53 Desoto Fluid drive trans worth using in a Hot Rod

I would be interested to hear what other have used as a replacement tranny.

 

Here's what I remember about them. My Dad had a bunch of Chryslers back in the '50s and one in particular was a '53 New Yorker. Here's the deal. Where second normally is is 1st. Where third normally is is 2nd & 3d. Now the trick deal. First is a really low gear and launches like crazy. Once you get it wound up in 1st you can just stab the clutch and it will shift like an automatic to 2nd. One wound up in 2nd grab 3'd and you are on your way. One uses the clutch to put it in gear but never uses it again. Under normal circumstances one just take off in 2nd (lever down like 3'd) and when up to some speed let off on the gas and it shifts to 3d. They were not a 4 speed transmission. You could just get 2nd in two different places. I tried my best to tear my Dad's up but never did. Would whip the shit out of a '53 Olds 98.

 

I ran a '98 Olds ragged with the old man's Chrysler. We raced for about 35 miles on crooked MO roads (Lebanon to Hartville). He held in there pretty good to about a hundred but that was it. Once we hit the hills and dales his ass was history. May have been different if he'd have had a Super 88 ...When? 1957 Where? Lebanon MO

 

Just to set the record straight, that is not completely accurate.

Chrysler had two distinct 'fluid drive' transmissions. They went by different names, and both of them were not always offered in the same make/model (Dodge, Desosto, Chrysler). Also, owners usually called them by the wrong names, like the name 'Frigidaire' might be ascribed to anyone's refrigerator.

First type: A conventional three on the tree manual and conventional clutch mounted behind a fluid drive coupling. This is the same tranny as found on zillions of MoPars, just with a longer input shaft and bellhousing to account for the added length of the fluid coupling. The torus would slip at low rpm and then slip less and less, and finally lock up at cruise.

With this transmission you could leave the car in high when coming to a stop. The turbine would slip and the engine would not stall. To accelerate again, just step on the gas and the car accelerates away, albeit slowly, in high gear. With the long stroke and tall rear, you can even drive one of these cars today in mild traffic. For a little extra pep, you could start in second and only have one shift. Or, you could run thru the gears as normal. You only used the clutch when moving the shift lever. A secondary bonus was that it was almost impossible to stall the engine. Just put her in gear and take your foot off the clutch. It was really hard to kill a clutch disk in these cars for that reason. The turbine would slip to accomodate. This was a versatile transmission at a time when the need to shift less - or not at all - PLUS the ability to not stall the engine when starting out was an important marketing feature. Also, automatic transmission technology was in its infancy back then, and this was a very reliable and inexpensive design. I still have a 49 Dodge with a quarter million miles and the fluid coupling has never leaked, or been topped off, and the car is on its original clutch disk.

Second type: This used the same bellhousing/clutch setup as described above, but the tranny was different. It was a manual four speed. But you could only move the shift lever (on the steering column) to one of three positions. Reverse, of course. Then low range and high range. Low range would put the tranny in first. When you hit a certain (low) speed and released the gas pedal, a solenoid similar to that used on an overdrive transmission would shift to second gear. Floor it below a certain speed, and it would downshift back down to first.

Low range was useful for climbing Mount Everest or pulling stumps out of the ground.

For 99% of your driving, you would put the gear lever in high range. Just remove your foot from the clutch as described above. Then, the car started in third gear and did the same upshift or downshift according to road speed and throttle position into fourth gear (direct drive).

This setup gave better acceleration (because of gear ratios) than leaving the Type 1 setup in high gear, and eliminated the need to shift from second to high (again, Type 1). But because the lags in this very simple electromechanical setup were long, it took a while.

Also, you could not go thru all four gears unless you did this: start in low range, let the tranny shift to second, then shift to high range, but you would then be in direct drive so floor it for kickdown to third, then let it shift up into high gear. By the time this all happened your kids had grown up.

If you were grandma, you could drive silky-smooth as you would want with a tranny that did not depend on the fancy hydraulics of the Powerglide, Dynaflow or Hydramatic.

These trannys were pretty much gone by the early 50s.

One other thing about these trannys (both types). No engine braking with the motor off, because the torus would slip. So keep a good parking brake or remember to park with your wheels pointing to the curb or against a rock. Also, both types made it really really easy to jump start the car. If there was the slightest downgrade, just switch the ignition on, put the car in gear and let her roll. In a moment the turbine would impart rotation to the engine, and the motor would start up smoothly and silently without using your battery or starter motor. This also saved me on many an occasion when the battery was too weak to spin the motor fast enough on its own.

So, in all, these are not performance transmissions at all, and the Type 2 is really weird, but the Type 1 is suitable for use in a rod: all the fluid coupling does is add a few inches of overall length and a ton of versatility.

 

When we left the gate that Olds was never ahead of me. I'm tellin' ya, if ya launch and shift like I said that old New Yorker will launch like a whacked in the ass mule!.

 

We used to call them Slush O Matics. Real smooth, but not hot rod material.

 

ply49 is right,i had the first type in a 331 hemi powered "buggy" or street legal rail type thing in the early 70s.
it had a regular clutch,and a torque converter,it worked really well.
i never had a problem with it,and i drove the shit out of it.
i have a yale forklift with a flat 6 in it thats got the same setup,works great.
if you hold the clutch in and rev it up,then dump the clutch its just like a manual tranny.
i would run it in a hotrod.

 

My older brothers submitted our new 1952 Desoto V8 to all the punishment a tranny could take and it lasted the two years we owned the car. Smoked the tires in low, slow through waiting for the the clunk, then at higher speeds the hemi kicked in and it was impressive. No one likes waiting for the clunk.
I used to ask my mom to smoke the tires when she dropped me off at school. She did it once, and scared herself to death.

 

ive read through 3 pages of this and everyone says not to use this tranny but no one mentions what tranny they would recomend... T5? muncie? ford truck manual??

 

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