Classic Beetle - All the gears, no idea...

The other two shifters didnt exist when i had mine.
I like the bugtech one, expensive though.
I'm not keen on the third option personally.

As i say, worth checking out opinions of the scats these days, i seem to remember a few folk not liking them but the old ones being considered better. I may be wrong though, hazy memories.

Cheers for the replies chaps! I wasn't sure how many mountings/bushings/linkages there was so glad to hear its usual VW simplicity! I've got a SCAT in the budget at the moment as they're a very good price at the moment so might try it and see how it goes, the thing I like about the bug tech ones are the simplicity of being able to see if anything is catching or wrong with the mechanism. How does the bottom connector attach to the Bug tech one out of interest, never seen the underside of one!

Its probably the fact alot of people buy scats, and not many people change the tunnel bush, that sometimes gives them a bad rep.

I forgot the rod has to come out to fit the bush! I had welded over the hole in the front valance so couldnt do mine until i smashed the front end up and had to replace it.

Thank you for the replies again, useful description and images zeberdee, I've never changed a whole gearstick before so genuinly had no idea what was involved in replacing it!

and your probably right there VW with people not changing the bushes,I imagine that's potentially an issue for almost all short shifters!

tonycocacola A Gene Berg is another option, just one that I haven't looked into so much over a SCAT/Bug-Tech (the Bug-Tech and CAE are both beyond the £300 mark... the CAE quite considerably)

As above ,

The gear linkage is in the tunnel .

You can’t see any of it from underneath .

Yeah, like zeberdee said, it's all in the tunnel, which is sealed. That's why they're a bit of a fiddle. The rear one isn't so bad, you lift the rear seat squab up and one screw undoes a covering plate at the back end of the tunnel. Inside is this;


Gear linkage finished by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

the tapered rod that goes into the front of the red bushing is the shifter rod; the narrower one the other side is the actuator in the end of the gearbox nose. You need to undo the square-headed bolt to release the entire cage assembly, then the large screw that goes through both rubber blocks (the red bits are new polyurethane ones). Like I said, better to keep the steel VW cage rather than the new crappy aftermarket one. The large screw cuts its own thread into a flanged sleeve that goes through the bush from the other side, thus locking both rubber blocks together

The old rubber bushes in mine were totally knackered, it was well worth swapping


Gear linkage old v new by Nick Liassides, on Flickr


I haven't got photos of doing the front bush, but it's basically a little doughnut that lives in a loop welded to the inside of the tunnel. It hangs down just behind the aperture where the gearlever mounts. This means to change it, you have to slide the shifter rod (having undone the rear bush assembly as above) all the way forwards until it's free of the bush


floor cleaning by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

As you can see, that's quite a length. Length matters, apparently. There's a closing plate in the front valance and another in the front of the framehead that you need to remove to slide the rod out the front of the car afar enough to clear the bush. Then all you have to do is swap the little nylon bush without through a hole smaller than your hand, blind, without dropping it irretrievably into the bottom of the tunnel. Then thread the shift rod back through without pushing the bush out of its mounting. Fun it ain't

The advantage of having a ramp is you don't have to access the closing plates at the front rolling around on the floor, but other than that, it won't be much help, sad to say