Turboglide Automobile Transmission

Why 2 Letters KILLED Chevrolet's MOST ADVANCED Transmission!
Muscle Car Masters

That's a nice story, but it doesn't satisfy my inner techno-geek. So we go looking for more.

Chevrolet Turboglide Transmission
Arpit Thakur

The diagram got me here, it shows up at the 12:12 mark and Arpit goes thru the diagram bit by tedious bit, and there's a more than a few bits. He's a little hard to understand, but he repeats himself and uses a pointer effectively. I dunno what the rest of the video is about.

Torque Converter – How Does It Work? (3D Animation)
CARinfo3d (En)

Nice, simplified explanation of how torque convertors work. I still wonder who came up with this idea, how they made the prototypes, and how they make them now. Probably won't be satisfied until I see the equations for fluid flow and that's probably pointless because I probably wouldn't understand them. Well, I probably could if I spent a couple months studying up. It would take me at least that long because I only get about an hour's worth of actual work done a day. Anyway, here's some Turboglide pictures.

Turboglide Simplified Schematic

Figure 41. Reverse Power Flow

Turboglide Cross Section

Key for Turboglide Cross Section:

1. Needle Bearing and Races

2. Converter Cover Hub Bushing

3. First Turbine Hub Bushing (Serviced)

4. Caged Needle Bearings

5. Converter Cover (Serviced as an Assembly with Item 7)

6. Third Turbine Assembly

7. Stator Assembly

8. Transmission Case

9. Second Turbine Assembly

10. First Turbine Assembly

11. Stator Rear Thrust Pod

12. Needle Bearing and Race

13. Converter Pump (Serviced as an Assembly with Item 4)

14. Front Pump Oil Seal

15. Front Pump Assembly

16. Frant Pump Cover (Stator Support)

17. Reverse Piston

18. Reverse Piston Spring

19. Thruster Washer (Selective)

20. Neutral Clutch Hub

21. Neutral Clutch Piston

22. Neutral Clutch Piston Return Spring (16)

23. Neutral Clutch Drive Plates (3) and Driven Plates (3)

24. Neutral Clutch Piston Return Spring Reluiner

25. Neutral Clutch Rear Drive Plate

26. Front Ring Gear Hub

27. Front Ring Gear

28. Front Planet Carrier Assembly

29. Front Sun Gear Front Bushings (Serviced)

30. Forward Clutch Freewheel Sprag Race

31. Forward Clutch Freewheel Sprag (Outer Sprag)

32. Rear Ring Gear Freewheel Sprag (Inner Sprog)

33. Front Sun Gear

34. Forward Piston

35. Forward and Brake Piston Support

36. Forward and Brake Piston Return Spring

37. Forward ond Brake Piston Return

Spring Seat 38. Brake Piston

39. Rear Ring Gear Assembly

40. Broke Drive Plates (3) and Reactor Plates (2 Inner and 2 Outer)

41. Rear Planet Carrier Assembly (includes Output Shaft)

42. Transmission Case Bushing (Serviced)

43. Rear Oil Pump Gear Spocer

44. Rear Oil Pump Assembly 45. Rear Oil Pump Drive Pin

46. Vent Assembly

47. Oil Deflector

48. Transmission Extension

49. Oil Seal Assembly

50. Speedometer Driven Gear

51. Speedometer Drive Gear

52. Rear Oil Pump Bushing (Serviced)

53. Needle Thrust Bearing Assembly

54. Valve Body Assembly

55. Needle Bearing Assembly

56. Oil Pressure Tube (2)

57. Retainer Ring

58. Forward Clutch Drive Plates (4) and Reaction Plates (4)

59. Forward Clutch Pressure Plate

60. Retainer Ring

61. Needle Bearing Assembly

62. Needle Bearing Assembly and Race

63. Front Planet Carrier Thrust Washer

64. Reverse Clutch Reaction Insert

65. Reverse Rear Pressure Plate

66. Reverse Drive Plates (3) and Reaction Plates (2)

67. Reverse Front Pressure Plate (Selective)

68. Oil Pan

69. Oil Seal Rings

70. Stator Support Shaft (Part of Stator Support)

71. Second Turbine Shaft (Part of Front Ring Gear Hub)

72. Third Turbine Shaft (Part of Neutral Clutch Hub)

73. First Turbine Shaft (Port of First Turbine Assembly)

Google was able to extract the next from a jpg of the original, poorly printed version.

1959 Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint

1959 Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint

I think Alfas have always been my favorite cars, at least after I realized that the twelve cylinder Ferrari I lusted over was out of reach. I mean, I should have able to buy an Alfa, but people grow and change and it never happened.

