1999 911 Gear Problems

[85 944 early]

I have a 1999 911 with about 88K miles on it and It has started having problems with the shifting. Sometimes I loose reverse, 1st, 3rd and 5th gears. If I move my shifter around a lot they come back. If anyone knows what would be the cause of this and how to fix it I would be greatly appreciative.

[Rrrockhound]

I would suspect your shifter cables are out of adjustment. Try posting your question on RennTech.org. It is much more technically-oriented than this site. Pelican tends to emphasize the older cars more.

[Fast Corners]

It is interesting that it is only the "forward" gears that you are having trouble with. This may indicate an issue with the shifter alignment. If the shifter is not located properly (i.e. to far back in the throw) you may have trouble engaging the forward gears (R,1,3 & 5) while still being able to reach the back gears (2,4 & 6) There is a special tool (#9619) that Porsche has to lock the shifter in the proper "neutral" position and from what I have heard the dealer can check the alignment of the shifter rather easily with it. You may want to start by comparing the location of your shifter to the realtive position of another 996.

If the shifter checks out then I would start in on checking the cables. Good Luck

[jwetering]

There's some good threads on Renntech and/or Rennlist which describe the removal of the console between the seats.

Once that console is removed, it becomes very obvious how the cable shift mechanism works, and it should be very easy to diagnose your problem.

I would have taken some photos of the setup when I did my console delete project a few weeks ago because I took the time to investigate a possible shifting issue with my own car (there was no issue by the way). Once it was apart it was simple enough that I figured it wasn't worth the effort (my bad).

In a nutshell

1) when the cables are disconnected, the shift handle has total freedom to move in an area much greater than is required to operate the transmission.

2) The cables are connected to the mechanism by a funky little serrated rod setup. This is the part where it would be useful to have a photograph since this is the only part which I could see having failed in your case.

The tool referenced above is totally unnecessary to do an adjustment. I could see if you wanted to centre your shift lever to within a fraction of a millimetre or something, but functionally it is not required.

Step one - remove your centre console.