remove the whole assembly. However, this was easy for me to do. The cable was now free to pull out.

Step 5: Pull the cable out. Prior to pulling out the cable, I tied a piece of fishing line to the end of the cable that attached to the speedometer. My thinking was that it would be easy to pull the new cable through using this line, more on that later. Now it is time to get dirty because you need to crawl under the car. Right by the transmission crossmember is where the speedometer cable connects to the transmission. This is on my 69 with a 901 gearbox. The cable can be unscrewed using an adjustable wrench. The boot on my car was totally deteriorated so it made access very easy. I also recommend installing a new boot while you are at it. With the cable detached from all ends I was able to pull the old cable out from the underside of the car. This came out complete with the fishing line attached as I planned.

Step 6: Installing the cable. I removed the fishing line from the old cable after removing it from the car. I attached the fishing line to the smaller end of the speedometer cable. From the underside of the car, I pushed the cable into the tunnel with the line attached. Once the cable was into the tunnel about 6 inches, I went back into the car. Through the access point from the shifter I grabbed the fishing cable and pulled gently to try and feed the cable through the tunnel. All the while I was pulling on the cable I was pushing the body of the cable from the access point by the shift coupler. This worked until the cable came near the parking brake assembly. Here the fishing line snapped off and I was left with the one choice, continue feeding the cable through via the opening by the shift coupler. I found the longest, thinnest straight blade screwdriver I could find to guide the cable while I continued to push the cable. Working it past the parking brake took a little time but with perseverance, a good light source and patience it is not that bad. I will add that I was given a flashlight that clamps to your forehead via an elastic strap. This is a LED based flashlight and it is PERFECT for this job. The only other challenge I encountered was by the shifter. After I got the cable past the parking brake I just kept pushing the cable while guiding I with the screwdriver. The whole cable is fed along the tunnel on the passenger side. Once you are past the shifter you are home free. It is very easy at this point to pass the cable through the whole above the pedals and into the trunk compartment.

Step 7: Completing the connections. The cable is easily screwed onto the speedometer and transmission. I just used my fingers to tighten it at the speedometer and the adjustable at the transmission. Make sure to fold the tabs over the cable in the tunnel area. These are the ones you did in step 4. As I said before, I installed the new shift coupler bushings, ball socket bushing at the shifter, the plastic part for the hand throttle and adjusted the parking brake.

Step 8: Reinstall the shifter, parking brake assembly, shift coupler cover, carpet, grommet by the speedometer cable to the trunk and any other items you may have removed. Now you can enjoy a quiet speedometer that does not bounce around.

Let me know what you all think.