Thanks for the replies.

I’m surprised there’s no love for the ratchet shifters on here? I sat scratching my head for awhile and realized that it wasn’t going to build itself and my time when I can make noise and sparks is limited each week so I just started going after it and letting the metal tell me what it wanted.

First I made a mounting plate out of 3/16” so it could be a stressed member and participate in the floor frame keeping my cab square. I had X braced the cab when I cut out the entire soggy floor months ago, then built a tube floor frame that tied into the rockers and A & B pillars. The body mounts are plates on that frame and when I chucked the motor and trans in there I chopped the floor frame out to make room so the body mounts were all that were keeping my cab square in the meantime.

I mocked up the bench and tacked on some 3rd and 4th hand brackets/stands so I could float the shifter plate above the trans and measure to make it a stressed member of the floor/tunnel frame crossmembers. Overkill I know. I re-connected the rear floor frame with a driveshaft loop and a mini tunnel over the middle bar.

Now I’m in the process of making a skeleton out of 1/4” round bar that will get plated out with facets of 16g- kind of a shortcut to making a complicated shape that won’t waste any legroom.

I’m surprised there isn’t more love for the ratchet shifters? I have a hurst promatic II in my swinger that is super fun to drive or easy to leave in D. This one is strictly a stoplight brawler- no ratchet downshifting just detent action or ratchet slapping up from 1. It was cheap though and I figured it would compliment my tf2 kit when I wanted to have a little fun. I didn’t feel like making a mechanical linkage from a dakota column shoved through a handmade firewall with 8” motor setback and the floor detent shifters seem dangerous with so much leverage and no lockout especially since I ride my kid to the park in the truck on sundays.

Here’s pics of the process and mockup so far.