I Have recently installed a 1960 Pontiac 389 and 3 speed gear box in my model A project. Fired the engine a couple weeks ago and almost everything seems fine. this past week i started mounting the body and making floors. in order to do so i thought it would be a good idea to get a shifter in there and bought a cheese **** "one size fits none" 3 speed shifter to use for the time being until i could find a nice old timey one. Sure enough it doesn't fit. it is for a completely different style 3 speed, the kind were all used to seeing. this transmission is weird to me and i am kind of stuck. i have done searches and have found nothing. Im ***uming it was column shift from the factory. so my question to you is what can you tell me about these transmissions? were they Pontiac specific? was there ever a after-market floor shifter made? by who? any information is greatly appreciated! thank-you Drew
Buddy had a '59 Pontiac that had a 3 speed column shift. He wanted a floor shift and we had a tough time finding someone that made one for that single arm transmission. He bought one thru Almquist and sent it back. I think the one he ended up buying and using was a Ansen. Not sure about that though since it was 45 years ago. I think the stick shift Buicks, and possibly Olds of that era, had the same single arm transmissions.
That looks like a 55-early 56 trans. I have never seen a floor shift( I'm sure they made them when they were fairly new) here's a link to some info on installing a top shift from an early Buick plus some interchange ability http://starchief57.tripod.com/techtips.htm#gear
Yep it's a 1949-56 Pontiac transmission. Column shift. The 5 bolt transmissions were all made by Buick I think. In 1957 they switched to Saginaw with cover on the side. You will be hard pressed to make a floor shifter with that one shift arm.....
Yes, Ansen and I think, Dragfast? made shifters fot the "selector" type trans...well at least the stronger version like on 51-up Olds with 6 bolt cover. Any shifter you find or make will have an oddball shift pattern with high gear being forward. There are some pics buried in threads here, on how the shifters look and work. The Ansen is real simple. I'll try to find a pic I saved on ebay. Try a search for "selector" here on hamb
here it is: Read the whole thread...Check post number 3 for a pic http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=309757&highlight=selector
Wow alright. thank-you F&J for the link to the other post, i missed it somehow. so this should be interesting. Is this gear box worth using? should i lock myself in the shop and make something work? (that olds engine with the conversion is pretty neat but not to practical) i plan on running this car real hard and would not like the gear box to be the weak link. i guess i could find a stock column and make that work?, not so fun for grabbing gears but would help with the lack of floor space in a heavy channeled roadster. I could be patient and wait to find a correct Ansen floor shift conversion? im thinking in text here, what do you guys think? i want to drive this thing. to clarify the lower arm on the gear box is not used with a after-market floor shift? give me your thoughts.....thanks-Drew
F&J i saw your post on your 32 and putting olds guts into the buick case.... i know not as strong as the olds, but could this be done with said pontiac gears in the buick case and use the long open drive pontiac tailshaft?
From looking at your trans style, I am 100% sure the 37 Buick case stuff will not work. by the way, the buick donor trans needs to be from the largest models of 37 buicks, the small series is different. Tough to find these days. The 37 Buick trans body is identical in size to the 51-56 Olds trans, so the shaft and gears all fit. Your case is very small, so I can't see anything fitting. By the way, that 37 buick gear stuff looks identical to the olds gears, but the angle of the teeth was changed to a straighter pitch to make them stronger for the olds torque. If it were me, and could not find a stronger trans...I would fab up the same shifter as in post #3 in that thread. That shifter only uses the side shift fork, not the bottom one. It is real simple. Look at the way the shifter handle pivots, so when you move it sideways to go to the other "gate", the lower end of the shifter either pulls-out or pushes-in on the trans side lever. Extremely easy to make with heim ends, some round stock, and plate steel. Like I said, it will have a strange shift pattern. Trans swaps...I am pretty on my Olds selector trans, that I compared the length of the input shaft to a chevy type 4spd, and the chevy was too short. Now, as some have said on hamb, not all selectors had the same output shafts or input shaft lengths/diameters. Maybe just for grins, measure your trans input length to compare with a more modern trans. If you were lucky to have your length match something better, then maybe there is a way to fit it to your bell. ???
Alright thanks for the help- I guess i have some measuring and brainstorming to do. I think i can live with a goofy shift pattern. I will post what i come up with. Drewwwww
Things I would consider..... When it breaks can I find another without 2 months of searching, and will the one I find be a totally unknown quan***y that's sat for 50 years? Will 2 or 3 of em end up costing as much or more than one muscle car type transmission? Are you interested in this transmission enough to become an expert on them? Many guys that run oddball parts "hard" end up as experts due to breakage. Will the goofball shifter fawk up powershifting or speed shifting since there's not many options? Like if a vintage ansen doesn't have the shift quality you seek, what can you do other than make your own? Given the high demand for strong V8 manual boxes, why weren't these adopted since they went thru a period of super-cheapness when the cars they came in were headed to s****yards. These are just things to ask yourself, I'm not gonna say what's right for your project. Only you know. Good luck with a cool project!
just happened to p*** this post, and that pic of the selector shifter should work! If that has the 6 bolt top its like the big buick trans, and as i recall those large Buick gears are strong. I remember a buddy with a 40 roadmaster [same body as a caddy] could almost lift the front end off the ground on that thing. I think Olds used that trans till 1963. The smaller vesion wasn,t as strong but they looked alike cept one was bigger. as the pic shows the shift lever can pull the selector side to side and thats what selects which rail its shifting. I think i,ll go in the garage and start making one! I have a floorshift from a japanese 5 speed and it is a selector type shifter, I,m experimenting with it now, I have a 39 buick coupe.
Shifty--thank you for saying all that- cause i was trying to look past it. availability is definitely something to consider. i am just so anxious to get this thing on the road and drive it before the snow flys, and the thought of having to find another gearbox and possibly bell housing and then the chance of having to cut up my newly made center crossmember makes me frustrated for overlooking something so simple, i dident even question it. I will consider all of your points and see what i can make happen......for cheap. 39cent- GO for it! god speed, and please post pics of what your working with and what problems your running into, i might do the same thing this weekend i have the top shift off a t-5 i might butcher up or just start from scratch for somthing more old timey looking
well I dont know when i will be able to get to my projects I,m inbetween trying to clean my [fibber magee's]garage and get my 39 chevy front discs project finished. But i just threw out some ideas for anyone to take a look at if they want to use thier selector type trans. That type of trans is still being used in cars today, a lot of the asian cars use them, with nice smooth shifting cable operation.
For the record here, several GM cars used what i call the SELECTOR type shifting mechanisms. There were as far as I know 3 sizes of these types of transmissions. Small for chevys, and medium for Olds, Pontiac,Buick, and large for Buick and 50,s era V8,s like Olds and Pont. There were some after market floor shifters made for these trans, but they are kinda scarce now, some guys would make up thier own homemade shifters, I can remmebr the homespun mechanisms made from ford column shift ***emblies. As I said previously I,m looking at making up something like that from one of these asian cars floor shifter mech, which may be able to work ok.
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