You know how some things just sort of…disappear? Like their existence is a tenuous thing, based on the flimsiest of handshake agreements with reality, and managed by a forgetful custodian. Common things in this category are Tupperware lids, socks, 10mm sockets, that sort of thing. Today I learned that this category also seems to include some important parts of my shift linkage?
I had just started driving my Citroën 2CV, backed it out of the driveway, drove it around the corner, when all of a sudden the gearshift went all floppy in my hand. Luckily, I was in neutral when it happened, and so wasn’t stuck in any gear, because I could feel exactly what happened. This wasn’t some gearshift erectile issue; this was a broken linkage.
I’ve encountered broken shift linkages before, maybe most memorably when I fixed a broken linkage in my old Yugo with two hose clamps and a rock:
On the way home from the zoo, the Yugo decided that trouble-free operation felt too weird so the shift linkage vanished. I bodged up a fix with 2 hose clamps and a rock and we made it home. pic.twitter.com/25PWyfq4fn
— Jason Torchinsky (@JasonTorchinsky) November 27, 2021
…but in that case, at least it happened because a part broke, and didn’t just, you know, disappear.
I realize I’m saying a part disappeared, so I should probably back that up with some evidence. First, let me show you where the shift linkage is in a 2CV, because it’s a little odd. When you shift a 2CV, you use this funny little bent handle on the dashboard that is essentially like shifting with your arm stuck through the dashboard:
So, there’s a stick sprouting out of the transmission like you’d expect, it’s just that the stick is actually in the engine compartment and you’re in the body of the car. So to shift, you move the actual gearstick with a little other gearstick, and they’re connected by a simple linkage made of a twisted bit of flat metal stock and some bushings and cotter pins. You can see the shift linkage here:
Hold on, let me zoom in a bit. Computer! Enlarge and enhance section 4,3! Execute!
See that? That’s what my shift linkage looked like when it was working fine and I wasn’t thinking about it. Here’s a video showing what a perfect one should look like:
Okay, that seems close enough to what I had? Maybe minus that top washer? Anyway, let’s look at what I saw when the shifter got all floppy:
Actually, this is actually a little better than what I saw, as when I saw it the parts weren’t even in contact with one another; I set it up like this so I could at least shift it enough to get it off the road. But as you can see, the whole bushing/pin thing on the dash shift handle end is just…gone.
Where the hell did it go? It was just there! It had been trouble-free as long as I’ve had this car, and now it just decided call in non-existent? It left the chat? Why? and how?
I looked all over the car for the pieces but found nothing. Well, that’s not entirely true; I did find a cotter pin that I think was from this, which I used instead of the bent nail I had been readying for the job.
Using some crap I had laying on my workbench (specifically that little rubber boot thing that I’m not sure where origin of but I think maybe was an electrical plug insulator thing that, up until this point, I’ve mostly been chewing on) and the found cotter pin, I was able to very quickly create this ersatz version of the shift linkage.
I tried it out, rowed through all the gears, including reverse, and it works just fine. I don’t even feel any difference at all, if I’m honest. This is one of the things I really love about the 2CV – sure, stuff can break sometimes, but it’s all so crude, clever, and simple that you can almost always just see what went wrong, comprehend it, and fix it with whatever you happen to have handy.
How many other cars have shift linkages you can fix without having to lay down under the car, too? I’m sure there’s some, but this is the first one I’ve owned that’s like this!
Seriously, though, where the hell did that little part go? Did it just fly off? How? Kleptomaniacal gnomes? Smurfs? What the hell happened?
Maybe you were trying too hard to go backwards forwards quickly?
This fix is only meant to be temporary. Unless is works.
Picture it: Southern Illinois, 1980:
One of the first cars I ever drove was a Fiat 850 Spider. (Spyder?). After a short drive, on country roads, at probably fourteen years old… the shifter just stopped working completely as turned to jelly in my hand. My Father, not the most patient fellow (but a good guy) started yelling at me that I destroyed the Fiat’s transmission. I will admit I had not been very smooth with the clutch/gear change interface, but I don’t think I’d ever really a shifted a car before. (Motorcycles – no problem!)
