I had a 1954 Pontiac Super Chief Coupe , it was a terrific car with InLine FlatHead 8 cylinder engine and a Dual Hydromatic tranny .
It has warped & burned valves so *very* low compression but once I got it started (that was always the trick) it ran just fine and went like stink , handled nicely too .
For those who do not know , back on those days , the GM Hydromatic automatic tranny didn't have a " Park " gear , what you did was to shift it into _reverse_ when the engine was off and the reverse gear slid over and locked up the driveline tight .
Enter poor 16 year old Nate and his latest saved from the crusher car (it really was a beautiful car !) , with this tranny and bad valves , I'd be backing up and looking over my shoulder as the engine chug - chugged along @ 350 RPM's or so , occasionally it would stall and then I had about four seconds to turn around , grab the shift lever and work it all the way back to Neutral or Drive before the tranny locked up with the 4,000 Lb. car still rolling backwards @ 4 MPH or so , this of course made the old tech Bias Ply tires skid and screech not to mention whipping the soft GM 1905's suspension to it's limits a few times, nearly snapping my neck in the process.....
Oh , those Halycon days of youth long gone past....
-Nate
Brian Wrote ;
Re : GM Dual Hyr
And herein lies another sad story. When I was a young 16 year old boy with my 1950 Oldsmobile Club Coupe, and being poor and frugal - I took my car up to Mt. Baldy for a day in the snow. With the gas tank at a 1/4 tank or so for the drive down the mountain, I thought I would save some fuel by turning the engine off and come down the mountain using the trannie to slow me down. Well, it was several weeks later when the trannie went south on me and gave up the ghost. I was going to convert over to a LaSalle stick shift anyway, but I admit, I was a foolish and stupid young boy at the time.
brian from la verne, ca
No comments:
Post a Comment