@Bing–The 1949 Desoto either had tip-toe shift or fluid drive. Tip-toe shift had a fluid coupling between the engine and the clutch. There was low range, drive range, reverse and neutral. Low range was where 2nd gear was on a conventional 3 speed manual transmission. Drive range was in high gear position. Reverse and neutral were in the usual positions. For normal driving, one put the lever in high range, released the clutch and did not have to touch the clutch until one had to back up. Shifting was done by releasing the accelerator at about 15 mph or higher. The car would then shift from 3rd to 4th. The clutch did not have to be depressed at stop signs. Low range also had 2 speeds, and operated in a similar fashion.
The other transmission offered on the 1949 Desoto was fluid drive which amounted to a fluid coupling between the engine and clutch. The car had a regular 3 speed manual transmission. One could start in high gear and the slippage in the fluid coupling (it did not multiply torque as a torque converter does) and one could stop at a traffic signal without depressing the clutch. However, to move the gearshift from high to another gear, one did have to depress the clutch.
It's very simple. It's just a regular 5 or 6 speed manual transmission, you know with the gears lubricated by plain old gear oil
Not ALL manual transmissions used gear oil. My 84 S-15 used Dexron III ATF. And it was a MANUAL transmission.
I think it was 1959 that my neighbor had a 49 Desoto or something as a temporary car. It had basically a centrifical clutch so you could just shift it without the clutch.
VW had something like that in the 60’s. They called it an automatic clutch.
Marnet, for an automatic transmission, a cable is used to link the stick to the transmission, so mounting it on the column or the center console doesn’t make any difference. The column shift was in demand back in the 60’s and earlier because so many people had large families with lots of kids, and only one car with a bench front seat.
Today, few families have more than two kids or less than two cars and people today just seem to prefer the floor (console) shifter and bucket seats.
It had basically a centrifical clutch so you could just shift it without the clutch.
VW had something like that in the 60’s. They called it an automatic clutch.
I know that VW had an automatic stick shift, but I’m not certain that it had a centrifugal clutch. As I understand a centrifugal clutch, it would disengage below a certain rpm and then engage when the engine was above that rpm. I have a centrifugal clutch on my rototiller–the tines engage when I rev up the engine and disengage when I release the throttle control and the engine rpm drops to an idle. I didn’t remember the VW auto stick shift working this way, but I could be wrong. I know that the 1949 Desoto didn’t operate this way.
@triedaq I’m pretty sure the old Desoto had a manual transmission with the fluid clutch but geez that was 54 years ago and because we were only 11 years old, couldn’t drive it except in the driveway.
@Bing–my dad had a 1947 Desoto and it had the tiptoe shift. He also owned a 1952 Dodge with that same transmission but Dodge called it GyroMatic. He also owned a 1947 Dodge and a 1949 Dodge with the fluid clutch but a manual transmission. Many years later, I owned a 1948 Dodge with the fluid clutch and manual transmission.
As for rare cars, if the 1949 Desoto had a manual transmission with the fluid clutch, it was rather rare. This setup was only available in the low trim line DeSotos (which was called the Deluxe). The upper trim line, called the Custom, had the tiptoe shift as standard equipment.
The domestic RWD automatics of the 60s and 70s were very reliable and durable. With minimum maintenance they ran trouble free well beyond 100,00, often to 300,000 + miles. Will anything today surpass those transmissions.
Interesting commments above. Coincidentally, there’s a post somewhere here in the forums yesterday about a Ford Fiesta, the owner was complaining the shifting wasn’t smooth. From the posts above, I think the Ford Fiesta may have an automatic-manual. The rough shifting problem according to the poster with his Fiesta was something wrong w/ the “clutch-drum”.
“Clutch-drum”? I’ve never heard of a “clutch-drum”. Clutch-disk, yes. But not clutch-drum.
Anybody know why Ford is using a clutch-drum – and what exactly is that? – instead of the convential clutch-disc/pressure plate arrangement? Is there an advantage to a clutch-drum vs a clutch-disk/pressure plate?
