I installed an under car shifter (RUF type clone by 9ff) last week. It did not have the sheet metal retaining piece. The instructions from 9ff made no mention of it. Is this part a heat shield for a non turbo 996 application or does it function to keep the cable from slipping off the ball? In other words is it needed on a 996TT? It seems to work perfectly without it.

 

It keeps the shifter cable's socket from popping off the ball. Funny thing is , there is no such thing protecting either of the two stock cable ends back at the tranny so it's probably not needed or Porsche would have done the same. The hefty amount of force to pop off the cable end is perpendicular to the direction of cable movement .

 

thanks