Parking Brake Frustrations....could use some insight

So the parking brake lever assembly on my 98 XJ has not been working correctly. It will engage for up to 4 clicks, but above that it will slam down. I assume the teeth are sheered in the mechanism so I picked up a replacement last time I was at the junkyard. Last night I attempted to install it.

The removal of the entire console and all associated ducting went fine without any problem. I even got the old brake lever assembly removed without a snag. Here's my problem: I cannot seem to slot the end of the parking brake cable into the metal guide on the brake lever assembly. I am able to pull the cable end out about an inch(with vice grips), but can't seem to hold it in place while I line up the metal guide. How do you do this? I thought about extending the cable end before sliding the cable through the bracket, but there's no clearance for my vice-grips or anything else to slot through the hole. It seems that the cable must first be slid through the slot in the lever assembly, then the end somehow gets pulled out and guided into the metal slot. After 2 hours of wrestling with this I gave up last night. Is there an easier way? Do I need to let off the cable slack under the frame to allow the cable to pull out for the purpose of sliding it into the guide?

Any insight would be greatly appreciated. It was hard to hold my coffee this morning without a console and who knows which gear I was in!! (I'm kidding of course.....poor me.)

Thanks

If it was mine I would slacken the the cable adjuster under the vehicle.

Good luck.

That's what I was thinking Joe. Is that relatively easy to do? I found the location under the driver side framerail but it was close to midnight and my knuckles were already bleeding. If I loosen the adjuster under the vehicle, how hard is it to re-adjust once it's all back together?

Easy to adjust. Run it out far enough to make attaching the handle eay. Then run it back so that the brake is fully engaged befor the end of the handle travel. Unfortunately, this failure is common.

When my 97 failed, the XJ was on my very not flat drive, engine running. As it was a 5 speed, it was in neutral. Can you see it coming?

Rolled down the drive, across the cul-de-sac and into my neighbors Chrysler 300. Destroyed the front end sheet metal, popped the radiator and burst the condenser. $3000 damage to the 300, I picked off the paint transfer from my ProtoFab bumper...