Technical How do you drive with Borg Warner overdrive?

I installed one in my 56 Chev pickup in the early 70's with a 3.90 rear. Used a cable for the lock out and engage and a toggle on my Hurst floor shift. Even thou you are advised to not use 1st over, sometimes if I was next to some foreign car like an E Jag I would make it a 6 speed by splitting every gear. Man did I get some looks. The engine was a warmed up 283 with a Rochester fuel injection with just a little whistle at idle and I had no trouble keeping up with traffic.

 

That is one fly in the ointment... Some electronic ignitions won't like you shorting the coil to ground like that for 'kickdown'. You'd really need to ask the manufacturer of your specific ignition for the best way to interrupt power. Worst case, installing another relay with the OEM circuit controlling the relay and the relay opening some part of the ignition circuit should work.

It's really a shame these fell out of favor, as they're probably the best overdrive transmission ever made in terms of ease of use and fuel economy. My understanding is two factors led to their demise; one, some OEM manufacturers didn't like the lack of engine braking; they had liability concerns and semi-discouraged their use. And two, the transmissions were somewhat fragile but B-W was very reluctant to upgrade them to keep pace with the increasing power of OEM motors, particularly in view the decreasing use of them. Just like with the B-W T-10; B-W didn't upgrade those until after Ford, GM, and Chrysler came out with their own 4-speeds and they were forced to develop the 'Super T-10' or face losing the market share they managed to keep.

At one time, you could buy a conversion kit to install the OD unit behind T-10s and Muncie 4-speeds (I never saw a Ford toploader kit, but they may have existed) but these used the rare heavy-duty 4 pinion OD units, not the common 3 pinion units so I would suspect that not many were ever sold.

 

I have a R10 unit out of a 1954 Savoy I mounted in my 1948 Dodge w. fluid drive. I hooked it up exactly as Chrysler did for these cars in beginning of the 50's factory set up, except for the kickdown switch; Since my carb did not had bracket etc for the kickdown I put it in dash regular push button just for mock up to get to test the drive gear ASAP.
Well, I instantly learned that driving this old boat with the plenty low rev torque I will very seldom need to touch the kickdown, thus the push button is still on the dash.
I've told this dozen times before, but once more won't hurt: The R10 OD is by far the best improvement one can imagine for 40's-50's era car. It made mine a dream to drive! With the fluid drive it's a perfect marriage.
In town I never need to manually shift after pulling in the 2nd. 2ndOD will swich automatically when I let the pedal up for a half second. When I need to slow down it shifts down to reg.2nd so smooth you can only tell when you hear solenoid click off. The same driving on road with 3rd, reg.3rd is low enough for accelerating, 3rdOD gets me 65mph at high mpg & low engine noise. Again, when I need to slow down or accelerate the governor controls the solenoid automatically, I do not need anything but the gas pedal.

I know some people have moved the kickdown button in the end of the gear shift stick and I also made a custom shift knob and mounted a push button inside it, but I never get to wire it for my ride, since I currently feel it will not do much good in practice - I simply do not have any need to use the kickdown... Seldom in very steep hill when I have to slow down du to slow traffic or so...

I do have the manual cable for locking the OD off mechanically, of course, but I have never had need to use it.

 

I don't know all the applications, but in my 55 bird the O/D kickdown happened a full throttle. There was a bell crank (for lack of a better term) on the manifold, and the foot throttle connected to it, and a second rod from it to the carb. The second rod had an internal spring arrangement. You went to full throttle, and with more pressure (you could feel it) you pushed thru it. It lengthened, and let the throttle pedal push the kickdown switch (floor mounted, under the pedal) without over stressing the carb itself. I don't know where you'd find one now, last I looked they weren't being reproduced. I rarely used it, I had a dash switch to drop out the O\D if I saw the need coming, or downshifted to 2nd over.

 

If your refering to the repro foot switch, follow the link below

http://www.macsautoparts.com/ford_t...erbird-overdirve-kickdown-switch-1955-59.html

Oldmics

 

I just bought a 56 F-100 with factory overdrive and it really is a cool transmission how it works. My overdrive works great...my one questions is, is it safe to push or pull the lever while the vehicle is moving? I can see why you would have it engaged all the time, but say I wanted to disengage the overdrive. Should I come to a complete stop first?

Also, does it do harm to lug the unit in OD? Not that I have, but lets say you are climbing a hill and it does not kick out...will it hurt it? The truck has a 223 6 shooter by the way

 

I moved my GM at times. Since mine was set up with a toggle and not factory it was not a problem. If I wanted to lock it out while driving I'd make sure to be accelerating slightly in high gear so it would not be in any free wheeling mode. Going the other way could happen at anytime since I used a toggle to engage it.
I used 2nd OD a lot when climbing in hills and never had problem. I had a tach and never ever let it under 2000 rpm in 2nd OD; as it started slowing on a grade I'd flip the toggle back into standard 2nd and pull the cable to hold it there to keep it from free wheel. Sounds complicated but for me it wssn't

 

Yes, don't know the exact reason but that's what I've always been told.

