marfcuS4

First of all, BIG hats off to the guys over at JHM for making such great products and being a big asset to the Audi community especially the B5 S4 guru.

Now on to the review. On a scale of 1 (easy as pie) and 10 (hope you are a Audi certified master tech) I would say this is 2 as long as you have all the proper tools recommended and follow the directions. Everything is very clearly stated in video that comes with shifter however, I couldn't get it to work in either of my computers for some reason so I just downloaded the video off the JHM website. All in all it probably took an hour to remove, assemble, and reinstall everything.

The only hard part of the whole ordeal is the alignment. Everyone do yourself a favor and get an angle finder with the magnetic base. You can get one from Harbor Freight (link below) for $6. Save yourself two hours of cursing at the damn shifter because you can't seem to get it right. I could always find all the gears except reverse and then when I found reverse I didn't have 1st or 2nd. After a while I finally found a spot that worked OK but it was a little tricky to get into reverse and a little more notchy than I wanted. I finally went to my local harbor freight retail store and bought the angle finder and got it aligned perfectly. Reverse engages as well if not better than stock and all gears are there.

I have no experience with any other SS on the market for the S4 so I will try and explain the feel and function as best as possible. Solid shifter is right! The only slop I have now is due to the linkage bushing being a little soft otherwise there is no movement in this thing. Every gear is so much easier to find and the 35% reduction is perfect imho. The shifter is slightly more notchy than stock but not by much if you get it aligned properly. It adds a much more sporty feel to the car, gives it a racing feel. At first I wasn't sure how I liked it but after driving it for 10 minutes, when I finally got it aligned, it was perfect for what I wanted. No more transmission giving you that big old DENIED when hunting for 3rd or downshifting into 2nd. It just slides right into 2nd like butter now especially when double clutching. The shifter is slightly more noisy due to the metal construction but it really isn't that bad and you don't notice it unless you really try to listen for it.

Overall I am very pleased with this short shifter and I highly recommend it to anyone in the market for one.


<a href="http://www.jhmotorsports.com/products/shifters.html">JHMortosports</a>

<a href="http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=34214">Harbor Freight "Angle Finder"</a>

Cypher2k

2nd on the angle thingi. Got it right on the first try.

daves4izzle::ASP 3-

Therd.