How to Adjust Shifter Location

Hey, welcome to Fix My Hog. My name's Steve Noble, and what we are doing today is adjusting the shifter position on our '22 Low Rider ST. Now, this is an M8 Softail, however, this procedure is pretty much the same for all Big Twin Harleys. It's even the same for Sportsters if you have forward controls. The only one it doesn't completely work for is mid controls, and even that's kind of close.

So what we're gonna do here is actually adjust the position of the shifter. Maybe you've found situations where your work boots don't fit underneath to upshift, or you find it to be like a really high ankle lift to get your foot on top the shifter. Now, you have two ways to adjust this shifter. You can either move your shifter on the shaft here and actually adjust it one tooth at a time on the spline, or you can fine-tune it here at your shifter linkage. And on your mid controls, like on your M8 Softails and on your Dynas, your mid controls, you have a short linkage right here.

If you have forwards on your Softails, Dynas, Baggers, or even your Sportsters, this linkage is here, it's just longer. it's a pretty easy task. You can do with some basic hand tools. you can do this in your driveway. And it's one of those things you might wanna do to fine-tune your motorcycle so it fits for you.

So from here, let's move in for a closer look. Now first, let's look at the major adjustment on your shifter. Your shifter is mounted onto a spline shaft here, and this one bolt holds it in place. So you can take two half-inch wrenches and lefty loosey that bolt off of there. To get this shifter off, the bolt must be completely removed.

Then from there, you can just grab your shifter and pull on the top and the bottom and wiggle it back and forth and it will slide off of that spline. If for some reason you have a hard time getting it off of there, try to get two items behind it there to pull it off evenly. If you pull it crooked, it will lock up on itself and you'll never get it off of there. Now, if you're taking this off for a repair, it never hurts to mark the shaft with a black Magic Marker in relation to where your shifter goes. But today we're looking at making an adjustment with it.

So as you can see, there's a bunch of splines on this, or those tiny little teeth. So it was right about there. Now, if we wanna go up just a little bit higher, we'll go up to right about there. Then you can just push your shifter shaft or shifter back on the shaft right there. Now I have a little more clearance here.

It's kinda, I'm gonna have to actually lift my foot up to push down on the shifter, but it'll be easier for me to get my steel-toed boots underneath the shifter, which will be a lot easier for riding into work. Then from there, we can take our bolt, slide it back in there, and run the nut on until it's snug. And then tighten it up. Then after that, put a torque wrench on it and torque it to spec. And you're gonna wanna torque that to 18 to 22 foot-pounds.

Now let's look at fine tune adjustments. Now, on this linkage right here, this is what attaches your shifter to your transmission. This has a threaded end on each end of it, so if you take one end off, you could turn it in or out about a thread or about a half a rotation, and that's going to move these two pins either closer together or further apart, depending on which way you wanna go. And that's gonna make a small adjustment in relation to the position of the shifter. So for that, just take a half-inch wrench, break both those free.

Now, sadly, these are both right-handed threads, so you can't just move the inner shaft. It won't spread them apart or pull them closer together. You have to unbolt one end or the other. But that's not too hard to do. Takes a 3/16 Allen.

Just break it free and spin the bolt right on out of there. Now what we can do is turn this Well, let's take the bolt out first. Now what we can do is we can actually turn this rod end either in or out, depending on how far you wanna go, and that's gonna adjust your shifter height. Now, make sure you still have three or four threads engaged on this. You don't wanna thread it all the way out to the end and then you only have one or two threads on there, because then when you stomp on your shifter, you'll shift, you'll strip the thing out.

Nobody wants that. So get set to about the right position. Line up your bolt and your shifter linkage there. And run it back in. Now from there, feel free to hop on the bike, check your shifter position, make sure it feels good for you, and then you can tighten that bolt back up.

And of course, once it's on there snug, you can torque it to spec. And you're gonna wanna torque that to 120 to 168 inch-pounds. And after those are done, run these nuts out to the rod end there. Just take your wrench and tighten them up. Now, there are two flats on this rod end that you're gonna wanna hold on to.

Once those are on, tightened down, you're ready to go ride. All right, there you have it. Everything is back together and torqued to spec. Now the shifter is in a good position that fits me. And your motorcycle should fit you.

It's your bike, you're riding it, you should be comfortable on it. That's all I really have for you today. My name's Steve Noble, this is Fix My Hog, and thank you for watching.