 

Glad I found this thread.. Hope all you fellas are well and enjoying your old iron.. My 3 speed trans started jumping out of 3rd above 50 MPH so I figured it was time to do something. With the price of gas these days, I'm trying to get better economy from my DD so I found and installed a Muncie SM 319 with BW R-10 OD tailshaft.. Hoping it works out well in my '66 GMC w 250 6 banger.. I don't have all the parts yet but I do have a lockout cable. The governor and solenoid appear to be in good working order. Can I just run power to the solenoid and a jumper from there to the governor and actuate the overdrive that way? I'll be getting the other parts eventually, but I want to verify the trans and OD is working before buying the rest of those parts.

 

I have thought of wiring an Eaton 2 speed switch into the system .

 

I had a Saginaw 4 speed that I adapted to the OD in a 37 Chevy Pu with a GMC 302..Had just a switch on the shifter...Normally kept the OD locked out to avoid the freewheeling...I played around with splitting the gears bit it was no real advantage for my truck.
Those old Macks B's with the Thermodyne had a very narrow powerband so they needed so many gears...I drove old gas 10 wheel dumps that also needed compound gearboxes....

 

not really....the solenoid has a power input and gets ground from the housing, and the governor only grounds the terminal when it gets to speed. You need to switch power, and the governor won't do that.

On the Edsel, I used a horn relay to overcome this problem. pretty simple.

 

The two-spd rears with the electric shifter in medium trucks are pretty easy to shift, if you do it right lol- but many of the old trucks had a plate riveted to the dash with instructions. The older REOs and such had a vacuum shifter (lever on the dash) and were also pretty easy. Some also had vacuum wipers, so if you were climbing a steep hill with your foot in it, the wipers could stop, so you had to let off the throttle for a second so the wipers could take a couple swipes- tons a fun

 

In the summer of ‘99 I bought a Muncie 319 from Jack Halton, past President of Inliners, International. He wrote up a diagram of how he worked the overdrive. The diagram (obviously no electrical background) above is one I wrote up for a few friends I have helped along the way. The neat deviation from stock is the ‘OVERDRIVE INDICATOR LIGHT’ that automatically turns on when the Governor reaches the Overdrive cut in speed.

Key question for Mr. D’Monsta is: “What is your ‘66 GMC truck rear end ratio? 4.57, 4.11, 3.73? Any ratio higher (lower numerically) probably would not be worth it, although tire/wheel size does factor into the decision.

I have successfully driven my truck with a 3.90 rear over 120k miles in this configuration, 15 years as a dd/only vehicle, many 1k trips.

 

Lotsa good information thus far.

Borg Warner, starting in the 1930s through the 1960s, made three very different transmissions, either with and without overdrive.

T96 - light duty 4-bolt top cover, used in Jeeps and Studebaker Champion cars, among others. R10 3-pinion overdrive unit.

T86 - medium duty 6-bolt top cover, used in Studebaker pickups and V8 cars, as well as many other cars and trucks of the era. Also used the R10 OD.

Both the T96 and T86 were available with top shifters; usually found in Jeeps and Studebaker M-series pickups.

T85 - heavy duty side cover, used in larger Studebakers, Ford, Mopar, some GMs. R11 4-pinion OD. The T85 was the progenitor of the T10 4-speed. And yes, Tom Beatty made an aluminum casting and a long tailshaft to mount the R11 overdrive behind the T10. I have the last unit he made and sold; its a Chevy/GM case with a long tailshaft Ford R11 overdrive. and a Hurst shifter.

As some have mentioned, whether splitting the gears is of benefit depends upon whether it's a car or a truck transmission. A little-known fact is Borg Warner offered truck versions of the T86, called a T90 and of the T85, called the T89. Both of these have lower first and second gears, so there is a wide enough gap between second and third, so second overdrive actually makes it into a useful five-speed, whereas as previously mentioned, in the car versions, second OD is so close to third direct, it's not worth the effort. The truck cases are the same as the car, so it's necessary to pull the cover to confirm. The truck versions have a straight-cut low-reverse slider gear, while the car versions have a beveled gear.

jack vines

 

Man time flies! Seems like yesterday since Jim was playing around with this one.

 

The overdrive unit was designed to be used in high gear only. Therefor limiting the torque you put through it. So… how you use it depends a lot on how you drive it and how much engine you have in front of it….and to a lessser amount your rear gear and weight of the vehicle.
Like mentioned there are two basic overdrive units, the R-10 and R-11, with the later being the heavier of the two. Lots of times you will see the planetary gears stripped in these overdrive units, this is usually a result of using the overdrive in a lower gear with some horsepower in front or popping the clutch in a lower gear. Giving the overdrive a bad rep. If used properly, the overdrive unit will last the life of the car. But some folks can tear up a steel ball with a rubber hammer!
I have a three speed top loader with a R-10 in a 1960 van with a 200 cubic inch six and a 4:11 rear end. Wired up my way and it drove great, with zero problems!

