Gear stick positioning
 

Having not been able to progress my car for the last 8 months or so due to other family priorities I am now picking up on things from last summer.
Appreciate some input on engine alignment and gearstick positioning.
I have an M52 engine and with the engine mounts as supplied by Marlin with the gearbox mount in the centre of the transmission tunnel the gearbox drive flange seems quite nicely aligned with the rear diff flange.
However my concern is where that leaves the gearstick mount in relation to the transmission tunnel. While not obsessed with it being absolutely dead centre of the tunnel mine ends up hard over to one side. See attached pic. Surely this can’t be right. Looking at pics I have taken of various cars at shows etc it seems way off.
Before I get too deep into a solution I was wondering where others found their gearstick ending up and whether they had had any problems in getting them where they wanted them.

That isn't good as you know. You say drive flange looks aligned, so it's a bit strange. New engine mounts.... are they handed? on correct sides? Just a thought (I don't have a Marlin BTW). It wouldn't take much movement at the engine mounts to create a large movement on the gear remote, but then (presumably) the drive flange would also change alignment, but maybe to a lesser extent? If nobody comes up with any pointers, is it feasible to loosen mountings and try some movement?

Hi,

The engine mounts are handed but can only go on one way round. I have shuffled the engine around occasions and will have to give it another go. One thing I have to be careful of is that moving it more than a touch results in it getting far too close for comfort to the brake servo.
So looks like it will be something of a compromise.

I think there is something odd about the position of that e39 gearshift.
Have you thought about trying a gearbox and shift mechanism from an e36 car? I think most Sportsters have been built using either e30 or e36 engine/gearboxes and I haven't seen a problem like this before.

It is worth an investigation. I have managed to get it to come across a bit by using the other set of engine mounts I got from Marlin. But it is still off centre.
Thanks

Needs a bit more investigation but I obtained a gearshift linkage from an E36 which has the same gearbox. It is much shorter than the e39 one which results in the gearchange being further forward where the transmission tunnel flares out. Much more like I have got in various Marlin photos from shows.
On offering all the bits up I can’t see any reason why it won’t work and allows me to position the gearstick far more centrally.