This is a fairly common problem. I guess we must be a world full of ham-fisted rally drivers.

At 08:40 PM 9/24/05 -0400, Gregory Brown wrote:
"My fix for the threads that are broken off of the shift lever is drill and tap the shank and lock-tite a 5/16-18 set screw in it."

That's a nice trick. If you can find a long hardeded steel set screw it should be stronger than the original part.

The first time I had to deal with it I was still on a shoe string budget. I ground the sides down with a hand grinder to get back to the original stud size, then cut a new thread on it with a hand die, leaving the lever a little shorter.

More recently I had one where someone had welded a threaded stud on top, but that was a bit of a mess. I was never sure if there was enough material there to drill and tap, but it looks okay. Let me know if it ever breaks below the stud.