Why does my gear shift lever spins?

John-T

John-T

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It's not a loose knob on the top, the whole gear shift lever rotates freely. The base doesn't turn, it's the lever that spins. Should there be a screw or a pin somewhere to prevent it from turning? Or could it be a worn out socket / joint?
I have attached a picture of the inside of the boot.

Thank you in advance for your input.

John
 

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Pittraider18 said:
In theory, you could remove all of the existing rubber with a Dremel or fire and replace with urethane, but it would be a real pain. Would likely be easier to just replace the piece itself.
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Yup, I was reading a little more about this on a different forum and I quickly came to the conclusion that it is much easier to replace the whole thing.

Thank you for the reply.
 
John-T said:
Thanks Don. Is it possible to just replace the rubber inside?
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Yes, just remove the shift lever from the car, remove the spring clip at the bottom inside of the chrome piece, and pull the 2 sections apart. If stuck you may need to put one end in a vice to hold while you yank the other. There are 2 pieces of rubber inside, one that caps the lower piece (25111205441) and fits up into the upper piece, and one that looks like a donut (23411666133). May as well grease and replace the upper and lower ball joint cups while you're in there (2 x 23411466110).
 
Thanks Steve for the info. One question how do I remove the lever? Is there a clip that holds it in place or just pull it out?
 
John-T said:
Thanks Steve for the info. One question how do I remove the lever? Is there a clip that holds it in place or just pull it out?
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Under the car you have to remove the clip that connects the bottom of the shift lever to the shift rod that goes into the transmission. Up in the cabin at the base of the shift lever on the tunnel is a circlip that holds the entire assembly in.
 
Stevehose said:
Under the car you have to remove the clip that connects the bottom of the shift lever to the shift rod that goes into the transmission. Up in the cabin at the base of the shift lever on the tunnel is a circlip that holds the entire assembly in.
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Very helpful.
Thanks for the information. I really appreciate it.
 
Last edited:
Hi everyone,
While looking for some other info on the shift lever, I came across this thread. And I have exctly the same problem: a rotating lever. Not so bothering for me, except fot the BMW logo spinning a complete round in a few days. So thanks to this thread I supposedly know how to fix it. I will give it a try while I'm at it.
But my problem is a bit different: I just had a 5 gearbox installed. Which I am totally satisfied with. But despite my mechanic best efforts, the lever is hitting the center console on all the "upper" gears. We all know this problem when shifting into reverse: the lever does hit the edge of the center console after passing the "hard spot".
Well I am now banging the upper edge of the console on mainly 1st, 3rd too and 5th not so bad. At some point, at a red light for example, If I don't push all the way the lever on 1st, the gear just pops out. Same on 3rd I sometimes "miss it", and I get the horrible cracking of gears not meshing but "rubbing"...
So, I just dismounted the center console to se what can be done.
I can see that the lever is in 2 portions: the staight one that comes out of the console, and a lower part, after the cone, with an important angle. There must also be some kind of rotule in there, I beleive.
So I was thinking, if there is some kind of adjustment, I could simply offset the straight lever a little to the right, and a little backwards, so as to avoid the interference with the console while shifting.
Does anybody know something about this. Or is the angle between the upper and lower parts "fixed"? Thank you guys.
 
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