I own a 90SE. Two months ago, I had a mechanic install 1) A Stillen short shifter and 2) A WSP Y-pipe, along with a few other items. The car runs like a champ. Anyway...

To make this short, heated air is coming into the passenger compartment via the shifter opening for the manual transmission. This is noticed by the ballooning of the shift boot at high speeds and steady stream of hot air. The center console surrounding the shifter between the seats also gets hot. None of this existed prior to this mod.

My questions... would the replacement of the above two items cause this to occur? Did the mechanic forget to replace a heat shield or air deflector? How did you resolve this problem?

It gets really uncomfortable even with the A/C cranked up.

any thoughts?

An old

 

check and see if that rubber boot is still around hte shifter base.

Also where did you get your shifter and how much? lol

 

I'll check for a rubber boot.

I purchased the shifter from stillen.com and paid $205 plus s/h and CA tax. I find it a bit notchy but like the overall feel versus OEM.

 

nice mod.. i cut my shifter to save 205..the heat coming from this area could be from a missing heat shield.also u can place a lining or insulation their..it worked for me

 

he forgot the heatshield that is directly underneath the shifter. Chances are, the shield didn't fit with the shifter on and instead of denting it, he just threw it out

 

hmmmm... okay, so I need to check for the rubber boot AND it seems that the heat shield is gone.

Now for the dumb question(s)... if these parts are gone, can they be replaced with used/new parts and what is the level of effort to replace them?

 

klown is correct. no more heat shield.
y-pipe has nothing to do with problem.

yes, they can be replaced, but why? you don't want OEM pipe anymore.
no good for you.

level and effort is waste of time. your life is finite. time for redundant
work is like smoking cigarettes = each cigarette is 11 minutes taken from your life. same with redundant work. but worse. oem pipe - to y-pipe -back to oem pipe? = life is shaved off. you will die with less newer experience of something different. but you can choose redundant way.

 

Yea I have the Stillen STS, best STS out there, I drove a SMC STS 3rd gen and it was crap. The Stillen keeps the same height but the throws are much shorter and the feeling is great. Also I noticed that my center console would get a bit hot around the shifter area but nothing too bad. Also during the installation the shield bolts broke off, so I said fukc it and just took it off. It gets hot but nothing too bad, I can live with it. I guess I will call courtesy and order a new shield.

 

Chad, WTF are you talking about?!
He's asking if he can put the heat shields back on because they're blowing hot air into the car.

the answer is they're not too difficult. check the rubber boot at the top first- just pull the trim off aorund your shifter and see if there's an accordian type rubber cover on it. If not, there's your problem.. I'll bet it's gone. It'll tkae 15 seconds to check and you don't get your hands dirty.

It wouldn't surprise me if the mechanic removed the heat shield under the car as well. when you install a STS, you often end up rubbing on it with the shifter- and he was too lazy to pound a dent in it and replace it. he just took it off..
If that's the case, it's still not hard to replcae, but it's a PITa because you have to get under the car and get all dirty. If it's missing, I'd take it back and tell the mechanic to do the job again- for free- because he was too lazy to do it right the first time.

 

What Matt said. Nice because you probably have to remove some of the exhaust to get at it too.

 

he mentioned y-pipe in the first post, too. thought he may suspect that part as well. sorry if i misunderstood.
his problem is the heat shield.

 

Thanks Everyone !!!

Troubleshooting by consensus points to the heat shield and rubber boot.