Gearshift Lever Length

[w30bob]

Hi Guys,

Looking at various pics of M37s I noticed that some trucks have really long gearshift levers.......so long that the shift knob is actually higher than the bottom of the windshield and it looks cartoonish. When I found one of these pics a few days ago I thought it was just someone fooling around. Now I've found a few more. Anybody know why there were two different length transmission gearshift levers?

thanks,
bob

[WarrenD]

The short ones were in the early M37s. The long ones are one of the changes for the later M37B1 version. I have a B1 shifter in my 53 and like it very much, I think it makes shifting much easier. Also, being that my M37 is in a Vietnam era theme, it fits right in.

[T. Highway]

Bob,

It was just one of many changes made over the years, Warren is correct that the early models had the shorter gearshift lever. Mine had the short one and I replaced it with the longer version also.

Bert