Shift lock & Parking Brake
 

For a while my shift lock has been acting up. particularly in very cold weather.

I always apply the parking brake. In order to shift out of park the brake must be disengaged. Lately I've had to release reapply and release the brake a couple of times to enable the shifter to move out of park.

The last couple of times, on mild days well above freezing, I've had to use the shift lock button to move the shift leaver.

Is there a simple fix for this?

Re: Shift lock & Parking Brake
 

Anyone have any ideas?

Re: Shift lock & Parking Brake
 

Could be a failing Shift Inter Lock Unit, this thing:
https://www.ebay.com/i/183393246360?chn=ps

Or a failing Inter Lock solenoid (the thing going click when you put your foot on the brake pedal). I've not had to replace that part, so I'm not sure of the details/part number.

Or some wiring or plug is failing.

First steps would be checking the grounds and 12V lines going to the unit and solenoid.

On my previous SVX I had a problem where I always had to use the shift interlock override button to get our of park all the time. I diagnosed this as a problem with the Shift Lock Unit, spent some time trying to diagnose problem and repair the Unit before giving up and getting another used one. This fixed the problem for a few weeks before it became unreliable. I noticed that pressing on the plug in certain ways made it more reliable. So I replaced the plug (bought one off of ebay and soldered it in), that worked for a few weeks before becoming unreliable again....

At that point I jammed a piece of card board to hold the shift lock button down and just lived with it. I suspect there might be dry solder joints on both my Shift Lock Units, I might be able to fix this by re-flowing them, but I never got around to doing this.

HTHs.
Ian.

Re: Shift lock & Parking Brake
 

My problem is intermittent. Where is the unit and how do you access it? BTW my car is a '92.

Re: Shift lock & Parking Brake
 

The Shift Lock Unit in located under the center console/arm-rest. It's fairly straight forward to remove. There is also a small access panel, which you should be able to see if you lift up the hand brake. Removing the small access panel would give you access to the connector (if you want to try jiggling it to see if that helps, or test grounds, etc.). Although you'll need to remove the center control to get full access to it.

Good luck!
Ian.