This weekend I changed shift lever (no 6) and bearing (No 7)

http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts.do?mo...hg=25&fg=05

Original shift lever art no: 25117521444 was changed to short shift art no: 25117546373
And new bearing art no: 25111220600

The change was not that complicated. About 2h work, on the garage floor.

To do the change according to the book, you are supposed to remove, exhaust, heat shields and drive shaft.
With thin arms with four joint you are able to just remove heat shield bolts and squeeze the arm in between everything
This operation is needed to remove the circlip (no 12), to be able to remove shift lever from the top.

This operation is strongly recommended.
The shift throw is just noticeable shorter, but the great advantage is the "new car" feeling you get from changing the bearing.

I will attach a couple of pictures during the day.

 

I just did this last night...but I took one look at all the heat shields and decided to try it from inside the car. (I have small hands.) I used a big tie wrap looped around the selector rod to keep it from falling down once I released the circlip from the shifter. (I did manage to drop the circlip, but I had several on hand from previous short shifter installs.) I removed the bearing/shifter, installed new bearing onto the new shifter, then snapped it back into place on the carrier. I then used a combination of forceps, a thick allen wrench, and lots of cursing to get the selector rod back on the new shifter, attach the circlip, and close everything up.

result is fantastic; not quite as short as short shifters I've used in the past, but smooooooooth. especially with the weighted ZHP shift knob. Took less than 1 hr, but I've done this on 6-7 BMWs now (granted, this is the first one I've done completely from inside the car.)

-felix
05 545/6 TiAg/blk

 

How did you get the bearing out? When I did mine, I took the whole carrier assembly out (from below) and worked on it on the bench. It was a real pain getting the plastic bearing out of the carrier.

 

Two flat screwdrivers, bending the bearing inwards, and just pull the stick right up.
My stick just popped right out, with bearing and all.....No sweat

 

The bearing is like $6. It helps to have a new one available, as you could likely crack the old one while you're removing it, and seeing the part out of the carrier will help you understand what we're talking about. Basically, you have to bend/crack the two "fingers" that have tabs going into the metal carrier, then stick a screwdriver into the slot at the 6 o'clock position and rotate the bearing clockwise a bit to unlock the tabs. Then the assembly just pulls right out. To install put the bearing on the shifter first, then put the assembly into the car.

 

Yes, you should get a new bearing, agree.
This is the most noticable enhancement.

Stick and bearing. Arrows point at the small tabs mentioned in previous post.





This is where to put the small flat screw drivers, to release the bearing from the aluminum carrier.