Right now I could buy one, but I don't really have any time to spend on it. I'm busy blogging and anytime I need to go anywhere, I want a modern car suitable for the rugby scrum that is modern traffic. Don't worry, some people have the time:

The cars of the California Mille

The cars of the California Mille

Vehicle eligibility

The California Mille is open to any car that could have participated in the original Mille Miglia. We are seeking a variety of makes and types. Foreign and domestic manufacturers are welcome, but all cars must have been made prior to January 1, 1958. 

The event is limited to approximately 65-70 cars based on the availability of hotel reservations. To maintain the spirit of the Mille Miglia, we carefully choose cars that fit our requirements and specifications from each year’s group of applicants.

The California Mille is an annual historic and classic car tour inspired by the Mille Miglia, a former Italian open-road endurance race covering roughly 1000 miles from Brescia-to-Rome-to-Brescia and ran twenty-four times from 1927 to 1957.

Entry fee is $17 grand. Yeah, no thanks, I'm good.

1923 Ford vs 2023 Tesla

1923 Ford vs 2023 Tesla
SuperfastMatt

100 years seems like a perfect time to compare the old and new, even if I am three years late. I'm slowly getting adjusted to the idea of an electric car, but I'm still gonna wait until they come up with a better battery, one that doesn't weigh a thousand pounds and catch fire when it's unhappy.

Return of Powerglide

Why GM's CHEAPEST 2-Speed Was SECRETLY The Most INSANE Transmission Ever!
Muscle Car Masters

I've read many articles in car magazines disparaging GM's two-speed automatic transmission, the Powerglide, and here it has been reincarnated as the preferred transmission for drag racing. Who'd a thunk it?

Is it a problem if you don't notice it?

Problems experienced by original owners of three-year-old vehicles

Looking at this chart got me to wondering if it is accurate. Maybe we aren't looking at the actual number of problems, but the psychological profile of people who buy these cars. Maybe people who buy Volvos and Volkswagens are more particular about their cars, and people who buy Lexii are just oblivious. Or maybe people who drive Lexii have other things on their minds and can't be bothered with problems with their car.

1954 Ford Comète Monte Carlo

1954 Ford Comète Monte Carlo

California Bob sent me the link to an ad for this car. I wonder what he's thinking. It's kind of cool, and a little unusual:

The Comète was developed at the direction of new Ford SAF president, François Lehideux, who desired a new level of prestige for the French subsidiary of Ford Motor Company. Legideux pressed forward with the Comète independent of their American parent company in Dearborn and sought help from the most notable European automotive visionaries. The Comète combined the elegance of Farina design and the expertise of Facel coach work. The result: a car some have dubbed the most beautiful Ford ever produced. The V8 powered Comete was both large and expensive for the European market. The expensive production and French taxation system, that heavily penalized automobiles with engines larger than 2.0 liters, meant few examples were produced. 

Comète Interior

More pictures here. The engine is a V8, but it's a flathead, not an overhead valve. The four speed transmission is from a truck.

RADAR

Toyota Grill

Saw this car yesterday and noticed three little round things in the grill. You might need to embiggenate the image in order to see them. I'm wondering what they are and then I realize they are likely sensors for looking at the road ahead. Might be cameras, might be RADAR, might be mystical quantum doodads.

1935 Renault Celtaquatre by Ermell

1935 Renault Celtaquatre by Ermell

Renault made 44,000 of these cars between 1934 and 1938. The engine produced 34 horsepower. It sold for $1,100 when gold was $35 an ounce. In 1964 gold was still $35 an ounce and new American car cost $2,000, so this Renault was really cheap. In 1934 this Renault would have been worth two pounds of gold. Two pounds of gold today is worth about $100,000 which would allow you to have your pick of a new car.

Starfire

1955 Oldsmobile 98 Starfire Convertible

Toyota At War

What do You Think They're Doing With All Those Landcruisers?
Kagan Dunlap

Hilux - The Evolution of Revolution

Old Cars

Toyota Tundra Pickup Odometer

Iowa man took this photo when he changed the oil on his pick-em-up truck. He also sent me a link to the Top Speed article about the Tundra engine - the 4.7-Liter 2UZ-FE.

Our Mitsubishi Endeavor recently hit the 200,000 mile mark, and my Hyundai is over 150,000.

Park

Automatic Transmission Park Gear & Pawl

Masked men, presumably ICE agents, pulled two guys out of an Uber last week. Okay, that's ICE doing their job, or some cartel thugs doing theirs. But this is what caught my eye:

"They ordered her to unlock the doors, which the car did automatically when she put it in park. The agents then opened the back doors of the vehicle and ordered the men to get out."

