borg-warner overdrive

P

Peyton

Senior Member
What would cause the BW o/d to totally lock up rendering a car inoperable. I once owned a Studebaker Champ which totally locked up in gear. Sold the car for $50 to a mechanically inclined friend who fixed the car and sold it for $100. How could the car have been fixed cheaply. I saw the car operating for years after. This happened more than 50 years ago.

I've heard of this happening in the Ford world also. Any thoughts out there about this?
 
On the Stude column shift you need to have the two rods to the ****** properly adjusted or the column can lock in gear. This is a very quick and easy fix. I've never had a problem with the Studebaker overdrive or ******, but when you use the B/W overdrive on the Model A driveshaft you have to be sure it's locked out of overdrive before shifting into reverse, or you can cause severe damage. This is taken care of automatically when the overdrive is coupled to the ******, as the factory built it.
 
I remember a kind of grinding/ grating noise when trying to get the car in reverse. It would not get out of first gear. It's possible that it would have been low on lubricant as I was completely ignorant about maintenance then and broke. Too bad because the Stude was one of the best cars I've owned.

The 56 Chevy, stick V8, o/d that followed the Stude was a real "dog"! Ten mpg, slow, and a real oil burner.
 
"The 56 Chevy, stick V8, o/d that followed the Stude was a real "dog"! Ten mpg, slow, and a real oil burner."

Payton,

I had a '57 Chevy V-8 w/automatic transmission in 1958. One of the best cars I ever had. Never knew what the gas mileage was. With gas going at 25 cents/gal., we didn't worry about it.

David Serrano
 
I put a rebuilt 1956 265 and overdrive into my 1955 Chevy, and never could get more than 17 MPG, and the same thing with my 1962 Chevy 283 with overdrive. 18 on the freeway was the very best either one could do. My Studebakers got 28 MPG with overdrive while on the freeway. Fuel mileage always mattered to me, and I wanted to drive for a penny a mile or less. Of course that can't happen anymore with our high gas prices.
 
Thanks all. I did a similar post to the AACA Studebaker forum and was told that
the problem was a stuck shift solenoid. Sounds reasonable to me. And I must confess that the 56 Chevy was on its last leg --- not a fair comparison to the Stude.
 
I had a '57 Chevy with OD. The previous owner had loaded the trans with 2.2:1 Corvette
gears and a 4.56 rear. All the original controls worked. If I shifted from 1st to 1st OD then 2nd, 3rd and 3rd OD It gave me 5 equally spaced gears. With the high first gear it would pull 40 to 45 mph in first more than enough to shift into OD. Kick down passing gear was great. This was at a time where 4 speeds were just becoming known in American cars.
 
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