1956 Crown Victoria shifter

1

1929Towncar

Junior Member
Hi All.
I am trying to help a friend of my dads who has a ‘56 Crown that the bushings and maybe the rod itself are worn out on the rod from Steering column to transmission. Automatic trans. It won’t bring the trans all the way to park. He has used the emergency brake to hold it and tries to park on the level etc. but would like to fix it so it’s right. Thoughts on sources for the bushings top and bottom? Any thoughts about putting a modern cable in place of the rod? Any help appreciated. He’s in his mid 80’s and wants to use the car when warm weather returns. Thanks from Maine. Rick.
 
I just replaced those bushings on my '55. Mine is a 3 on the tree, but I'm pretty sure the bushings are the same, just two of them on a 3 speed car as opposed to one for an automatic. That's the first place I'd look to address the problem you describe. I got my bushing kit from Obsolete Ford Parts at Nashville GA. I would expect any of the old Ford parts houses to have them. It'll take five minutes to remove the cotter pin and flat washer that attaches the linkage to the shifter arm on the column to see if the bushing is worn out. If that's the problem, and I'm almost certain it is, it'll take five minutes to put in a new bushing.
 
The rubber bushings for manual transmission cars are still available from many of the popular repro parts suppliers. Once upon a time, they had the bushing for Ford-O-Matics also, but not anymore, and it has been a few years now that those are no longer stocked by anybody. I've got a catalog issued in 2017 that doesn't have them.
I replaced the one in my '55 Courier in 1998, so they still had them then.
You would think that they would be same as the ones for manual xmission, but I believe that the manual xmission bushings are a bit smaller.
The one in my '55 Fairlane is about shot now and I started looking for a new one a couple years back. Tempted now to make one out of modified nylon washers with steel washers on both sides of the lever. Mine will still engage in all detents, so I'm not up against a rock and a hard place yet.
 
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