Worked on the car had valve cover off to adjust valves and now car shifts late shifts into 2nd at about 3500-3700 rpm used when it was real cold shift about 3000 but after going about a block or 2 shift better at about 2500 which I can live with. Once it warmed up always shifted at about 2500. I would like to shift into 2nd at about 2000 rpm. I do have a broken adjuster on the bowden cable but had that always and it worked better before. Tried to adjust bowden in all the way then out all the way no change what so ever, tried to u hook the kick down switch and no change. I did unhook the egr valve while working on car and blocked both openings on engine but I can not see how that would have anything to do with shifting. Any clues as to what happened to make it shift so much later?

The cable likely became mis-adjusted with the cover off, and you aren't able to adjust it back due to the broken part. I'd plan to replace the cable.

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Could have introduced a vacuum leak which affects shifting - I'd check replace the rubber vacuum hose connectors or at least disconnect and reinstall them (to verify they are tight). It can be hard to visually spot a loose connector but you can feel it.

I recently read a post about inserting a short piece of plastic tube as a spacer to make up for the lost adjustment on the bowden cable due to the adjustor being broken.

Simplest answer is that you disconnected a vacuum line somewhere when you were doing the valves. I managed to disolodge two when I did my '85 this fall. It won't necessarily be the transmission vacuum line. Check every connection carefully (you could also have cracked a rubber connector, these get iffy with age).

Other side of the coin, on my old SD, I had the same issue with the Bowden cable after re/re-ing it for a valve adjustment. So sadly that is also a possibility, though I would think if it's the Bowden, it would shift differently at all shift points. As was pointed out, you can rig a work around at the adjuster that will hold for a while until you want to replace the cable.

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2002 e320 4matic estate│1985 300d│1980 300td
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After I did a search yesterday on this site they all pointed to bowden cable. I totally unhooked it and sure enough I saw a big difference so I gave tne cable more slack with the adjuster and found the sweet spot. It now shifts from 1st to 2nd at about 2000-2500 and follows thru with 3rd + 4th very nicely. Its like driving a different car now very pleased with results