1962 Oldsmobile Starfire convertible

[electra225]

What a beautiful car!....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=haKkdMGxZFc

[TC Chris]

Love it!! My friend's grandfather had a '61, silver with black top and red interior like that one. I figured it was the most elegant machine that existed. When grandpa bought a '63 hardtop, his mom got the convertible.

Chris Campbell

[Firedome]

Yes! '61 and '62 Starfires are my favorite big Olds, what a gorgeous car this is in black/maroon. Their "Slim-Jim" Hydramatic was a weak point, a mistake form the get-go, but they can be made to work OK under proper maintenance and use. I love this one!

[electra225]

I don't see why one couldn't transplant a Turbo 400 into a '62 Starfire. I'll bet somebody has done it. If Olds is like Buick, you might have to use a later starter or flywheel to make it work. The Slim-Jim doesn't have a torque converter. Or why couldn't you use the old Dual-Range Hydro in a '62 Olds. They are rough as a cob, but they are almost bulletproof. Every hot rodder in the '50's envied having one.

[Ken Doyle]

The slim jim was designed to make the transmission hump in the floor smaller, so the old Hydra-Matic or the Turbo 400 transmissions will not fit.

[William]

I was watching and listening to Rex's post on Frankie Carle and spotted this in the RH column.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0woJIaHiWX8

And here's another youtube link. The color of this Starfire is the color of my parents 1963 Grand Prix.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BQ2SOv8axI

Bill

[TC Chris]

Hey, thanks for those! That's my '65!! (except that the one in the video has 100K fewer miles, and no Michigan salt!

Chris Campbell

[electra225]

I never thought about the transmission tunnel size. What was the weakness of the Slim Jim? I know folks who pulled an Airstream trailer with a '63 Dynamic 88 for years. I don't know if they had transmission trouble or not.

[Firedome]

It was a mod of the old 4 sp Hydra to make it more compact, but had only 3 spd + a fluid coupling that Olds called "Accel - a-Rotor". It tended to shift rough especially 1 to 2, drawn out then kinda slammed into 2. Linkage adjustment was tricky and crucial. Roto-Hydramatic (the correct name) was called by GM a "3 3peed 4 range" transmission. It ran on high pressure because of the way it filled and drained to shift, so tended to develop leaks. It was also very efficient because in certain of the fill and drain stages it was in full mechanical lock-up, similar to '80s and later transmissions. It could be make to work ok by experts but was never a good solution, that finally came with THM400 in 1965.

[electra225]

The old, original Dual Range Hydro was smoother when coupled to low-revving six or straight eight engines. As the engines got higher revving and peppier, the shifting got rougher. I think I've told the story about how Rolls Royce treated the Hydro when GM converted one of their cars. I know grandpa's friend pulled that 23' Airstream with a black Dynamic 88 and he wasn't easy on it. I wonder if the Roto Hydra-Matic got a bad rap like the 6X5 did with the Zenith guys. Flight Pitch Dynaflow got a bad rap because people didn't know how to use it. If Buick had called it "Flight Pitch Drive" and left the word "Dynaflow" off, they would have had better success. It was a better transmission than Dynaflow, better torque multiplication, faster take-off. People didn't understand it.

Dynaflow used whale oil for factory-fill transmission fluid before about 1953. It turned black in use. When you pull the dipstick out of a Dynaflow in a salvage yard, the fluid is always like diesel motor oil. Unless and until someone put Type A fluid in it.

[Firedome]

I've always been interested in automatic transmission design, in some ways more complex than an engine. GM's foray into successors to Dynaflow (Flight Pitch Dynaflow) and Hydramatic (Roto-Hydramatic) were, from what I've read, were pretty much a flop all around. The "Flight Pitch" (1958) aka "Triple Turbine" (1959) and Chev's Turbo Glide were GM Transmission Group's (Oliver Kelley) attempt to make an even smoother, ultimate torque converter transmission. Roto Hydramatic was about compactness. They spent a huge amount of $ to develop but it proved a dead end. Turob Glide and Flight Pitch were different but both had 3 turbines. Smoothness was the object, so they were essentially an early CVT transmission. Both had all kinds of issues that were largely corrected eventually, but why bother when superior designs Like TorqueFlite were out there. There was no Low range, initially no "hill retarder (later built in), weak cone clutches, and no part-throttle kickdown (as in original Hydramatic) so the trans had to be constantly hammered on with full throttle to get decent response, thus passing response was very non-linear and disconcerting to drive. Aluminum cases cracked due to new casting techniques. Transmission Group even developed a FOUR turbine trans to improve things, but it went nowhere. Ultimately Roto-Hydramatic, TurboGlide, and Triple Turbine were answers to a question nobody asked, far more complicated/expensive than the older Dual Path Dynaflow and Hydramatic, and not the improvement hoped for. Motivated to correct the mistake, THM400 proved to be the answer, one of the great automatics ever.

