NON CORVETTE TECHNICAL QUESTION

[Chuck G.]

Re: NON CORVETTE TECHNICAL QUESTION

Hi Mike. Our mutual friend, Pat Kraus is the Olds guru. He has a 49 and a 50 Olds club coupe, and also an Olds powered 32 Ford street rod. If anybody can answer your question, it would be "The Kraus". Chuck

[Terry D.]

Re: NON CORVETTE TECHNICAL QUESTION

Why not contact B&M and ask them. Hopefully someone with enough age will remember Stone Woods and Cook, I sure do.

Terry

[Clem Z.]

49 olds rocket engines

those old olds with the torque tube drive would lift up in the rear when you nailed the gas like it was ready to leap. when the 49 rocket engine came out the dealers had a see thru plastic hood for the demo car so you could see the engine. they also had to buy a walnut shell blaster to clean out the carbon from the combustion chambers because the compression ratio was very high for the fuel that was available back then.

[Mike M.]

Re: 49 olds rocket engines

clem: stick to chevys. the first v-8 olds, appearing in 1949, also had open drive line, and as i recall the olds and pontiacs all had openb drivelines fron at least 1939 and on. regards and happy new year. mike

[Clem Z.]

Re: 49 olds rocket engines

i may be wrong about the torque tube but i remember them lifting up in the back on accceration.

[Terry M.]

Re: 49 olds rocket engines

I don't know about old Olds, but a properly setup Chevelle (the original A-body) with a four link rear suspension will rise up just like Clem describes - that is just before it pulls the front wheels. I presume the Buick, Pontiac and Oldsmobile variants of the A-body will do the same. Pretty impressive sight, right Billy Stevenson?

[William C.]

Re: 49 olds rocket engines

The '49 Olds also had a coil-spring rear suspension, not totally dissimilar to the A body.

[Clem Z.]

mike this guy may have a answer

www.transmissionadapters.com/early_olds.htm

[Duke W.]

Re: NON CORVETTE TECHNICAL QUESTION

Can't help with the specific techical question, but the original GM four-speed Hydramatic transmission does NOT have a torque converter.

It's a "fluid coupling". The difference between the two is that a fluid coupling does not provide any torque multiplication. A fluid coupling is more efficient than a non-locking torque converter and has less tendency to "creep" at idle.

That's why the original Hydramatics had such a stump puller first gear. I think this basic design four-speed with the fluid coupling carried through until it was replaced by the three speed Turbo-Hydramatic, which was the first Hydramatic with a torque converter.

Of course, Buick's Dynaflow and Chevrolet's Powerglide had torque converters from their inceptions.

Duke