Made an old Shimano bell crank shifted 3 speed work by forcing the hub into a lower gear
on a minimum to zero expenditure repair, forcing a piece of plastic under the bellcrank to down shift it..

later thought screwing an acorn nut over the push rod and pushing the rod in that way might work too.

still a 1 speed out of 3 but might be the .75 gear or the 1, rather than the 4/3rds broken cable gear..

Sturmey's easier; thread in a spoke in place of the indicator rod and bend it

Yea but... this was a Shimano hub. push in is the opposite of pull out.

On the road, forced shifting on a Shimano 3-speed (pushrod version) with a broken cable is easy and no spare parts need be carried to do the job.

Remove cable and bell crank. Scout around for a pebble 1/4" diameter or so. Drop pebble into bellcrank and screw back on the exle until the pebble pushes the rod to the desired depth.

Which is why I said SA is easier, being the opposite.

Yeah, but a Shimano 3 speed defaults to low gear. Wouldn't you be upshifting it by forcing it? Having trouble understanding what you're saying here.
Unless you have one with a left side bell crank maybe? I've seen at least one like that.

NB: 'bell crank' is like a cantilever L . pull on one side of the pivot and it pushes in on the other..

Yeah, I know how they work. Still trying to get my head around how you push it to a lower gear when pushing on the rod results in a higher gear.

Ah , but it did.. that is All. ... over and Out..

[for the 130 people who looked at his thread]

I defer to your expertise here haven't looked at these in eons, and don't remember either way, but it's possible that you and Fietsbob are looking at different hubs.

Here's a drawing of an old 333 hub (the ones I vaguely remember) and if you look closely, it seems that the 1st gear on the lever is the tight cable position as with SA of that era, so the hub is a default high, and you'd need to push the rod in as Fietsbob says to shift to low.

Yea thats the one.. rather than 39 pushing on 40 , concept, was (acorn)
nut pushing the shaft, 40, directly..


customer wanted just make it work, no real investment..
[had Shimanos twist grip , cable rather proprietary so special order would be required.]




the 'summer 2nd house at the beach' people, have different priorities.

OK, trying not to be obtuse here, so I'll take Bob at his word. Don't have intimate knowledge of the internals of shimano 3 speeds of any era, just that any I have run into, (and that's a reasonably high number) new or old were low normal. (With the exception of the aforementioned left side mech).
But, one thing I should know by now, just when you think you've seen it all......

To just make it work, either a 1/4 bearing ball under the bellcrank, or a dome nut will do fine.

I took a short piece of Bar end plug. crammed it in then Zip tied it on to stay there ..


.
As long as the Boat gets back in, to tie up at the dock, it's a good repair.

(rather than call the Coast Guard for a tow, .. or get on the orange Gumby suit )

Can't tell ya how many times duct tape, vice grips, or zip ties have gotten me to a safe haven. ( Not necessarily on a bike either).

Add, hose clamps, picture hanging wire, and too many odd things to list. When I used to lead group tours and before real bikes were common in the hinterlands, I needed to do all sorts of emergency repairs. I'd browse hardware stores, looking for ideas. Often staff would brace me asking what I needed and I'd have to answer, I don't know, but I'll recognize it when I see it.

Once an owner, probably convinced I was a shoplifter or casing his joint for a robbery that night wouldn't let go, kept pressing me, so finally I got mad and asked what aisle Inspriration was in. That almost got me arrested, as he called the local cops, but it all worked out when I showed him the problem, and he knew who in town might help.