how exactly does thing work? ive tried to use it before and sometimes it will make a grinding noise if i dont do it EXACTLY when the light comes on. If i hit it within the 2 seconds the light comes on, it is fine. is this normal? I also dont get the point of this thing either. I know it is supposed to get you better gas mileage but i always thought you could shift into any gear you wanted to at anytime. Is this not the case? explain to me how all this works and what you can and cant do with shifting a manual trans before i **** up my car.

 

Stop paying attention to the light. Seriously. Disconnect the damn thing if you have to. Listen to the car. It's something you just learn to "feel". The tachometer and speedometer can help you out somewhat, but every car is geared differently, IMO. I wouldn't recommend what you said about "shifting into any gear at anytime". I suppose you could, technically, but you're either going to get a whiplash if you're going ~65mph and shift into 2nd gear, or you are going to lose power if you shift into an upper gear while at ~10mph. I hope to God you have a "Reverse" lockout.

 

grab some radio shack parts and disable that annoying POS!

 

When you say "annoying POS", are you speaking of the light or the car?

 

Skip shift yells at you to shift from 1st to 4th if the rpm's are lower than 2k. You can disable it with a resistor but they also make $20 or so kits that do the same thing if you don't feel like hacking up your wiring.

 

i know about the kits but nobody has answered my original questions yet.

 

no wire hacking involved actually, just unplugging the connection and taping, no cutting/splicing at all = easily reversible.

 

I pretty much did, it tries to lock you out of 2nd and 3rd gear if you're below 2000rpm. Just disconnect it and don't worry about it, It's nothing but a hassle and does nothing good for your car.

 

the grinding does not sound normal...that doesn't sound like a skip shift problem either. technically you could shift from 1st to fourth without skip shift, but skip shift locks out 2nd so the shifter slides right into fourth. even if you wanted to shift to fourth on your own, skip shift was created to avoid a gas guzzler tax.

i've never understood how you are possibly expected to get anywhere going from 1st to 4th...like the car is going to go anywhere under 1k rpm...

 

It's a piston inside your transmission that engages a grooved plate attached to the main shift rail. When RPM in 1st gear gets too high at part throttle it forces you to shift into 4th gear.

 

under 25% throttle
1500-2500rpm

something like that...

 

I got myself some 2.2k ohm resistors from radioshack. The best 99 cents I ever spent! Did this on all the f-bods, and the vette, in less than 10 minutes - it's usually the first thing I do when I get a car.

 

i bought my '96 a couple months ago and didn't get around to disabling CAGS for a couple weeks. it was a horrible couple weeks and I have no idea how the other three owners dealt with it for 12 years . on a side note I looked all over for my resisters i had saved for 3 years...i could not find them. I bought new ones and the first thing i see when i get home is the old resistors! still the best $2 i've spent on my last 2 camaros

 

I've never had grinding issues w/ skip shft.. For the whopping 4 weeks it was WORKING..

I just drive by ear.. as soon as it starts howling, I shift.. That seems to be about 2-2500rpm.

Skip shift, FWIK, is a solenoid that bridges off 2nd gear to have you go into 4th.. It activates at a certain condition, low throttle, low acceleration.

 

I have it both my LS ans LT... I never have an issue with it...in the off chance that it does try to lock me out a little bip of the throttle will open it,not that it matters if it goes to 4th...the car will still pull up to speed