I've been a follower of this forum for a long time and want to say thank you up front to everyone here for all the help you've provided me over the years. I have an issue I haven't been able to find an answer for so am posting the question. I have to replace the inside shift detent 'rooster tail' because I effed up and screwed up the pin on the old one while replacing the shift solenoids. (don't work on stuff when you are exhausted and cold) However I can't get the old part off the linkage shaft because the attached park rod won't give me enough room. So, I intend to pull the pin holding the linkage in place but want to know if there are any tricks to doing that. I don't want to screw anything else up under there. Car is on jack stands and trans is in car if that makes any difference. Any info you can provide is appreciated. I'm working on my burgundy '06 LS with 190K miles that I bought new and has been a great car with the exception of the thermostat issue and this cluster.
Shift Lever Retaining Pin Removal
- Thread starter gkhize
- Start date
Well I have ventured forth on my tranny problem and have an update to share. As you can see, I did not get any replies to my original question about removing the retaining pin for the manual linkage and took that to mean nobody had any sage advice to share. I now know that it was because nobody wanted to wast time replying with "Duh!". To provide a little background, before digging into my linkage repair I searched around for any information about how to get things out properly. Among the posts I saw was one on an Explorer site (they use the same 5R55S trans) where the guy ended up drilling out the pin. Another post talked about having to somehow use a slide hammer on the thing. I also saw a tool for $65 to help get them out. ??? Anyway, when I first got under there I grabbed hold of the pin with a good pliers and it didn't budge. I had to quit for other reasons at that time, so I later posted the question above based on what I'd seen and experienced. Cut to last night, one of 2 this week with double digit temps here, and got ready for what I was sure was going to be a battle. I didn't want to spend the $$ on that tool so I was gonna see what I could accomplish. I clamped my best vise grips on the 1/8" of pin showing and gave it a tug to see if the pliers were on right, and the stupid damned pin came right out!!! FYI to anyone needing to replace the detent 'rooster tail', removing the pin allows the shaft to move, but you will still need to remove the switch on the outside of the trans to move far enough to get the detent on. It will take a long flat 8mm wrench and a lot of patience to get the switch bolts off unless you have a dexterous three year old around who can get their tiny hands up in there. Also, make sure the park rod is seated properly (no clips or hooks but it has to mate up to the parking pawl in the tail shaft) and the shift lever shaft is properly aligned when you put the detent on. You probably can't get the detent on the shaft without seating the park rod properly, but I can see where you could get the lever shaft off 180 degrees and then the shifter probably wouldn't work right.
LSV8FAN
Active LVC Member
Did you check the 2006 service manual to see if it shows how to do it? 2006 service manual available at:
http://deneau.info/ls/
Also, this is not about the 5R55S, but I got this YouTube after Googling "detent rooster tail" and I think is shows about what you are doing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6UX9itv1NM
http://deneau.info/ls/
Also, this is not about the 5R55S, but I got this YouTube after Googling "detent rooster tail" and I think is shows about what you are doing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6UX9itv1NM
I would wager no has had to do this before. Very, very few people have actually opened up their transmissions. I thought you were talking about the pink "rooster tail" attached to the shifter mechanism.