Cole-Hersee used to offer that special overdrive switch, not sure if they still do. I bought several back in the day from them.


Bones

 

After munching the planetary roller bearings in the Edsel OD, I went easy on the Hudson, didn't have any trouble with it. Another thing that I thought of later was that the Edsel did not have the factory OD rear gear ratio, it was 3.55, while the Hudson had 4.56. That might have something to do with the loading on the OD planetaries.

 

great piece on the fordification site, "the borg-warner overdrive transmission explained." one of the coolest things is you can drive around town in second. since the rearend is geared low, start up in 2nd direct, lift your foot and it shifts into second over.

 

I'm running two of them, one in my roadster with a flathead and one in my '47 with a 331 Caddy. Both are wired the same, no governor or kickdown, just the solenoid powered with a relay and a push/pull switch on the dash. I usually just shift into overdrive after I'm in third, and up to speed, but for quicker acceleration I'll shift into overdrive after winding second out. Both are R-10's and have been tough, I've sheared the input shaft in both cars but the overdrives were both fine. I still shift with the clutch even when it freewheels.

 

I learned to drive in a 61 Willys two wheel drive wagon with a BW overdrive
very kool
I have an OD in my 29 Roadster with a 41 Lincoln Zephyr 3 speed and a BW OD
I am in the process of making it work.
Needs a relay and wired
I found that Vintage Auto Garage sells all the parts and manuals.

 

I had an R10 in a '37 Chevy coupe with a 235 w/ stock '37 3-speed trans. The OD was enabled/disabled with 2 push/pull cables (like choke cables). Got it up to over 25mph, let off the gas and pushed one cable in and the other out to engage.

Had to come to a complete stop to disengage (opposite pulls on the 2 cables).

Only big PITA was I had to remember to disengage the OD before going into reverse.

Drove that '37 all over the country for the 30 years I owned it, thousands of miles, with no problems.

 

This is under the heading:

I Did It Because I Thought It Was Cool (but then thought better of it)

I disconnected the governor and ran the Muncie 319 as a 6 speed: first gear, first overdrive, second gear, second overdrive third gear, third overdrive. It was fun and I did it just to prove to myself and my confused passengers that it could be done.

"I've got six forward gears and a Virginia overdrive, I'm taking little white pills and my eyes are open wide, I just passed a Gimmy and a White, I've been passing everything in sight, Six Days On The Road and I'm gonna make it home tonight." Lyrics stolen and altered w/o permission.

1st 2.85
1st od 1.995 (2.85 x .7)
2nd 1.68
2nd od 1.176 (1.68 x .7)
3rd 1.00
3rd od .70

I changed it back to using the Governor because of the danger in forgetting to engage the lock out when going into reverse. My best advice is for those of you out there with these transmission, please use the Governor.

 

You can take the trans out of overdrive (push the lever) buy making it down shift and then pull the lever when moving.

 

I thought the same thing; that the OEMs would use a pretty low rear axle ratio. But the '60 Ford Galaxie I recently bought for parts (352 4V/T85 w/OD) came from the factory with 3.56 rear gears according to the data plate. That translates into a Bonneville-like 2.49 final drive ratio in OD...

 

But that was a big block car with the R11, which is quite a bit stronger than the R10.

Thanks for the data point...interesting

 

This car appeared to have been special ordered. A 2 dr sedan, the big motor w/OD, radio delete, the bottom-of-the-line one knob heater, and a clock. If I had to guess, I'd say this was some sort of law enforcement order. There are a bunch of non-factory holes drilled in the bottom lip of the dash (police radio?). No sign of a antennae though, although the car was repainted a few times so it may have been filled.

One other interesting feature I hadn't seen before. Rather than have the OD cable under the dash, this one is in it. Has a chrome 'Overdrive' bezel and knob matching the other dash knobs.

At a conservative 4500 RPM, that axle ratio gives a calculated 145 MPH top end....

 

https://www.enginebuildermag.com/20...org-warners-r-10r-11-overdrive-transmissions/

 

If you have an interest, attached is an article that describes how to wire a splitter for six speed operation. I did do this, also attached is the control panel (fun winter project). Actually, I don't use the OD function, I have a modified 348 in my truck (1957 Chevy NAPCO) with 3:38 gears, and it gets along just fine with the normal 3 speed functionality. But it is nice to know I could use it if i want.
don

 

That must have been a Truckstell 101 ... talking with maybe ten people who have or had one, only two had reliable service.
And I never met an old mechanic who didn't give you a dirty look if you asked them to help.