Multi-carbs with an overdrive trans

You only need a flash temperature at or above the bonding failure point of the friction material once, to ruin a day, and a transmission

 

I'm familiar with that concept



yet folks seem to get a lot of miles out of their overdrives in hot rods, these days. I'm just looking for explanations....

 

What brand of clutches were those?

 

Those were red alto clutches and treated steels. It was still shifting and driving fine, which I though was rather interesting. It looks like I goofed on the transfer plate to case gasket...it's a TransGo manual kit, and I forgot to poke the extra holes in the gasket, so I think it wasn't getting pressure to all of the piston, like it's supposed to.

 

Yup, that will do it!

 

Your last paragraph I respectfully disagree with as do many hyperformance trans shops.
First, you can shift into OD manually on the super slab at 50+ and no harm, and shift out to third on the off ramp and proceed no harm. Unless you leave it in OD and lug it around. It will heat up and damage the clutch.
You can electrically lock up OD with a pressure switch which can intern release the lock up on slowing down. And you can do the same with a power to pressure switch interupter. Done any and all the above many times.
You gots to drive trans properly and not forget/go to sleep. That's when trouble will set in.

 

Yeah, no. The only electrical circuit in either a 200R4 or a 700R4 is the torque converter clutch.

The torque converter clutch is not the overdrive, 4th gear is.

You are talking about two separate and distinct functions that are not interrelated, with the exception that in a stock configuration there is a pressure switch in the 4th gear section, to only allow the torque converter to lock up in 4th (in rare 700R4s, also 3rd).

There are high performance 200R4s that can handle enormous power levels. Those are built without a torque converter lockup circuit, and without a lockup torque converter, because high torque would ruin the clutch.

4th gear is still overdrive, and the transmission has no electric components in it, at all.