Dad had a business, a car repair garage. The youngish mechanics that worked there (great guys) had to fix the Fiat… they were really nice to me. They told me it was a bolt that snapped. It cost something like a few pennies to fix it.
Dad never said anything about it again. That’s how I knew that all was well.
Dad was expecting a large / expensive bill… (hence the yelling) then likely was a bit embarrassed when it turned out to be a simple bolt that broke 🙂
My Father was a great fellow… and he loved lots of unusual cars. I think my interest in oddball cars came from him. (My first car was a 1972 Saab 99 – and he loved that I found such a neat vehicle just a few miles away, for just a few hundred dollars.) But he never apologized about stuff. And from my perspective, that was OK. (He died young so I did not have time to build up resentment or anything.)
This is just the Frech car gods getting back at you for your comments regarding the Peugeot in the JCM video. Yes, I am still waiting for an apology. Thanks for the birthday drawing !
Renault 4 is one that had this done even simpler. Much much simpler 😀
The gear… khm… can I call it “a mechanism”… is basicaly a gearknob on a stick/tube, one side beeing bent up, other side bent down. There was just a piece of metal with a hole welded to the tube with a rubber ring inside, all this beeing stuck over the gearshift stick directly from the gearbox 🙂
There’s a photo of it beeing proudly presented on CurbsideClassic web page, I hope I’m not ruining their web server for linking to the photo 😛
https://i2.wp.com/www.curbsideclassic.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/engine-1.jpg
There was also some semblance of NVH engineering going on with a rubber dumper on a spring near the air filter which somewhat prevented the whole stick vibrating too much 😀
The linked photo is from the newer/newest model with the radiator in the front. The older type had an engine mounted fan and the radiator was above the gearbox.
I had the exact same colour and also a GTL model with 1108 cc and whopping 34 HP on a cold day. People who drove low powered carbureted cars will understand 😀
Car was driven into the ground for 270.000 km by my father and then abused some more for 100.000 kilometers by me. My next car was Renault 5 with the same engine but with 10 more HP! 🙂
Call him Angus Mac Chinsky. Might have been a bit more elegant with duct tape and chewing gum though
Ah, you were visited by the Parts Goblin.
The Parts Goblin is a devious little fae critter that sneaks about vintage and self-repaired vehicles and takes the parts from some and occasionally leaves extra parts on others. Missing a bolt but have an extra washer? You’ve been visited by the little bastard.
The Parts Goblin especially favors linkage pins, any kind of odd-sized, impossible to find screw or bolt, proprietary fasteners that have been out of manufacture since the 1990s, and of course, deez nuts.
Parts Goblins get especially excited when someone decides to work on their own car. They flutter about moving parts, bolts and nuts especially as well as sockets and wrenches…
Oh how they Love to move around sockets!!!
Is it just luck that your rake hood prop matches the paint on your car or was that intentional?
You need safety wire on these track cars.
This explains the tight, crisp shift feel for which 2CVs are world renown.
“Like jamming a buck’s worth of quarters into a maytag” as either C&D or R&T described it.
Having said that, please don’t ever jam a 2CV into gear. The synchros are NOT an easy job to do, I’m told.
Thankfully, you were able to welcome back the cotter pin.
I GET IT
Did you say it with a poker face?
David, unfortunately, does not.
I’m blaming Horshack’s mother.
A rubber hose might have come in handy also
Likely it was Menehune.
Insert “Why Thou!?!” Meme here…
Where did it go?
I would guess that bushing disappeared bc of age… the rubber bushing got old, shriveled, cracked from so many heat & cooling cycles and the repeated stress from being pushed and pulled to the poiny it finally said… the hell with this and broke in half like a day old baguette