I was looking through some old word files on my computer and stumbled into this. It brought back many memories. Remember this?


The Gearshift Knob

I bought my MGB in April of 1972. I had spent most of the summer of 1971 in the hospital and at home recovering from a motorcycle accident. I’d thought about buying another bike, but I was too afraid to ride. Somewhere along the way I decided that four wheels would be safer.

That winter I commuted to college, 2 ½ hours each way on the Flushing Line of the New York City Subway system. By April, I decided it was time.

I loved my MG. It was perfect. Small, quick, responsive, fun, and just old fashioned enough to appeal to me. Most of my friends were driving the muscle cars of the day, but the Detroit Iron never appealed to me. I wanted a British sports car. I was enamored of the fact that it didn’t have a hood, but instead had a bonnet, didn’t have a rear window but instead a backlight and didn’t have a transmission but instead a gearbox. I took to wearing tweed and herringbone sports jackets and Kangol caps. I was captivated. I loved my MG.

The only thing wrong with my MGB was the gearshift knob. It was a small, round, black bakelite knob with the shift pattern etched into the top. No, this could never do. In the midst of all of this tradition I couldn’t allow this uncomfortable excuse for a shift knob. Within a few weeks, after a visit to a foreign car parts store, I found a perfectly shaped walnut shift knob with an enamel MG emblem on top.

It was perfect. The walnut was soft as only wood could be, yet it was hard as only wood could be. It was warm in the winter and cool in the summer. It was perfectly shaped to fit my hand, and the emblem, a red octagon and letters on a white background, was the emblem that I had come to love. It looked exactly like the gearshift knob in an MG should look, and shifting with it tickled my fancy.

The longer I had the knob in the car, the deeper the color became. In the heat of the summer my hand would sweat, and the wood would absorb that and grow darker. Before a date with a pretty girl my hand would sweat, and the wood would absorb that and grow darker. Before a spirited drive at speed through some difficult twists and turns, my hand would sweat, and the wood would absorb that and grow darker. Over time, my skin oils gave the walnut shift knob a texture and a color that comes only with hours of driving pleasure and love. The gearshift knob had absorbed enough of my oils and sweat that it had become a part of me.

Sometime in the summer of 1976 a gang of kids in my neighborhood went on a destructive rampage. Overnight they dug up some cobblestones from the streets and tossed them at the parked cars. About 10 cars were hit, my MGB was hit the hardest. So much damage was done that I decided to trade the car on a Triumph TR-6. Before I gave the car to the dealer, I took out my gearshift knob as a keepsake.

When I took the walnut gearshift knob out of my MG so many years ago, I put it somewhere for safe keeping. I can’t remember where that somewhere is and I haven’t seen it in years.


Now I have a Honda S2000. It is just like the MGB in that it is perfect in almost every way. Perfect except for the gearshift knob. I have the titanium knob that was thrown in by the dealer at the time of the sale. It’s nice but, it gets very cold in the winter, and very hot in the summer. It fits my hand, but not my soul. It lacks the character of the old walnut shift knob that I had in my MGB. It doesn’t absorb my skin oils and darken with age. It fits with the interior design of the car, but not with my vision of the link to the past. My S is, after all, the same car today as my MGB was way back when. It is my magic carpet, my pride and joy and my idea of what a sports car should be. That gearshift knob would be the chain tying my past to my present.


So, if you see an S2000 at one of our meets, and you see a shift knob made of walnut with an MG emblem on top, don’t laugh. Yes, it will look out of place, and yes, it probably won’t fit in with the contemporary look of the interior, but what you will be seeing is a part of my history, a part of my past. You will be seeing the one thing that can bring these two great cars together. My MGB and my S2000, they are different, but only by 30 years. Otherwise, they are the same.


(The inspiration for this came from a magnificent piece written and sent to me by Dave dlq04. His mention of the gearshift knob in his MGA brought back some fond memories.)

 

I remember that Rob. It sent me through my old gearshift knob collection. I have plenty of the old bakelite knobs.

 

I had a wooden gearshift knob in my GT6's so can relate and agree 100% wish I had one for the S as well

 

I'm pretty shure Rob made one fit.

I have a woden shift knob on the Healey, but the color is too dark. I hate buying mail order interior parts. Appearance is so important, but you can't see what you bought until it arrives. I loved the days when I could drive to the local "Foreign Auto Parts" store and browse.

 

Something like this perhaps? One of my favorite mods.




It's a lot darker and shinier now.

 

Ha ha. that's great. I think Rob's has the MG crest.

 

I left off the shift pattern as a theft deterrent - well that and the fact that it wasn't offered that way at the time. It is amazing how constant the temperature of the knob is; never too hot, never too cold.

If I remember correctly I bought it off a guy on s2kca that Rob knows. It's the only wooden knob I've seen that's shaped like the OEM - which is still in the garage along with the lock nut. I got a bit of counter sink by deleting the lock nut but it rattles like hell if I don't crank it to the right occasionally.

 

Actually I have two. I've never been able to find the gearshift knob I had in my MGB so I bought an Amco wooden shift knob with the MG emblem at a local British car show a few years ago. I used a Sears 10X1.25 tap to rethread it to fit my S2000.

I also have a maple and walnut shift knob that my son made for me in his woodshop class in high school last year. Its really quite beautiful.

I alternate between the two. Right now I have my son's walnut and maple knob on the car, but I think I'll put the MG back on for the Spring Fling.

 

I took my interior mods even further..