Hey all, long time no see.

Well the car has been running great, but long story short I'm back at it and replacing the TV or Detent cable that runs from the passenger side of the trans to the throttle body on my 89 IROC Camaro.

Now, before I state my problem to you, I have to say that I know, for a fact, that the original cable and the new one are EXACTLY the same length. I measured them 3 times side by side. Surprisingly the cable casing is different length, the new one is shorter, but that doesn't seem to have played any part here.

Anyway, my problem is this: After installing the new cable on the Trans side, I came up top and was putting everything back together... but the detent cable has too much length up top. I tried the adjustment method that I'm sure most of you know about, but it's as 'short' as I can get it. And yet there is still at least 2 inches of slack too much. I can not hook it back up to the throttle with the slack like this. Does anyone know why this is?

I am a little stumped, though some Googleing has brought me the idea of starting up the car and letting it idle, to see if the trans has to change something on it's side of the line? I know what's in an auto transmission but I know very little of how it actually works.

Any help at all is appreciated, thanks.

 

You sure the little hook caught the cable down on the transmission side? The hook may have slipped out.

 

Well - if the outer cable length is shorter than the original, and the inner cables are the same length - of course there is going to be too much inner cable sticking out of the new one.

You will have to move the bracket further back if its possible, or get an identical cable with an equal inner/outer differential.

 

Bowtie Overdrives | TV Made EZ

this is a good read on these tv cables. alot of uncommon info.

 

@ oamhmad, Yes, I can pull on the actual cable from up top and it has spring to it, and it wants to set back at a certain position.

@ TreeFiddy, You know, you're right, and I don't know why I didn't think of this. I think I assumed the slack would be taken up somewhere, but the hook on the Trans side won't just miraculously pull back into the Tranny more... the slack will just hang out up top. I think that's it. Well this sucks, I couldn't find any other cable that was meant for my car. This is the one all the books and stuff called for for an 89 Camaro with the V8.

@ z28romance, That looks like a good link, I'm going to read that. Thanks.

 

Is your inner cable the type shown below, that has a ferrule on the end, and a separate free-floating black plastic clip that attached to the throttle body?

If so, pull the ferrule all the way thru the clip, past the throttle mounting point, and fit small tie wrap or wire loops around the slack part of the inner cable that sticks out. This will effectively shorten the inner cable - you will have to play with the number required. It's a temporary ******* solution, but will get you out of trouble for now.

Laugh if u want, but it worked fine for me - in fact after several months I still haven't fixed it properly yet! I have a carb, not sure if your throttle body situation is applicable.

 

Yeah, it's just like that. I suppose it would be a temp fix, but can I ask why you had to do such a thing? Why is yours too long?

 

As it turns out, yes. My cable is a universal replacement type, and the bracket is some kind of odd thing that I've never seen anywhere else.

I did some research into where the cable is supposed to attach to the throttle arm, in relation to the throttle shaft. In order to use the closest appropriate point on the throttle arm, the end of the outer cable with the D button ended up way behind the bracket.

So to move it forward, also required that the inner cable moved forward by the amount 'shimmed'. Once mounted like this, I could adjust it the usual way. Of course, the proper fix would be to get a new bracket that is long enough to reach back to the range where the D button wants to be naturally with this inner cable length.

I'm mildly surprised that it works so perfectly, enough so that I have much higher priority other things to fix before I get back to it.