Hi,
I have a 76 highboy with a 4 speed and last night, as I was putting it in gear, the shifter let go and it got stuck in neutral. Now the shifter is completely loose and floppy, won't go in gear at all - it's like something gave way and the shifter isn't attached to the tranny anymore. Anyone have any advice?

 

The same thing happend to me the other day. There is a socket that pushes in and turns to hold the shifter assemby in, right at the base where the shifter goes into the gearbox housing, and that socket has 'ears' or tabs on it that lock to hold everything in place, after years of wear and tear they break off, and there is nothing holding the shift assembly in place, so the shifter came out, the first time it happend I managed to get it to go back in, as it was in one of the forward gears, but the next time it happened it got stuck in reverse, and the shifter was completely detached from the gearbox, couldnt 'find' the position in which it came out for the life of me, finally figured out that there is a slot just big enough for the base of the shifter to slide into, and there is little spring loaded tab that you have to push to the left with a long screwdriver and then slide the bottom of the shifter in at the same time, and it should push out of the way. I am waiting on the new 'socket' ... cant get it from Ford anymore, but the parts guy at the Ford Store I work at found 3 in the Vintage Parts catologue. I will go take a pciture of what I am talking about for you.

 

*** I also have a '76 Highboy 4-Speed with a 390.

 

The socket with the notch in it should have tabs to lock it in place, but
they are broken.


The square notch in the middle is what the base of the shifter should fit into. Ive only seen the spring loaded 'tab' I was talking about when the trans is stuck in Reverse, when I took this photo, it was in Nuetral and the tab did not come out, so replacing the base of the shifter into that notch shouldn't be too difficult.


The socket I was referring to in the above picture should slide in and turn, to lock, on the two tabs that you can see on either side of the round shifter housing

I hope this helps!

 

Also, in Arctic ragtops 2nd pic..........if you look down in the tranny thru the shifter hole, you will see the shift rails. 3 of them. In this pic they are not lined up. They need to be to put the shifter back in. You can take a long screw driver or pry bar and slide them all to the middle position. When they are correct you will have the slots that the shifter fits into all 3 in the same position ..............in the middle...........play with it and you'll see what Im talking about........they slide front to rear........

 

I have a similar problem. My shifter slips out but the socket is still in good shape. I would like to fix the problem but I don't know what kind of transmission I have. I'm a new owner. Could anyone tell me how to find out what kind of tranny I have? My truck is a 1975 F250. The Engine is a 360 and I was told it came from a 1970 F250.

Also, once I know what tranny I have, were can I find out how to fix it and is it very difficult. I.e. can I fix it without dropping the tranny?

 

Thanks for the reply arctic ragtop! I used your explanation and got the shfiter out - the bottom of the shifter is actually cracked off because the PO replaced the shift rod with one out of an 80s truck.

So now I'm looking for a shift rod assembly for a 4 speed np435 - would anyone know where to get one? Will pay cash, or I have some stuff I could trade.

-gb

 

Ahh, I didn't realize it was actually broken, ouch. Not sure of where to find one, other than a wrecking yard?