Seems to me most cars will unlock the door when you open it from the inside. I've encountered a couple of cars where you had to specifically unlock the door before you could open it, but I don't think I've ever encountered a car that unlocked the doors automatically. Strikes me as the very opposite of safe. On the other hand, when I get out of the car and I go to get something out of the backseat, I have to unlock the doors and half the time I've already closed the driver's door so I have to open the driver's door back up, or I have to root around in my pocket for the stupid key fob.

Ask Google about this and I get this back:

Many modern cars can be programmed to automatically unlock doors when shifting to PARK, but it is not universal and depends on the vehicle's make, model, and settings. While some cars unlock upon shifting to Park, others only unlock when the engine is turned off or when the driver's door is opened. This feature is often configurable in the vehicle's infotainment settings menu. 

I suspect this is just another bit of marketing twerps trying to accommodate people who are not in tune with the mechanical world, i. e. the vast majority.

Agatha Christie’s Seven Dials - Netflix Series

Agatha Christie’s Seven Dials | Official Trailer | Netflix
Netflix

It's got the look and feel of nice, classic murder mystery, but the story is a bit clumsy.  We do have a cute girl playing the lead, and she drives a cool old car, a Lagonda:

1932 Lagonda 2 Litre

1932 Lagonda 2 Litre

This car looks a whole lot like the one in the show, though it's a little tough to tell, it only shows up on screen for a few seconds at a time. Ask Google to identify the car from a screenshot and it says it's a Blower Bently, i.e. James Bond's original car. I had a bit of a time sorting it out. In some scenes you see that the driver's door is cut down, but when you see the other side of the car the door full height. Nobody actually built cars, with different size doors, did they? As you can see from the photos, they did.  Anyway, it's not the correct car for the story, the show is set in 1920-25 and this one is from 1932.

There are a bunch of guns in this show. We have one scene where the swells, both men and women, are out shooting pheasants with shotguns, and they all seem to be competent enough. But then somebody gets killed (not by shotgun) and now one of the kids sends his butler out to procure a pistol. What kind of pistol does he want? 'One that shoots bullets with alacrity and has a stylish handle', just so we know the caliber of the people we are working with.

The story is that a man from Cameroon has invented a process that makes steel very much stronger, and all the European powers are competing for the rights to his patent.  Seems unlikely, but history is full of such unlikely stories, so I went looking for one that might be the basis for this. Found a variety of African-American inventors, and a couple from Cameroon, but nothing that sounded like it might have been earth-shaking, which is what we need for this story.

Cast

Actor	Surname	Title	Character	Surname
Mia	McKenna-Bruce	Lady	Eileen "Bundle"	Brent	Our girl
Edward	Bluemel		Jimmy	Thesiger	one of the boys
Iain	Glen	Lord		Caterham	deceased father of our girl
Martin	Freeman	Superintendent		Battle	Scotland Yard
Helena	Bonham Carter	Lady		Caterham	Our girl's mother
Hughie	O'Donnell		Bill	Eversleigh	one of the boys
Nyasha	Hatendi	Dr	Cyril	Matip	Inventor from Cameroon
Alex	Macqueen		George	Lomax	Engineer
Nabhaan	Rizwan		Ronny	Devereux	one of the boys
Corey	Mylchreest		Gerry	Wade	one of the boys, our girl is stricken with him
Dorothy	Atkinson	Lady	Maria	Coote	old biddie, deft hand with a shotgun
Mark Lewis	Jones	Sir	Oswald	Coote	old bat, deft hand with a shotgun
Tim	Preston		Rupert 'Pongo'	Bateman	Coote's butler
Ella-Rae	Smith		Loraine	Wade	Gerry's sister
Guy	Siner		Tredwell		Caterham's butler
Ella	Bruccoleri		Socks
Tristan	Gemmill	Doctor		Jackman
Liz	White		Emily
Josef	Davies		Alfred

3 episodes, one hour each.

There are some cool scenes, like this one of Barmouth Bridge.

Barmouth Bridge - Episode 3, just after the 20 minute mark.

Barmouth Bridge is a half-mile long, single-track wooden railway viaduct across the estuary of the River Mawddach built in 1867.

Barmouth Bridge

Barmouth Bridge location on the Irish Sea

The estuary is within Eryri National Park, also known as Snowdonia, which sounds like something out of a fairy tale.

Being as this is an Agatha Christie murder mystery, we have a giant, old English manor house.

Badminton House

Badminton House is the stand-in for the fictional Chimneys. This is also where we got badminton:

Whether or not the sport of badminton was re-introduced from British India or was invented during the hard winter of 1863 by the children of the eighth duke in the Great Hall (where the featherweight shuttlecock would not mar the life-size portraits of horses by John Wootton, as the tradition of the house has it), it was popularised at the house, hence the sport's name.

