ARK > Your mom *now with pics! :md:

[aZepolyn]

and by greater than, I mean better than, your mom

So here's the story ... he gf was taking care of her dad who had some surgery. I unno, the guy looked like total shit, they had him so doped up. The roomate was making a mess with his gf and her cousins bc yesterday was her birthday, so sleeping or relaxing was definately out of the question. Drunken bastards.
This all setup for a slow, and boring night. I figured, Hey, what the hell, let's make a night of it! Let's install the new shifter! :dance:
Three hours later .... it was installed, working, and feeling good. In that three hours time I trashed the inside of my car with the various goodies tucked into the consol, tore the fuck out of the shifter housing, and discovered I rather liked the no consol style.
Was a litle concered at first, as getting into 5th was a task, and reverse almost impossible. As I worked through the gears, it was getting better. Took it out for a test drive, shifts nice. I'd have to recommend the ARK short throw shifter if anyone's in the market. Has a near stock length shaft, which was the selling point for me.
I don't much care for the knob ARK tossed in. Either I, or CarDomain, goofed up on my Greddy weighted knob order though, they sent the fitting for Nissan/Mazda, which is entirely too small :censored:
I also flipped the ring around the top of the boot around, create more of a tansition from the Boot -> Shaft -> Knob.

I suppose I'll post pics later since I'd imagine most haven't seent he ARK shifter. Was dark when I finished last night, and still not enough light this mornigng for the camera phone. More to follow

Again, not a very adventurous install, was definately a "I Have Nothing Better To Do" kinda job, and a real pain in the ass, but the effort was well justified. Definately enjoy the product

[cz3ch]

ARKSpeedRacing makes some great products. One of my past sponsors, their STS is good and their Exhausts are the KILL.. They make a great catback for the TC btw... Expensive system but it remains unbeaten by anything out there at this time. They dyno well and sound aggressive!!

[aZepolyn]

ARKSpeedRacing makes some great products. One of my past sponsors, their STS is good and their Exhausts are the KILL.. They make a great catback for the TC btw... Expensive system but it remains unbeaten by anything out there at this time. They dyno well and sound aggressive!!

Yea, I saw that when I was ordering. It's new yea? I'd never seen it before ... then again I think most of the ScionLife members are ZPI fanboys by now, the little christian people at ARK don't get enough credit

[scionara_tC]

so where's the pics bro? waiting to see your handiwork 'cause i like that shifter. i liked their exhaust too, but $755???? Damn!

[aZepolyn]

gimme like ... 15-20 minutes lol
gonna run out ther eon break, sun's finally up. I just really like the fact the shifter is long, like stock. For some reason, when I think of the shoft shaft shifters, I think back to test driving the Yaris 5sp. Very awkward, at least for me ... I actually sit up in my chair.
I'll even take a pic of the shifter knob that doesnt fit! So you can like, pretend :up:

[aZepolyn]

Ok, here it is intalled, again, no visible difference really, it's lightly shorter, not enough for most to notice:
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Here's the ring flipped over:
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HEre's the bugered up housing, complete with missing clip. You don't want to see the clip holding in the sidearm, that's really bad
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Ok, and the installed shifter, without consol covering it up making it pretty
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The Greddy Weighted Knob .... this oen fits Nissans and Mazda ... hence why its still in packaging
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And here's my sole complaint. The knob that ARK supplied has these knotches at the top, just some fancy dressup. When you firmly grip the knob, they dig into your hand and it hurts. Also, the shift pattern sticker it game with was for a 6sp lol, oh well
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I can now confidently tear down the center consol within mere minutes! :md:

oops ... first picture fixed!

[scionara_tC]

cool! looks easy enough to do. hey, put on the 6 speed sticker and see how many questions you get about it..LOL

[aZepolyn]

well .. it is easy in that you tear down the center consol, disconnect the 2 wires that lead into the housing. At this point you can either tear down the shifer cup and sidearm still in the car, or you can unbolt the housing, take it out, and continue disassembling outside the car. Once it's all in, reverse the steps and you're good to go.

I opted to take it out and wrestle with it ont he floor of the garage. Key word there was leverage. The downside is there is a washer clip that holds the sidearm on ... that is a bitch. it's a real fucker, there's no way to get it off without some sort of damage to both the clip and the housing. Sorry, no way around it. All you can do is minimalize the damage done. Best thought I found was the dremel it off, just cut the damn thing. I went with the screw driver/knife/wire cutter thing that cuts metal/fight/cus up a storm method. It works, but its not pretty.
The next problem is getting the cap off the housing so you can remove the shifter itself. I went again with the screw driver/knife/wire cutter thing that cuts metal/fight/cus up a storm method (without the cutter) method, finally got it off. Ended up using a normal flathead screwdriver, and ratcheting screw driver with changeable heads. worked the changeable heads in so they held up the front of the cup about halfway, then levered the back of the cap off with the normal screwdriver. Once that fucker was off, it was all about greasing the cap at the bottom of the shifter and the center ball joint.
But then you go to put it back in. Part of the short shifter is the lower arm is longer than the stock. It's not an easy fit, but it'll fit again with little hassle. From there bolt the crap back in. I made sure I could hit all 6 points, then went for a test drive before I put the consol back on.

Like I said before, I really liked the naked look on the center of the car. Pondering doing smoething with that in the future ... way in the future. I would have left it all off if I didnt need the CLAs and AUX input.

[aZepolyn]

cool! looks easy enough to do. hey, put on the 6 speed sticker and see how many questions you get about it..LOL

Oh .. and I thought about it ... but between you and me (and the rest of the scikotics) I figured if I did it would confuse the gf and I didn't want to go into that explaination. It's bad enough that wen she drives it the gears are closer together, but then she's going to think there's a 6th gear and either wont be abel to find Reverse, or won't be able to drop into reverse going 70mph bc she thinks its 6th. Shhhhhh don't tell her! :up:

[scionara_tC]

cool! looks easy enough to do. hey, put on the 6 speed sticker and see how many questions you get about it..LOL

Oh .. and I thought about it ... but between you and me (and the rest of the scikotics) I figured if I did it would confuse the gf and I didn't want to go into that explaination. It's bad enough that wen she drives it the gears are closer together, but then she's going to think there's a 6th gear and either wont be abel to find Reverse, or won't be able to drop into reverse going 70mph bc she thinks its 6th. Shhhhhh don't tell her! :up:

:rofl2: :rofl2: