GAS PEDAL CABLE SPACER

When I was driving my 96 Ford Ranger, I hated how the gas pedal was so much lower than the brake pedal. To move my foot from the gas to the brake, I had to actually lift my leg then set it down again. On other vehicles that I had, it only took a short lifting movement at the ankle and I could pivot my foot on my heel and place the upper part of my foot on the brake pedal. I later found a link to a mod to raise the gas pedal. I did the mod and loved it.

My Mustang had the same problem. The gas pedal was way too low. I saw this article on Mustang World and decided to do the pedal mod again. I took a standard ball point pen and hacked away with a Dremel tool. The end of the pen made a good barrel-like spacer. I started with a one-inch length and cut one side open. This slips over the cable and is secured with cable ties. I had to trim the spacer about an eigth of an inch to get it just right. If the barrel spacer is too long, it will be holding the throttle partially open even with your foot off the pedal. If the spacer is too short, it won't lift the gas pedal high enough. It might take a few attempts to get it right. It helps a lot to remove the cable end from the throttle lever to give you more slack to work with under the dash.

The plastic pen spacer worked great for about a year, until Mr. Elephant Leg got in the drivers seat. During a dyno run, the spacer cracked under pressure. For some reason, the dyno operator figured it takes over 250 lbs of pressure on the pedal to get to WOT. Why, I don't know. Maybe he was trying to push the seat back while benchmarking my car. The good thing is that the plastic spacer broke before it put too much stress on the throttle cable.

I went out to buy some pens to make a new spacer but I had an urge to improve on my last one. I found a nylon spacer at the local hardware store and made myself a new spacer. I started with a 3/4" length but that had a little more slack than I wanted. I did it again and used a full 1" spacer and small cable ties. The pictures below explain the simple process.

1) Cut a slit in the spacer.

2) Slip it over the cable end.

3) Secure it with cable ties or small hose clamps.

4) Done. If you need more details, read this thread on ModularDepot.

Warning! The throttle will be wide open before the pedal hits the floor. In the heat of a race, you might get too excited and mash down on that gas pedal with all your might. Before you know it, snap! There goes the gas pedal cable. If anyone besides you drives your car, let them know. Or get a pedal bump stop...

GAS PEDAL BUMP STOP

To avoid snapping the cable or cracking the spacer, I needed a way to stop the pedal from traveling any farther than necessary to apply full throttle. I considered several options for plastic or rubber pedal stops but I had to throw those ideas out because I didn't want to drive a screw through the floor board and Velcro would not attach itself to the carpet. I couldn't find a way to secure a bump stop to the floor.

The approach I went with is to attach something to the throttle pedal arm that would press against the floor. I needed some sort of bracket to attach to the gas pedal arm. I could slide the bracket up and down the pedal arm to provide some fine tuning of the pedal stop point. I found this stem at a bicycle parts website. The stems cost anywhere from $30 to $150! Yikes! I emailed the bicycle parts website (sales@jensonusa.com) to inquire about their stems. I told them about my project and asked if there had cheaper stems. They emailed back within an hour and wrote, "Thank you for writing to us! We prefer that you do not use bicycle parts for your automobile! Good Luck with your project & Have a Great Day!" Bwahahahahaaaaaaaa! Fockers!

Next, I went to a local bike store to check out the stems. The guy pointed me to all their display racks. I found all sorts of brackets and clamps that attach something to the bike frame. A goldmine! After walking around the store three or four times, I settled on this bottle holder for $8.99 and took the clamp off. The bracket fit well on the gas pedal arm. I just needed a piece that will act as the bump stop. After an hour of looking through hundreds of small items at the hardware store, I left some longer screws and a rubber stopper. I attached the rubber stopper to the clamp. Then I attached the clamp to the gas pedal arm.

Unfortunately, this didn't work out too good. The rubber stopper against the carpet and padding on the floor made the pedal very spongy. By the time the pedal stop made contact, there was still about half an inch of travel. I didn't like it. I need something more rigid.

I went back to the hardware store and found myself looking at more nylon spacers, again. The same type of spacer that I used to take up the slack on the gas pedal cable but different sizes. I used a 1/2" and a 1/4" spacer on each of the screws on the clamp. This gave me two solid posts.

When I attached it to the gas pedal arm, it felt more solid. There was a definite point where the gas pedal bottoms out. I cut out some of the padding where the posts hit to improve this solid and sure feeling. I slid the pedal stop up and down the gas pedal arm to get the right stopping location. I perfected this with the data logging utility in the DiabloSport Predator. The Throttle Position Voltage (TP V) parameter goes from 0.96 to 4.60 volts. That's going from having your foot off the pedal to WOT. With the pedal stop installed, I can push down on the pedal till it bottoms out and the TP V will read 4.55 to 4.57. If I mash down on it, it will read 4.60.

Now, I can floor the pedal without worrying about snapping the cable.

Cost: $12.00 (probably more like $25 if you count the prototypes that didn't work)

(Did any of this help? Leave some comments in the guest book. Let me know you were here.)