Hello fellow owners. I'm having a hell of a time trying to remove the shifter knob so I can swap the shifter mechanism. The reason for that is because I had an upholster redo the headliner and he scratched the sport and traction control buttons and off course he didn't own up to it. He claimed it was like that. I was mad as hell but decided to just leave it at that since his labor charge was very reasonable. Anyways, I bought a new used shifter box and need to swap it.


The knob just keeps spinning but won't come off. I managed to loosen the bottom set screw (stem that tapers down just below the knob) but for the life of me can't get it off.


Any ideas? Thanks,

 

Sounds like the knob is just spinning on the captive nut in the gear knob, if this is the case then you may have to cut the leather part off to get to the nut .

 

Thanks for the reply. I wasn't sure is there was a captive nut inside. I'm going to tackle the job tomorrow.

 

If the threaded insert is spinning, do you think you can pull it off vertically?
BTW, got the same marks to my T/C button, as it feels like the same stupid rubber coating VW use to use. Wondering about using a vinyl stencil, then spraying over?

 

I tried doing the same but it turned out pretty crappy. I sprayed plasti dip on the buttons but the results were bad. It also covered the letters and light indicators.