Viper Machine Gated Shifter Install on the Turbo R

Way back in December of '24 I bought a Viper Machine shifter for our RZR Turbo R but life and a move got in the way. Six months went by and I have to admit I also procrastinated this job a few times knowing what a pain it was going to be to take the console out.  The other day I was perusing through threads on rzrforums.net and came across a post by user mikwallace that showed how to do this job much easier and faster by drilling a hole in the shift tunnel panel and filling it with a plastic plug.  I decided to snap a few pictures and document it here in case it might help anyone else out.

If you like this write up, please consider ordering your Viper Machine shifter from RockPeak UTV here.

First off, the Viper Machine instructions are kind of weak but you get the idea.  

Here's what I did.  First, just pull up and off the rubber piece shown here:

Next, I removed the stock plastic shift bezel/plate by removing the torx bolt at the back of the plate.  Lift up the back of the plate then pull back to remove it. Once the plate is out of the way, you can use a tape measure to measure from the top of the shift tunnel down to the shaft that has to be removed through the 1.25" hole you are going to drill in the side of the console/shift tunnel.  

Measure down on the outside the same distance and mark it with a sharpie.  

Look straight down from the top and mark the center of the pin on the plastic.

Now that you have your marks, you can drill your hole.  I used a 1.25" spade bit.  A hole saw would also work.

When you get done drilling your hole, you can look through it and see how well you lined it up with the shaft that needs to come out through the hole.  

Next I used a hook tool to pull off the E-clip on the main shaft.  Then I used a set of needle nose pliers to take the clip out of the shifter cable.  Be super careful here not to drop the E-clip or the shifter cable clip.  On the shifter cable, there is a washer right behind the clip and mine fell down onto the skid plate.  I just sourced a replacement washer out of my junk/spare fasteners bin.  Also, be careful not to drop the bushings, there is one on the shift cable and two on the main shifter shaft.  It would be a great idea to put a towel or rag under the e-clip and shift linkage when you do this to catch anything that falls by accident.

The shaft came right out through the hole, very easy!

New Viper Machine Shifter next to the old stocker.  You have to re-use the stud/pin piece from the old shifter as well as the two bushings from the main shaft and the one bushing from the linkage.

I connected the shifter linkage first and then installed the main shifter shaft back through the hole.  I found putting the main shaft bushing in the Viper to be a little tight.  

Looks great all buttoned up.  Viper included a nice stainless Allen button head machine screw for the back of the plate but it fell through the hole in the bottom of my cup holder!  I had to re-use the stock Torx bolt for the time being.  I have to say, getting the bolt to line up was a bit of a pain as it seemed to be the hole in the shifter plate was a couple of mm out of alignment.  

Quick Video of the Viper Machine installed and the shift action.  Looking forward to not missing gears!

If you liked the write up, please consider ordering your Viper Machine shifter from RockPeak UTV here.