57 Chevy

Land of 10,000 Stories: Man drives $75 pickup to work for 38 years
KARE 11

Not everything is rotten in Minnesota. You may have heard about the ginormous Somali fraud investigation going on in Minnesota. I suspect most of the fraud is found in Minneapolis, not out in places like Prinsburg out in the western boondocks. Wikipedia has this to say about Prinsburg politics:

The last Republican candidate for president to receive less than 82% of the vote in Prinsburg was Gerald Ford in 1976.

Prinsburg Minnesota

Our best experimental mods all in one engine - what will happen?

Our best experimental mods all in one engine - what will happen?
Garage 54

These guys are always doing weird stuff, like putting wooden pistons in an engine. I have to give them credit for trying things. This one is a little more conventional, mostly just cleaning and rebuilding an engine. I'm not sure lightening the crank and flywheel really gained them anything, we aren't building a race car here, and I wonder what became of the crankshaft's balance. Whatever, it didn't seem to affect the engine that much. But the modifications to the camshaft (7:40 mark) is some real third world shit, like something you would see on MacGyver.

I can't listen to the audio, it's dubbed and it just grates. I turn off the audio and read the subtitles. There's a lot of filler, so I tend to skip ahead ten seconds at a time by using the right arrow key.

1969 Chrysler 300

1969 Chrysler 300

Glory days, 440 cubic inch V8 engine, automatic transmission, 19 feet long, 4300 pounds of Detroit Iron.

Ferrari/Maserati Engine That Lasted 5 Minutes - Quattroporte GTS - PT6

Ferrari/Maserati Engine That Lasted 5 Minutes - Quattroporte GTS - PT6
M539 Restorations

I don't understand why I watch some videos and some I quit after a couple of minutes. It's kind of like reading books. Sometimes I'll pick up a book and start reading it and it will just grab me and I can't put it down. More often I will read a bit and get bored and set it down.

I suppose this one sucked me in because we're on the track of a mystery. Near as I can make out, it was running on dirty oil that caused some minor damage that started the bearings down the slippery slope to failure. I wonder if analysis of the old oil might have revealed impending doom. But even if you were alerted, what a pain to pull the engine out of this car. He must have pulled a zillion bolts before he was able to examine the rod bearings.

Remind me never to buy a car with a turbocharger. Nice, fancy jet-age power, but stuffing one under the hood of most any car is going to make any repairs twice as difficult and twice as expensive.

2022 Ferrari 296 GTB

There might be another reason I watched this video and that is I was reading about Ferrari's merchandising business, how they make more off of Ferrari branded T-shirts and jackets than they do from selling cars, which prompted me to go look on E-bay where I typed in Ferrari and I got back a bunch of Ferrari automobiles. I was expecting the usual kind of E-Bay crap like coffee mugs and planters, but no, there were a bunch of Ferraris on there, and there was a very nice looking one in South Carolina for $20K which got me to thinking about buying one. That is a really stupid idea, I hope I don't fall for one of my whims.

Monster Truck in Cuba

TOYO TIRES | BJ Baldwin’s Recoil 4 in Cuba
Toyo Tire U.S.A. Corp

Real life crazy, as opposed to imaginary crazy. Of course, the story is just a fantasy put together like a movie. I wonder how much they had to pay el presidente.

24 Hours of LeMons

Arc Angel Christine Rotolo punished their inconsiderate driving by welding a pig to this team’s roof.

That is LeMons, the 24 hour race of $500 beaters, not Le Mans, the 24 hour race of zillion dollar cars held in France. view from the porch posts a link to the original Car & Driver report on the race.

It's a great story. I especially enjoyed this paragraph. 

FedEx ships cars? Yes they do:

Uh-oh. The race was little more than a week off, and having endured an exhausting battery of cognacs and terrines of fois gras in Northwest's business class on my return from Paris, I was in no mood to haul the Aurora across the country. Enter FedEx Custom Critical Passport Auto Transport, a branch of the big delivery company that ships cars coast to coast. Since fabulously expensive cars that compete at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Élégance have been shipped by FedEx, we felt comfortable handing over the keys to our Aurora. Plus, in return for this paltry plug, they ate the bill. After dripping oil in FedEx's pristine transporter for five days, the car arrived with two days to spare.

Previous post about LeMons.

Let's go for a drive

My hunt for the legendary KING of Tail of the Dragon...
VINwiki

The story is amusing, but the interesting part for me is the way he talks about driving and how much he enjoys it.

Tail of the Dragon Road
Upper left hand portion of the map is Tennessee, lower right hard portion is North Carolina

Tail of the Dragon website