I’ve acquired a1954 Kaiser Darrin with a 1956 324 Olds 98 engine and Hydra-Matic. The tranny serial number starts with 0-56. According to my Olds manual, this indicates a Jetaway which was new for ‘56 but the floorshifter only moves to four detents. This would indicate a regular Hydra-Matic according to my research. With the pan off, I can see a detent on each end of the four detents that the linkage currently engages but the shift lever touches the fiberglass floorboard disallowing the pin to engage these two detents. The PO ran it like this from 1963, when he bought the car, until 1970 when he parked it. Maybe I shouls leave well enough alone. Any thoughts? Thanks, Steve
The Jetaway has a flat pan, the hydro has a side pan. The jetaway gets rubbished but they aren't that bad a transmission, pricey to rebuild though.
1956 up Jetaway, single bottom pan 1946-56 Hydramatic a side pan and a bottom pan O56 Jetaway R54 1954 DR HM, R55 a 1955 or 1956 Dual Range Hydramatic. - See my avatar, a Hydramatic cutaway
Here is our Darrin on the lift in our shop. My original post suggested that only 4 of the 6 detents were being used due to limited travel of the shifter. The first photo shows the detent bracket. Am I missing something? Steve
That's an incredible find! Is the Olds/auto the original engine or was it swapped in? I understand they came with several different combinations. At last year's Ironstone Concourse we were parked next to the Kaiser Group, two Darrins showed up, both white with red interiors. Very cool cars.
Carl is correct except about six that Dutch Darrin sold with Cadillac V8’s after Kaiser went belly up. Our Darrin had the Olds installed sometime before 1963 and it is a really cobbled up affair. We got it from a garage in the Sierra Nevada foothills in north-eastern California where it had sat since 1970. Steve
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