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Is a Short Shifter Worth It? - YouTube
Channel: Donut Media
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[Music]
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what's my time
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2.41 seconds oh that's way too slow it
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should be way faster
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that's why i have this it's called a
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short throw shifter and we're gonna
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install it in the miata today and see if
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it can actually make me any faster i'm
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zach and this is money pit let's get
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short
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and throwed let's start shifting let's
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shift into gear
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i don't know man let's get shifting
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that's the worst one yet
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use it
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thanks to blinkist for sponsoring
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today's episode of money pit are you
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like me you're constantly stuck under
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the hood of your project car
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leaving next to no time for any outside
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learning i know there are a ton of
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things i want to learn about but i just
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struggle to make the time
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now thanks to blinkist i'm able to break
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up my daily routine by listening or
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reading a full book in as little as 15
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minutes blinkist breaks down entire
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best-selling non-fiction book titles
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into manageable key points
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so you're able to read or listen to them
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in a hyper condensed period of time
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now while i'm working on the miata dude
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i finally let my real voice out
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now while i'm working on the miata i
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just pop in my headphones and listen and
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learn something new
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i've been on a kick of listening to
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non-fiction books like the creative
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curve
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and where good ideas come from so i'm
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able to stay creative during these
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routine times so go break up your daily
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routine and learn something new in 15
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minutes
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click the link in the description below
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to download the blinkist app and get
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your free
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seven day unlimited trial and if you're
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interested you'll get to take 25
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off the full membership now let's get
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back to the show
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you know a lot of people think that in
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order to go faster in your car
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you have to make your car faster but
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what if i told you you can actually make
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your car go faster
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by making yourself faster well one of
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the places that we can make
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ourselves a lot faster is in our gear
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changes
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whoa forever so there's obviously some
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time to be saved right there
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all right so we've got the old tape
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measure out and we're going to roughly
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measure what the length of the throw
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from first to second gear on our current
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stock shifter is
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uh so i've just got the tape measure
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held up to the front of the shift knob
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here
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first gear at rest second gear at rest
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three inches so we got a three inch
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throw on the front of the shift knob
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so that's where a short throw shifter is
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going to come into play should shorten
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up our shifts
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as well as making them a little bit more
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precise which will be sweet but if you
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just want a shorter shifter then why not
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just saw the top of your shifter off and
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make it shorter well that's not really
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actually how short throw shifters work
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let me show you so here we've got our
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short throw shifter from miata roadster
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and i just want to take a quick look at
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what a shifter is
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so we've got the upper portion of the
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shifter we've got the lower portion of
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the shifter
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and then right here this ball this is
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the fulcrum so a short throw shifter
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really is about
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lengthening the bottom part of the
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shifter by moving this fulcrum
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up so that the amount of travel you have
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to move to effect a shift
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at the top where the shift knob is is
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shorter let me show you a really simple
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demonstration of the difference between
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a stock shifter and a short throw
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shifter
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with an antenna and an antenna ball
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imagine for a minute that this is a
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shifter imagine this is
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a stock shifter so we've got our fulcrum
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point down here
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pretty close to the bottom it's really
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low which gives you a lot of leverage
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a lot of advantage over this shift so
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that your shifts are really effortless
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and really easy and it doesn't take any
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effort
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but all that mechanical advantage means
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that
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your shifts are going to be pretty long
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it takes a long travel up here
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to get a pretty short travel on the
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bottom of the shifter
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so a short throw shifter actually just
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lengthens the bottom portion of the
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shifter by moving
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that fulcrum up so we move that fulcrum
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up and you can see that it takes a lot
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less
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shifting distance to affect the same
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travel at the bottom of the shifter
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so basically it boils down to this
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versus
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you can tell which one's better
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okay so for shortening the shifts in the
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money pit miata here's what we got
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i got miata roadster short throw shifter
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kit and it's awesome it's exactly what a
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kit should be it comes with everything
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they've thought of it all from start to
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finish all the
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all the heat shielding new washers new
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hardware
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obviously the shifter itself all the way
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down to the instructions it comes with
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everything so this should be a really
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breezy install but the first part of the
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install is always getting that stock
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stuff out
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so let's go do that
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okay so the first thing we need to do to
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install a short throw shifter is remove
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the stock long throw shifter so the
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first thing i'm going to do is pop off
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the shift knob it just unscrews
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then we'll get this center console out
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of here and it'll keep moving so in the
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miata we've done the steering wheel so
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far
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so the thing that i touch probably the
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most is in great shape it
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works for me i love it so now it's time
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to focus on the shifter and make
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it great because you know when you're
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driving a car you shift
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a lot and it would be sweet if those
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shifts
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were sublime you know what i mean so
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that's what we're after here
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making the things that we interact with
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on the car awesome
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okay so now that we're down to the
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shifter we're going to take off this
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shift boot which is actually pretty new
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we replaced it recently but now we got
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another new one holy crap
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not too bad okay eddie your new boot
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thanks bro
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ah nice look at this old nasty heat
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insulation okay
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i'll take that you want it okay all
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right all right
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i love it try to keep oh
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literally as i'm saying i'm gonna try to
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keep all these on the top side of the
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car
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well you know what we might as well drop
