1970 lemans Sport shifter and console questions.

Hello,

Does the round logo on top of the shifter contain a button that must be pushed down to release some sort of reverse lockout/ when my car is in drive, i can push the gear selector up and down through all of the gears while moving forward...it does not lock out from nuetral to reverse.

How do you take the console apart...and the shifter to fix problems like the lockout butto and a weathered PND21 decal.

Thanks,

Ed  

WOW..........245 views and not one helpful response.......this forum blows.....i'm outta here!!  

Temper, temper! What you have to understand about this forum, is that sometimes you have wait for somebody who has experience with your particular problem! There is no paid tech staff here, just fellow enthusiasts. While I don't personally have any experience with 70 Lemans floor shifters, I recall that a buddy of mine had a 71 Lemans and its shifter appeared to be similar to my Firebird (79). If so, remove the button by prying it up with a small flat screwdriver. You will find a small flat metal tab bent in a U shape over the top of the shaft, remove it and use a pair of snap ring pliers to take off the C-clip that holds the shift knob. Then remove the screws that hold the trim plate to the console. I think you will find that the indicator strip is held in place by hot-melted tabs, but you should be able to carefully trim the tabs to disassemble the indicator, then use epoxy to reassemble it. Remove the console and disconnect the shift cable, remove four bolts and you can remove the whole shifter from the car. It should be obvious at this point how the lockout mechanism works from looking at it and determine why it doesn't work. Like I said, I think it is similar or identical to the Firebird/Camaro shifter so you may be able to source a replacement from one of those, you may even get lucky and find one of the factory ratchet shifters from a TA or Z28. These ratchet shifters allow you to manually shift from 1st to 2nd and 2nd to 3rd without jumping to neutral by pushing ahead and to the right (pushing towards the glovebox). They still allow emergengy shifts to neutral by pushing straight ahead from any of the three forward gears. Hope this helps, but if you are really "outta here!!" you won't see this anyway! Patience man! It's a virtue! I waited six months for someone to answer a question about my Bird's slanting seats, but when the answer came he hit it right on the money with part numbers no less!  
Trying to help... 'cause we don't all have to learn the hard way!