Putting aT5 5 speed in my A roadster. Quick question...... can I just remove the electric speedo sensor and replace it with a normal cable drive unit? I'm not too familiar with these things. I know I replaced a Camaro tailshaft with an s-10 to get the shifter where I wanted it and the gear locations didn't line up. Both of those were cable. Thanx....
You'll have to replace the electric pickup on the tail shaft with the appropriate gear for the mechanical unit which bolts in the housing. It's pretty straight forward, it's just locating the tail shaft gear and the mechanical pickup for the housing that the speedo cable screws into.
Electric sensor and mechanical sensor tailshafts are different. You cannot use a mechanical gear in an electronic tailshaft. If you have a mechanical S10 tailshaft on your T5, you have to relocate the gear to the correct position on the mainshaft. Bolt on the tailshaft snugly to the main case with 2 bolts, stick a sharpie through the speedo gear opening, spin the mainshaft while holding the sharpie against it. Remove the tailshaft and use a 3/16" masonry drill bit to drill a 1/8" deep hole into the shaft at the mark. That hole will hold the clip for the speedo gear. Cut a strip of .010 or .015 shim stock to slip under the gear to make up for the narrower main shaft at that point. Use the clip and the shim stock to mount the gear to the shaft at the point marked on the mainshaft and where the hold was drilled.. Epoxy the gear in place, reinstall the tailshaft. Done. Chris
I don't know what I did different but I changed my electric speedo with a mechanical gear without changing the shaft. In fact, the tranny never left the car. I just pulled the tail shaft housing to do it. The car has over 5000 trouble free miles since the swap. From what I recall there is a collar "tang" under the speedo gear which recessed into the indentation of where the electric pickup use to be. I could be wrong as I did the swap some time ago.
Sounds exactly what I did with the camaro/ s-10 change, right down to the shim...... thanx, I'll give it a try