So last night I drove my '69 RR home for the first time and she was flawless

She's got a TF727 with a Reverse Manual Vale Body and Hurst Pro-Matic 2 Shifter (here's a little video)


Anyhoo, I brought her back to my shop this morning and when I shut her down, I forgot to put her in park

About 15 minutes later, went to start her up and that's when I realized what I had done cause she wouldn't crank over

Tried to put her back in park, but no dice.

Shifter was stuck pretty good

Tried rolling her back and forth, but it did nothing, so I set the parking brake and bumped the starter from the relay to get her running.

After about a minute of idling, the shifter magically started working again

Are the detents on the 727 pressure sensitive?

I mean, does fluid have to be flowing in order for the shifter to move?

 

no, shifter should move with car not running

 

Check to make sure you are not melting the shifter cable on your Hurst shifter

 

The shifter bracket inside the valve body has a series of detents on it and a spring loaded ball bearing runs along this surface to hold the gear position... no you don't need fluid to shift it,
i tend to agree with the other two inputs that possibly your shifter cable is melting you may need to run it in a different location and or add heat shields.

 

THIS or some other shifter/ linkage related problem

You can take any lever shifted torqueflite and move the shift lever by hand whether the car is parked, running, not running, rolling or not. If it were not for the lockouts in the shifter itself, you could "grind" the park pawl going down the road.

By the way, I'm not sure I like your shifter for a manual shifted, reverse body. The reason is that you do not have a quick path to neutral in case of trouble. If you were to break a rear axle or driveshaft, it's "pretty dam handy" to have a quick path in order to get the trans into neutral

I also run a reverse/ manual valve, and like it a lot. I'm old enough and arthritic enough that I can no longer "row" a clutch/ 4 speed

I'm running a B&M "Pro-stick." I'm not sure I like it that much and have a used Cheetah shifter coming to try out. But the one thing the "Pro stick" does give you WITH SOME PRACTICE is a quick method to get from any forward gear into neutral.

This shifter DOES require a learning curve. The small separate reverse lever (not the big trigger on the main lever) locks you completely out of R--P until you bump it forward, then go back to the main lever. And you cannot get to park without pulling the trigger.

In N--1--2--3, You pull back one for 1st, back "hard" for 2nd, then pull trigger and back for 3rd. Downshift to 1 from 3 or 2 is not interlocked, but N is, so to get from any forward gear to N you need to keep your wits and pull the trigger.

So getting, example, into P is the most complicated:

If in 3rd, shove forward to 1, pull trigger, into N. Move hand and bump reverse lockout. Grab main handle, move to R, pulling trigger, and quickly move to P. You can see why even though it's all interlocked, this might not be all that handy in an emergency situation, say, on the street, if some idiot is trying to back into you in a parking lot, and you are trying to get the F out of the way!!!!!

 

A little update.

Checked the routing for the cable and all is fine.

With the engine off, I can pull it from Park into 1st, but I don't feel any of the detents of the trans and the stick feels very sticky

Start it up and let it run for a minute or so and everything moves buttery smooth again

Went through the gears while sitting stationary numerous times without issue, then shut the motor off and tried again.

Immediately I felt the stick get sticky again and I had a hard time getting it back into park, but was still able to move it with a lot of force (unlike yesterday when I couldn't move it at all after sitting)

When I get her up on the lift this week, I'll disconnect the cable and run it back and forth a few times, but I have a feeling it's in the transmission

 

MY BET is still on the cable !!! Been there done that !!!!

 

it is possible for the cup that holds the detent ball to break i have seen this happen before, you have to drop the pan and check it out
another possibility could be the selector arm inside the trany has slipped out of the the groove in the valve, sometimes they get adjusted to high in the saddle and slip out.

 

Would this cause it to only stick when the engine isn't running?

Drove around all day today without issue, but tested it again by shutting down in Reverse, waited for a bit and sure enough, it got stuck.

Bumped the starter with the E-Brake on, let her idle in gear for a minute and it it loosened up like normal again

 

if the ball is rattling around on the top of the valve body it could be getting pinched up along the selector or the piece of casting that broke off...

 

did we ever fix this ??

 

Not sure if there really is anything to fix

When the engine is running, the shifter works as it should.

When it's not running, it's really tight and if I leave it in gear (forward or reverse) and shut the engine down, if I don't put it in neutral or park right away, the shifter gets stuck and I have to jump the starter motor and let it idle for a bit and she loosens up on her own.