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I did this cheap easy mod Friday night after work (got the parts from my local Ace Hardware store.) Took her out for a short run Sat about 25 miles and returned home and inspected the two bolts to ensure they were tight. Today's ride about 150 miles she's solid and no sloppiness in the shifting! Thanks for all the input guys!
I got the chrome spherical rod ends from midwestcontrol.com and while shopping I saw their chrome rods and got one of those. Unlike the stock rod, this one has a LH thread at one end. Their parts are:
CTF-5 (5/16-24 chrome RH)
CTFL-5 (5/16-24 chrome LH)
TRC312-12.000 (5/16-24 LH/RH rod)
I had to cut 5/8 of the end of each rod in order to get to the stock center-to-center length of just over 12 inches. Unfortunately their thread was 2.5 inches so even after the trimming I have a bit over an inch showing at each end.
I have an acorn theme going so I made a acorn headed bolt by removing the head of a 5/16-25 1-1/4 SS bolt and then securing it into a chrome acorn nut with red loctite (I could have used 1-1/2 here for a bit more thread into the tranny side. Shifter side is a 1" SS bolt.
EDIT
After riding for a few days I notices that the rod ends were rattling a bit. To keep it from moving around I slid on a zip tie. After the photo was taken I snipped off the extra slid the part where the ends meet to about 5 o'clock and it can't be seen.
EDIT 2
I finally got around to replacing the zip tie with a O-ring from the local auto parts store...this has stopped the rattling and it is not visible
If I had this to do over again I might have got this route using the stock rod but using engine crinkle black.
Originally Posted by Swheeler67
Here's my adaptation of this mod.
Last edited by ReidRik_Von; Feb 22, 2016 at 11:19 PM.
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