I was looking for some background info and got started thinking about these and the different technologies used by the different manufacturers..... I'd appreciate it if y'all could tell me which cars had 'em. I remember my Godmother's mother's Dodge Dart, a high school guy with a volare(?) - we called it "the shark" because it wasn't your ******/econobox ****) and the edsel (iirc). What others are there? Which one(s) worked best?
In 1958 only Edsel offered it, controlled by servo's with ****ons mounted in the middle of the steering wheel. They were very troublesome and were soon discontinued. Mopar offered it from 1956 until the mid-60's, they were cable operated and very dependable, using them on their Powerflite 2 speeds and the Torqflite 3 speed which was used long after push****on was discontinued. Rambler also offered a push****on transmission setup although I'm not sure how well they worked, none of my Ramblers ever had them.
What squab sez. I've never had a teletouch, but I did have a 1st gen PB trans in my '56 Chrysler. Really nothing to it - instead of actuating a cable via a lever (which is how most companies actuate their transes these days) the cable was linked to a set of push****ons. The ****ons had a rather long travel to provide mechanical advantage to move the shift quadrant. It worked well - was fun to rock the car back and forth using yer thumb and a little gas. As far as I know, the PB trans system went out of favor in '63 not because it didn't work well, but rather because the DOT (I think) required manufacturers to adopt the now standard PRNDL quadrant for safety reasons.
I just got one mpar 727 for my *******ized chevy. While doin a bit o research I read that there is a shop in Canada that has a kit to adapt the push****on mechanism to a late model truck OD ****** (A518 I believe). That's what I'm gonna do if I ever I burn up the 727.
Rambler also had a cable push ****on unit on a Borg Warner auto trans. The same trans was used in Jeep, Studebaker and some Ford cars so you might be able to play some adapting games to use it on other cars. 1958-1960 or so anyhow had it; my '58 does at least.
I believe Packard (late 50's) had a deal with the ****ons mounted in a pod at the end of a stationary shift lever type thing on the right of the steering wheel. This in a 56 http://i11.ebayimg.com/01/i/06/08/be/28_1.JPG
The '57 Dodge TF has the starter ****on in the "N" ... also, the backup lights came on if "R" was pushed in 1/4" ... people following too close ususally freaked when you hit the switch. Shift mechanism trouble free if you don't mess with them. 302
A bud of mine located a mid-50's Dodge truck and was shocked to find it had a push-****on ******, didn't know they'd put them in trucks, too. What kind of ****** would it be, in a mid-50s truck?
If the ****ons read RNDL or RND1 then it's a Powerflite. Most of the automatic trucks got these in the mid 50's. If it has RND21 then it's a Torqflite which is a very good 3 speed auto ******.
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