It does seem from the coments, like for the most simple version of the automatic-manual, the driver with the automatic-manual would have to accept some compromise, not quite as smooth shifting, especially at lower speeds, compared to a true automatic. It’s not a big compromise, as it is the same thing driver of clutch-equipped cars already accept.
@Triedaq, I used to work on those Automatic Stick VWs now and then and even owned a 1969 Super Beetle with the Auto Stick.
The transmission was a normal manual 3 speed and had a normal clutch assembly in it. The clutch was attached to a torque converter and the converter fed by fluid from an external tank.
The gearshift lever basically had a contact point area on the bottom that closed a circuit for the vacuum/electromagnetic shift valve in the engine compartment. The weight of the hand on the gearshift knob is what depressed the shifter handle and closed the contact points.
In turn that applied engine vacuum to a pod which moved the throwout bearing arm and would then disengage or engage the clutch. The valve was adjustable so that vacuum could be controlled so as to prevent slamming the clutch.
Personally, I loathed the Auto Stick feature and preferred the normal 4 speed manual. The main problem with the Auto Stick feature is that after a while the contact points in the shifter burns or gets out of adjustment. It’s not a major fix but some people have caused various kinds of grief by not knowing this and continuing to gnash gears…
@ok4450–Thanks for the information about the auto stick shift VWs. I never rode in a VW automatic stick shift and didn’t realize that it did have a torque converter.
Different manufacturers in the past tried different schemes for automatically controlling clutch operation. The Packard back in the 1940s had an electric clutch option and the Hudson had Vacu-matic that operated the clutch by engine vacuum. It also had a more expensive option called Drivemaster that combined the Vacu-matic with a device that did the shifting.
For its 1942 models, Mercury had some sort of semi-automatic transmission arrangement called Liquimatic. I’ve only read about it, but apparently it worked so poorly the Ford recalled the Mercurys with the Liquimatic and replaced them with manual transmissions. The 1942 production ended in February of 1942 because of WW II.
Not to be undone, Chrysler made HyDrive available on the 1953 Plymouth. Hydrive was a 3 speed manual with a torque converter between the engine and the clutch and could be driven in high gear without using the clutch. The torque converter allowed torque multiplication for high gear starts. Unfortunately, the torque converter and engine shared the same oil supply which led to real problems. It seems to me that in all these cases it was a real complicated way of doing things and it would be easier just to learn to use the clutch.
@triedaq Pretty sure it was a Desoto and a 49. It was 1959 and they had a new 59 Chevy that they ran into someone with. They decided to fix it themselves so bought this car to get around in while they fixed the 59 with pretty extensive front end damage. If I remember right they paid $50 for it. Green 4 door.
Well, Ford and VW should have stick with something simpler, a single clutch automated manual. Dual clutch maybe faster, but the added complexity is not worth trouble, especially in automobiles for the masses. Besides, a dual clutch unit requires an oil pump to keep a clutch engaged, zipping away some engine power.
Yes, even some of the exotic cars are switching from F1 style single clutch automated manuals to dual clutch systems. The single clutch systems can be fast, but at the expense of smoothness. The dual clutch trannies Ford has used just need better software. They’ve updated it some already. Other makes have solved this problem and make very nice systems.
I hope George won’t take this personally, but I found the OP to be very interesting.
The proposal was to take a manual transmission and automate it. Thinking it through, there would have to be something to operate the clutch at start up, operate the clutch at shift points, operate the shift lever, and lastly something to sense when this needed to take place.
I don’t know about others, but this sounds like a whole 'nother level of complexity - the very thing being cited in automatic transmissions. I would also think these would be prone to failure until all the bugs were worked out.
and before people ask: Yes, I am aware that such systems are in use and have been for some time. But these are on fairly exotic cars and I would guess fairly expensive - not something a generic Chevy or Ford could use.
So it was obvious to me George hadn’t thought this through.