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all three then you know okay so now
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we're down to our shifter
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setup here and we just pick it straight
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up out comes out nice and easy and our
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turret still has oil in it because i
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think we filled it up not too long ago
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you can see our lower shift cup is on
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there we'll be replacing that as well
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so time to get this out the car
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oops so here we can clearly see the
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change in fulcrum position
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uh in the stock shifter versus the short
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throw shifter
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you can see that fulcrum ball is almost
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all the way at the bottom here on this
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stock shifter and then on the
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aftermarket one it's moved considerably
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upwards to make those
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shifts shorter so it's really easy to
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see when you look at it like that
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and uh now we gotta go put it in the car
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what was that what so in the n a miata
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there's what's called a turret right
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here that the shifter sits in and it's
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actually fluid filled you just use
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whatever transmission fluid that you use
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in your transmission and put it here
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they are separate so it doesn't quite
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matter too much what fluid you use in
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here
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now i filled this back up recently i
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think when we did the clutch job
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so it's fine in there i'm sure but the
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kit even comes with a turkey baster with
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a little length of hose
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to suck out the turret fluid so you can
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replace it that is thinking ahead
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so i figure while we're in here i might
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as well replace the turret fluid
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even though it's not really going to get
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me anything
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okay that should be enough so we're
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going to drop in our new tip bushing
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that goes onto the bottom
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of the shifter which actually is what
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drives the gears back and forth
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and this is our stock one not only do
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these wear out in this inner diameter
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here
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but mine's also broken so that
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does not help with the way shifts feel
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so this will be a nice addition
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okay so now that's down in there like so
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and now all we need to do is fill it up
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with a little bit of
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trans fluid cover that thing up so we've
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got a new
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unbroken oem wave spring included in the
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kit
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this just drops down into the turret and
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sits on that lower bore
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now we got to go back to the bench and
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lube up our new
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uh bushing put that thing in and hell
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we're halfway home
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i'm just playing dog
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[Music]
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just like so you see it's just covering
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up that lower bushing
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perfect okay so these slots
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match up with you'll have one or two
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pins in the miata depending on what
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generation you have
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so this slot is gonna line up with that
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pin
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just like so now we're on top of that
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wave spring
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now our fulcrum point is ready to meet
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up with our new shifter
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so these pins will meet up with the
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indents in this bushing down here
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like so and then these holes line up
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perfectly
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ready to drop the new short throw
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shifter in before we did that i lined up
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this plastic ring here these indents
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line up with the slots
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which line up with these pins so it
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shouldn't should be ready to drop in
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let's see what happens that looks nice
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it's just nice to replace all these
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gaskets and the heat insulation
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so much heat comes through the shifter
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area as it was
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this is a great day all right
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see if she shifts
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oh my god it's amazing
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oh all right let's keep going i gotta
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get a knob on there we gotta drive this
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[Music]
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okay so now the boot's in place now we
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can use this
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reusable zip tie that it comes with
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[Music]
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and that is some serious heat insulation
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i know it maybe
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looks a little overkill but this thing
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lets a lot of heat through the shifter
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area and
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i'm really excited for it to not be so
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hot right here so
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uh that's it now i got to put my center
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console back on drop it on top and then
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all this will be hidden anyway so
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you'll never even know let's do it
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ah
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okay she's in last thing we gotta do is
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put the knob back on
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and we're just gonna put the stock one
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back on for now so we can measure the
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difference
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in the overall shift throw because we
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were measuring from the shift knob so if
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we change the shift knob we
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change the measurement okay so when
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first
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shift back to second we were at three
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inches now we're just
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under two so we've reduced our shift
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length we've reduced the throw of our
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shifter by
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what 33 ish percent a third that's
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pretty dang good
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all right now it's time for the moment
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of truth
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oh man i've been training for this i
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don't know if you noticed but i went
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inside for like an hour earlier and i
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was just doing that
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is that what you're doing yeah uh on the
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sim
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is that what you got are you ready
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yeah dude i'm ready
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in three two
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one go what's my time
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your time is 1 76. yeah baby
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i told you we get under two seconds well
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the proof's in the pudding i can shift
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first second third fourth all the way
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into fifth at a standstill in under two
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seconds so it must be better
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now obviously that's a bit of a joke
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let's go drive it and see how this thing
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does
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let's see how quick we can shift
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that's nice so in my opinion the biggest
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benefit of a short throw shifter
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isn't really how quickly you can get
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from gear to gear because that's not
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really how we shift cars
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most of the time the biggest benefit is
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just how
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every gear change feels now it feels so
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much more crisp
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so much more positive it's got this
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mechanical click
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that feels the exact way you want a
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shifter to feel
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and the fact is that when i drive this
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car i'm constantly shifting it
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so why wouldn't i make that
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shift feel as good as possible so that
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every time i do it
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i get a little smile on my face and that
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to me is why a short shifter is worth it
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it makes every shift better not just the
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ones you're banging into gear
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let me know what you guys think about
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that in the comments below thank you so
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much for watching
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you can follow me on instagram zackjob
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follow donut
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media across all social platforms and
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i'll see you guys
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next week we're bam baby
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