The shift **** on my coupe was badly scratched by the original owner. I thought it was just painted plastic. Sanding it I discovered it has a thin aluminum shell. The scratches went into the aluminum. I considered buying an aftermarket ****, but thought it was worth trying to restore this one first.

So this is what the **** looked like when I started.




After sanding with 400 grit wet/dry sandpaper and painting with a scratch fill primer.



The finished **** painted silver again and topped with a clear coat.



I'm happy with the results.

 

That looks a lot better, nice work.

 

How well has it been holding up?

 

Very nice work! Are you thinking of painting in the lines and numbers? Black? Red?

 

awesome results, i have the same scratches. how did you remove the ****? i tried turning counter clockwise but i feel like it'll snap or break something. any tricks or just go for broke?

 

The **** has held up well with no scratches, but the car is not a daily driver.

No plans to fill in the numbers. I have too many other projects in process.

The **** is easily removed if you know the trick. You have to remove the base of the leather boot cover away from the center console. You do that by pressing the sides of the bottom of the boot towards the shifter to release the boot retainer clips from the console. You then lift the boot up and above the shifter ****. Underneath the leather boot cover, at the base of the shift ****, you will see a round screw on nut which is made out of plastic. Gently unscrew that "with you fingers" from the ****. With that nut unscrewed from the **** you can now just pull the **** up and off the shifting shaft.

 

awesome thanks for the tip! i'll post an update when i get to it. now what color to paint it? lol

 

Do you have a picture of it sanded, but before any paint? I was wondering what sanded bare metal would look like, if cleared over.

 

Looks good. Is it a two part clearcoat (i.e. with a catalyst), or just one part like the kind you buy in the typical automotive parts store?

 

That's not a BIT ****, that's 110% ****.

 

I do not have pictures of it sanded down to bare metal. I only sanded the top half where it was scratched and the metal itself was scratched, so going for a bare metal look would not work.

I used regular automotive paint. First using a scratch fill primer, the base silver coat, and then the clear.

A helpful hint when painting it is to do very light coats or you can easily fill in the numbers. In addition, do not press on the spray can button while pointing it at the ****. Start the spray off to the side and spray across the ****. The spray button should be at least 8 inches from the ****.

 

I take it that the post was "Edited"?

 

I guess the microfibre towel is way less painful than using an orbital polisher when polishing your ****.

 

I had to search on "**** lube" and I got a hit ona Mercedes site!
A/c **** lube ? | Mercedes-Benz Club of America

 

OUCH!



We can call him....Mr. Blister!

And it's hard to understand why you would Google "**** Lube"!

 

Hah! Yes it was. I wasn't familiar with how the (over)censorship on this site works. So I wrote a post using the censored word to be silly and poke fun at needing to be censored. But then I noticed that once I signed in the ****s went away revealing the word that is used as a grip or handle, and it no longer was humorous. So then I just deleted the text and replaced it with my question related to the type of clear coat used. FWIW, the clear coat spray cans that use a catalyst provide a more durable coating; you just need to wear the proper equipment when spraying.

 

Absolutely. I rattle-canned the silver river in mine and used 7 coats of Duplicolor's finest (clearcoat). I haven't been able to scratch it yet, though I have tried....

It seems to set up softer. But more easily repaired/polished. Maybe it's just me.