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Old Engines Are Cool, but New Transmissions Rule
There’s a lot to like about vintage engines. Just the sheer fact that it isn’t a small-block Chevy is enough to inspire many hot rodders. Now, don’t get us wrong; the small-block Chevrolet is nothing less than awesome, but it is also the default engine of most hot rodders. Often, there is no thought involved as many rodders simply want the 350/350 treatment. That’s probably fine for most hot rodders, but there has been a real resurgence in putting vintage motors in vintage hot rods, and we love the concept. The Oldsmobile, Cadillac, Buick Nailhead and Hemi are all great candidates for powering a vintage hot rod. Parts are still available for most of these engines, some being tougher to find than others. A surprising amount of speed equipment survives for these engines, too, and companies like Offenhauser still produce a lot of vintage speed equipment.
Once you rebuild your vintage powerplant and dress it up with great speed goodies, you must connect it to a vintage transmission, and that’s where things get tough. Many vintage motors have the bell housing cast as part of the engine block. This makes it very difficult to adapt a modern transmission to these vintage engines. Early Hemi engines and Oldsmobile engines are just two examples of this style of engine block. There have been adapter plates available for over 50 years to mate these engines to the likes of a ’39 Ford transmission or even a later four-speed, but for a modern automatic transmission, the selection was almost nonexistent.
One of the cars in our staff fleet is my ’57 Ford Ranch Wagon, which is powered by nothing less than a ground-pounding 312 Y-block sporting three deuces and a pair of very pretty T-bird valve covers. The engine runs great and looks even better, but it was coupled to a T35 manual overdrive transmission. The overdrive worked intermittently, and first gear was so high that it took forever to get up to speed. As a matter of fact, performance was so poor that we contemplated pulling the engine and going with a late-model engine and transmission. Then, we adapted a modern AOD to the engine, and suddenly, the car was quick off the line and a pleasure on the highway. The Y-block remains, and we have the modern convenience of an automatic overdrive transmission. While we were singing the praises of this great combination—early motor, modern tranny—we discovered a shortage of adapters for some other engine and tranny combinations. But like most things involving vintage hot rodding, the interest is growing, and companies are filling the needs of hot rodders everywhere.
One such company is Tanson Enterprises in Sacramento, California (916/448-2950). These good folks will modify a transmission case to mate to your early 303ci Oldsmobile engine (among others). They can supply you with either a 350 Turbo, 400 Turbo or a 700R4 that will simply bolt to your vintage engine, but only after considerable surgery to the transmission case. When your transmission arrives, all you need to do is bolt the transmission to your engine using the flywheel, flywheel adapter and torque converter. It’s really that simple.
What Tanson Enterprises actually does is shorten the bell housing portion of the modern transmission to a common size that will mate to the rear of the vintage engine. Then, a thick aluminum plate is welded to the transmission flange so that it will bolt to the Oldsmobile engine, along with aluminum tubular bosses for the bolts. Then, a machined adapter permits the use of a flexplate on the early crankshaft; the converter is then bolted in place, followed by the modified transmission. After that, you have the joys of an early motor and a modern transmission. Add an appropriate transmission cooler, shifter and driveshaft, and you’re ready for some happy motoring on the open road. Follow along as we show you the installation on Gary Moore’s Oldsmobile and 350 Turbo combination that is slated to go in his ’27 roadster.