[Firedome]

Here's a good little piece by PM I just found:

the "theoretically-ideal" design they are talking about is a CVT. It was ahead of it's time.
I don't like driving a CVT but they are more efficient (gas mileage) which is why they're being widely adopted.

[TC Chris]

It tended to shift rough especially 1 to 2, drawn out then kinda slammed into 2.

OK, this is going to sound odd, but I loved the sound of those transmissions doing the 1-2 shift. They wound out a bit in 1, then the engine speed dropped way down in 2 and you'd hear the most wonderful V-8 low-frequency burble. When I was driving the '65 with its much newer TH, I'd sometimes shift it manually, holding it in 1 and then letting it shift into 2 to emulate that old RH sound. It never sounded as good.

Chris Campbell

[electra225]

Flight Pitch was technically available until 1960. I have never seen a 1960 Buick with Flight Pitch. I have seen one 1959. Air suspension was still available in 1959, but on the rear wheels only. Flight Pitch was standard on the 1958 Limited and Roadmaster series, optional on the other series. I know of a '58 Special two-door sedan, Lido Lavendar with green interior, factory documented. It also includes air conditioning and Flight Pitch. Dynaflow was the original CVT. This from 1948 on until the last ones in 1963. Twin Turbine Dynaflow came out in 1953 to better handle the higher-revving new V-8. Twin Turbine Dynaflow with Switch Pitch variable pitch torque converter came out with the 1955 models to provide some feeling of "shifting" when you stepped on the gas. Triple Turbine Dynaflow came out with the 1959 models, all Dynaflow units, not just Flight Pitch. This continued to the end of production in 1963. From 1961 on, the terminology "Dynaflow' was omitted from Buick advertising. Simply called "Turbine Drive" it was a nod to the new Super Turbine transmission that was supposed to have been introduced in 1961, but was delayed, courtesy of the bean counters, until 1964 due to poor sales of the 1957 to 1959 models. "Dynaflow" was still cast in the transmission cases like it always had been. The Limited convertible I posted a picture of the engine had a Flight Pitch to Dynaflow conversion while Art was restoring it. Almost everything in the drive train except the engine block itself was different. Starter, flywheel, transmission, cross member, trans mount, torque ball seal, torque tube, driveshaft, brake cable, brake line, cooler lines, all the switch pitch linkage, plus some parts I may have omitted. Fortunately, Super models will yield the suitable parts necessary. We found a Super with no front clip and no engine, but it had eveything else. I did this procedure ONCE. That was more than enough. Doing a frame-off restoration on a '58 Buick Limited convertible is not for the faint of heart, a conversation for another thread.

[William]

Chris, my aunt and uncle had an Oldsmobile, sorry I can't remember the year, and I too always loved the sound it made when shifting from 1 to 2.

Bill

[Firedome]

Wow if any '58 car deserved that kind of extreme measure, a '58 Limited convertible was one of them. I know in the '80s and later one of GM's designers drove a pink '58 Limited convertible, as sort of a tongue-in-cheek statement, it being so over the top it was cool. Worth a fortune now.

As for color combos, Lavender with green interior actually works well due to purple and green being opposites on the "Color Wheel". This we learned when my cousin, a college art teacher who teaches a Color Theory course, advised us on a bathroom we were re-doing that needed a wall color color selection to go with mint-green tile bordered by black bull-nose . The tile was in beautiful shape and we wanted to keep it so we were looking at pastel green or yellow paint for the walls, He said try pale lavender paint... LSS we did, and it was gorgeous, we always got compliments on it!

About the same time I had my '58 Olds 88, white with green/white/black interior. Had I kept it (sold because no PS and no A/C and I'm getting old!) it would have gotten this fabulous factory combo Heather and Rose Mist 2-tone with it's existing green interior...I still kinda wish I had done it.