Wheel and Shifter Swap – Pictorial
Just finished the swap and thought I’d add in my pictures and notes from the process. Just to note: my dad is a very talented engineer and craftsman, and he takes great pains to point out the stupid stuff he did during projects so that I can learn from them. See if you can figure out where I was doing stupid stuff before I did.
I'll come clean as I type.
M6 Shifter Swap:
Parts list
Knob: 24261463
Boot: 24261464
Removing the factory shifter
1) Grab the silver trim pieces to the left (1) and right (2) of the shifter and pull towards the back of the car. It’s tough to get a hold of without your trusty interior trim tools. I got a medium quality set off of amazon years ago and am glad to have them in my tool kit.
a. Note that I removed the screws above the numbers in the picture below – it wasn’t necessary.
2) Pull up on the gloss black trim piece (3) surrounding the shifter. You’ll have to pull harder than you want to. It’ll pop off all at once and will scare you.
3) Pull the shift boot over the knob to expose the black zip tie (4) directly under the knob. This zip tie holds the boot in place.
4) Remove the torx bolt from the left side of the shifter (5).
*** Note that on my car the torx bolt came out with a bit too much effort and didn’t feel right. I made a note to chase the threads before reassembly ***
Installing the replacement boot
1) Remove the ZL1 boot from the plastic housing that it is installed on by prying open the clips clumsily with a screwdriver … at least, that’s how I did it.
2) Remove the white plastic time bit between the OEM boot and the chrome ring. Sorry – no picture here.
Now, here’s the first place where I made a minor mistake, if only a mistake of efficiency. Someone else posted that he had used a needle and thread to tack the new boot onto this white piece. I thought about that, and decided that some adhesive would probably be much easier. That said, my can of adhesive was 20 miles away, so I used the needle and thread method. It worked just fine, but was more of a pain in the rear that the glue would have been. I’ll give you my process anyway:
3) Drill some very small holes parallel to each other into the white trim to allow for sewing. Lower would have been better here.
4) In order to avoid the extra material issue that other folks had, I simply ran the boot further down until the trim ring fit without excess. Don’t worry - there’s plenty of slack for shifting and it looks good too.
5) Stitch the white ring to the boot to secure it.
a. I haven’t ever done this before, so I’m sure I buggered this up. No worries – the trim rings help to hold it in place.
6) Reassemble the trim and pat yourself on the back.
Anyone see it yet? Yeah, I sewed the dumb thing on backwards. The fatter part should go toward the front of the car and the stitching should go toward the bottom. After re-doing my work it looks like this:
Reassembly
1) Reassembly is the reverse order for the trim and is easy
2) Install the new knob onto the shifter, but note that the mounting hole in the shift knob is on the right instead of the left as on the OEM part. That shouldn’t have been a big deal …
*** Remember how I said I had a note to chase those threads? Yeah, well … I didn’t. Guess what? Snap. After quite a bit of cursing and two broken extractors I ended up drilling and tapping a new hole on the other axis. Yeah … I know … I didn’t like it either. Works fine, of course, but ****. ***
When all’s said and done it should look like this:
Steering Wheel Swap:
Parts List
Wheel: 22896546
Switches: 92256901; 92256902
I slacked off on this one and didn’t take enough pictures – please forgive me. I ordered new switches for this partially to leave my OEM wheel completely intact, and partially because I wanted to take my time here. It’s a $50 delta.
Prepare the new wheel (I didn't have a shot of this, so I'm notating a picture of the new wheel after installation. Just play along)
1) Unplug the two switches (1 &2) from either side of the wheel.
2) Starting at the top of the black trim (3 & 4) gently pull up on the trim. It will peel off all the way down to bottom of the silver trim.
3) Remove the button clusters from the trim by releasing the clips. I broke a few of these, but they’re for the Camaro, so I didn’t mind.
Here’s what they look like – note the bosses on the bottom. Those are what secure the switches to the wheel itself.
4) Attempt to install the SS button clusters into the ZL1 wheel.
a. There will be a couple of clips and standoffs that are in the way. Trim them off. That will include a clip on each switch cluster.
*** I know, I know – it’s sacrilege to do that sort of stuff, but I promise to bosses will be the more important mechanical connection to the wheel. Also, remember that I bought new clusters, so I didn’t dink the original part.***
5) Once you know the switches will fit flush install the trim and along with the switches into the ZL1 wheel.
a. If the trim doesn’t feel solid, make sure the various clips are all interacting with the wheel correctly. It should be very solid.
Remove the old wheel:
1) Start the car and turn the steering wheel 180 degrees. (do this before step 2 … ask me how I know)
2) Disconnect the negative battery terminal in the trunk and wait a few minutes. No one wants to eat airbag.
3) Take a flathead screwdriver (or something similar) and insert it into one of the two access holes on the back of the wheel.
a. The handle should be in the middle of the wheel with the tip pointing outward
4) Gently pry inward until you feel a very gentle pressure – that’s the airbag spring (1).
a. After some trial and error you’ll get both clips to release and the airbag will come free.
5) Gently pry up on the airbag connector locks (2) to free the airbag.
6) Store airbag with the logo up on the passenger foot well.
7) Disconnect the button cluster wiring harness (3)
a. The airbag harness is not connected to the wheel and will pull through
8) Use a Torx T-50 with an extension and a long ratchet to loosen the main bolt (4)
a. Note that a gorilla on meth installed this thing and you’ll have to work hard to remove it.
9) Pull straight back on the wheel to remove.
Reinstallation is the reverse order of removal. I added more blue lock-tite to the main bolt to mimic the factory. All in all, I think it was worth it. It feels great in hand and, in my opinion, feels like a more quality material than the OEM parts.