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Help! 2007 C6 Won’t Shift From Park

Victory Red C6

Well-known member
Joined
May 10, 2007
Messages
205
Location
Gibbon, MN
Corvette
2007 Victory Red Coupe
A couple years ago I started have problems with my 07 not shifting from park as it should. It’s still in storage for another month or so. I’ve seen all sorts of fixes while searching on Google, everything from breaking the locking mechanism, to replacing micro switches, replacing the shift and putting some foam tape on the shift lever. Just wondering what you’ve all done to correct the problem? Thank you.
 
Can you be a little more specific?
With your foot on the brake, can you not shift out of Park at any time? Or is it an intermittent problem.

Have you tried researching the service manual for a diagnosis and repair procedure?
 
Just fixed my '07 C6 for good. I'll try to describe what I did. Hope my explanation of the various pieces is understandable. Once you are in there my words should make more sense.
1. Remove console. Shift lever should be in N to help with removal shift console over the top of the gear shift.
2. Undo vinyl shift boot and lift up and out of the way. No need to remove shift knob or a large rubber gasket that surrounds the shift well. That gasket is glued into place with rubber cement. It also serves to hold the vinyl shift boot into place.
3. Unsnap and remove PRND clear plastic cover. As I remember it seems like I also had to remove the red plastic shift indicator.
4. Look straight down to see thin steel "push rod". This is activated by solenoid located just rearward of where that rod goes through a vertical aluminum guide plate.
5. If you grab that rod with needle-nose pliers and move the rod forward you will see that it mechanically actuates a black plastic cammed "pawl", rotating it rearward and out of a locking slot on the gear shift mechanism. You will not be able to see the slot. It is buried where you do not go. When you depress the brake that solenoid is supposed to energize and move that rod forward, thereby rotating the pawl rearward and away out of the locking slot it rests against, thus allowing you to move the gear shift lever out of Park. I know, clear as mud!
6. For whatever reason that solenoid does not always energize. Have you noticed that when the system works, you hear a "click" when you depress the brake pedal. When it is not going to work there is a deadly silence when the brake brake pedal is depressed. That deadly silence means that da_ned solenoid is not moving that rod and attached locking pawl. You think "oh s_it", knowing you ain't goin' anywhere for a bit. Eventually, with enough profanity and banging on the console and shift lever you hear that marvelous clicking noise and you know you are good to go.
7. What I did to fix mine was to grab that control rod again and move it forward all the way so that that pawl moved rearward. With the pawl rearward I could grab it with some locking forceps to hold it in place while I drilled a small hole through it, near the top.
8. I looped a thin piece of piano wire (cut to fit and u-shaped on one end) though the hole, pulled that wire tight toward the rear, and wrapped the other end of it so some unused plastic tab toward the rear of where the PRND plastic cover attaches. Hard to describe but again, you will understand once once you get there. That wire effectively keeps that plastic pawl pulled rearward and permanently out of the way of its locking slot. Voila! Works every time now.
9. Now button every thing back up and you are good to go.
PS- If you have searched the internet trying to educate yourself about how to DIY, you may have seen some good write-ups with accompanying photos which were not so good. That's what I did to get an idea as to what I was getting myself into, although getting in there yourself is much better than looking at cell phone photos. Ask me how I know. Good luck.
 
What Ted said. Last time this happened to me was at a railroad crossing put car in park waiting for train to clear the crossing. train cleared stuck in park with a line of traffic behind me. this is an easy procedure to do once you see how it works. here is a link with pictures. I posted in another thread. I tied mine back didn't do the wire in the console https://www.corvetteactioncenter.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=26469&d=1579058999
 
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