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I stand corrected. I was 11 or 12. My father and I looked at a few cars, and in every case my mother would have killed him. But the push-button trans in the 58 was to the right of the steering.
That was to VDCdriver. Sorry, Iâm new at this. And old.
According to this site, the '58 Mercuryâs push-button transmission controls were on the left of the steering wheel:
Scroll down to the section dealing with the '58 Mercury, and then click on the words âleast intuitive transmission ever createdâ.
Clearly, the push buttons are on the left!
That 63 Plymouth with the buttons on the right side of the steering wheel- those were the heater control buttons, the transmission buttond are clearly seen in the photo on the left.
Triedacâs list was accurate but not complete. Beside the large Mercurys the 56 Packard could be had with push button shift and it was on the right.
@oldtimer-11. I forgot about the 1956 Packard. We didnât see very many of them in my part of the country. This was the last true Packard. The 1957 and 1958 Packards were essentially Studebakers. As far as pushbutton transmission controls are concerned, I never saw the point even when they came out in the 1950s. I thought a lever on the steering column was just fine. I couldnât understand why Chrysler moved the transmission control to a lever coming out of the dashboard in 1955,. then replaced it with the pushbuttons in 1956. My 2011 Toyota Sienna has the transmission control as a.lever.coming out of the dashboard much like the 1955 Plymouth. I much preferred the column shifter on my 2006 Chevrolet Uplander. I just hope Toyota doesnât look at any 1956-1964 Chrysler products and go to pushbuttons. In 1965, there was a standardization of the transmission controls and all cars had either the column lever or floor shifter. This Standard control made sense to me.
I really think that some of the âfeaturesâ on Chrysler products of the late '50s through the early '60s were done just for the sake of being different.
How about their practice of moving the rear view mirrorâs mounting to the dashboard?
That just seemedâŠunusualâŠuntil you had passengers in the rear seat, at which point it became a true annoyance.
And, in the era of bench seats, if you had three people sitting in the front seat, the middle passenger totally blocked any rear view from that mirror, and at that point their âbetter ideaâ became an actual safety hazard.
I also recall that one of my uncleâs Chryslers (perhaps his '60 New Yorker convertible??) had the directional signal lever mounted on the dashboard, to the left side of the steering wheel.
Yes, it was logical to move that lever to the left for left turns, and to the right for right turns, but anyone driving that car for the first time was of the belief that there were no directional signals, simply because there was no lever attached to the steering wheel!
Doing things differently is fine as long as the difference constitutes a substantive improvement, but I donât think that Chryslerâs differences in those days were an improvement of any sort.
@VDCdriver. The Studebakers beginning with the 1947 models through the 1952 models had dash mounted rear view mirrors. I also remember the Chrysler and Imperial with the dash mounted turning signal switch. It didnât cancel after a turn. I think Chrysler"s intent was to move all the controls off the steering column. Now the trend seems to be to put as many controls as possible on the column. I particularly do not like the multifunction switch. I have no problem turning the headlights on and off with a dashboard switch. I guess todayâs auto designers must have examined the 1949 Nash AirFlytes that had the ignition switch, headlight switch, and I believe the wiper switch on the steering column as well as the gear shift and turning signal switch. The indicator for the turning signal was a light at the end of the stalk that flashed on and off with the turning signals.
Lots of these decisions were made for design reasons, just so the car was a bit different. The 55 Plymouth with I think the ammeter and the oil pressure gauge in front of the passenger was a fine example of design form over function. Studebaker put the starter button under the clutch pedal, so you had to push the clutch to the floor to start the car, a really good idea that disappeared. And everyone put the dimmer switch on the floor for many years, and it was ok there, but now itâs on the steering column.
I liked the Chrysler Corp push buttons, and they worked well. I donât recall any trouble with them. You could push the Reverse button part way in and feel the back up light switch click, so you could flash the guy behind you if they were too close.
Actually, it was just the oil pressure gauge that was on the far right side of the dashboard.
I know that because, as a kid, it was my job to monitor the oil pressure on my fatherâs '55 Belvedere and to report the readings to him every few minutes.
The other gaugesâincluding the ammeterâwere within easy view for the driver.
On my fatherâs '59 Plymouth, on a few occasions one of the push buttons went so far into the dashboard that you could no longer see it.
I recall our mechanic having to do some sort of fix on a couple of occasions.
I had forgotten about that design defect!
Further proof that âdifferentâ is not necessarilyâŠbetter.
@VDCdriver As I remember the 1955 Plymouth, the ammeter and fuel gauge were on the driverâs side of the dashboard and the oil pressure and temperature gauges were on the passenger side
This was done in the interest of symmetry. The glove compartment was in the center of the dashboard. On the far right was the round radio speaker grill to balance thw speedometer on the left side. At least the 1955 Plymouth had a full set of gauges while the 1955 Ford and Chevrolet had warning lights for the battery and oil pressure.
I really liked the push buttons, it seemed to me a simpler and more elegant design that having a huge shift lever that had to move through other gear contacts to get to the one you wanted. It was easier to rock the car in the snow also.
Back in the pre power brake days Chryslerâs double leading shoe front drums were superior to others. I thought the hemi and poly head engines were better than the competition also. They disappeared not because they werenât better but because they were more expensive to build. Cheap drives out better all the time. I liked the rheostat wiper controls on my 56 Desoto, you could make the wipers any speed you wanted. I also liked the fact that you didnât have to use the heater blower to move air through to car if you were moving.
@Triedaq
After refreshing my memory by looking at images of '55 Plymouth dashboards, I see that there were indeed two gauges on the right side of the dashboard.
I assume that, because my father only wanted me to monitor the one on the far right (the oil pressure gauge), the other gauge on the right side of the dashboard must have beenâŠjust close enoughâŠfor him to see. Whether that other gauge on the right side was the ammeter or the temperature gauge I donât recall.
Yes, thank you. The 1956 Packard Caribbean had push-button tranny to the right of the steering. I could have sworn the Monterey did too, but it looks like that was the radio.
Now, these days, with all the electronic controlled transmissions . . why not do that again ?
I have two cars that seem completely illogical to have any lever in a console at all . . I wish it wasnât there and I could have one more seat and belt there.
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Exactly!
For several years, some European models have had a rotary knob for selection of the appropriate gear, so it would be just as easy for auto manufacturers to utilize push buttons.
My best guess as to why most companies retain shift levers is that their customers would think that the vehicle was less âsportingâ if it didnât have a shift lever.
Most people probably still think that there is a mechanical control between their shift lever and their automatic transmission, but in reality, this is just not the case with almost all vehicles nowadays.
Fordâs going to buttons on some, Lincolns in particular.
I always felt that pushbutton automatics were a great idea, technology just had to catch up to them. Versions from the old cars mentioned were mechanical/electromechanical and prone to problems. With todayâs technology, automatic tyrannies are operated electronically via the TCM anyway. Reliable pushbutton tyrannies could easily be made with modern technology. I would welcome the return of them. Console shifters are meant to imply a sporty car, but IMHO they take up lots of unnecessary room for no good technical reason. Perhaps they could be an option. Perhaps they could even be a dealer-installed or aftermarket option.