Wolf_n_Kat wrote:
Thanks Griff! I'm looking over Lokar's website now and you're right, it looks like I'll need to have it special ordered. I'm glad to see that there are companies that are working with us mavericks! ;-)
That's good to hear about the early pushbuttons too. I wish I knew what happened to it, but my grandfather used to have a truck (nicknamed "The Old Goat" for it's ability to go darn near anywhere) with a pushbutton transmission.
If it was two-speed, it was a PowerFlite transmission, a heavy, iron case beast with extreme durability. If three-speed, prior to 1960, it was the very rare iron case TorqueFlite. The aluminum case TorqueFlite came out in 1960/61 (I'd have to look up the exact model year), still in pushbutton configuration. The pushbutton lasted until 1964/65, with the final year being a bastardize configuration that was used as a stepping stone to lever shift transmissions. The basic A727 still exists today in the form of the overdrive A518.
The drivers' education programs basically forced Mother Mopar to change to lever shift transmissions by refusing to use vehicles with pushbutton transmission.
Interestingly, in recent years Dodge has returned to pushbutton shifting in some of its vehicles.
The Old Goat probably had an early big block like the 350 or 361 B block. More likely, it had an A block, called the polysphere or "semi-Hemi". It could also have had the early slant 6, which was know to have a lot of torque and power but no top end in standard production. (The earliest Dodge motorhomes had slant 6 engine that worked well but couldn't get up over 50 mph.)
P.S. It looks like I threw away some of the website bookmarks when my daughter pissed me off. (The one I mention was bookmarked as a source for her '59 Plymouth Savoy project.)
