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Ultramatic
Ultramatic was the trademarked name of the Packard Motor Car Company's automatic transmission introduced in 1949 and produced until 1954, at Packard's Detroit, Michigan, East Grand Boulevard factory. It was produced thereafter from late 1954, thru 1956 at the new Packard "Utica" Utica, Michigan facility. 1935–1948: Development Packard's Ultramatic transmission was the creation of the company's chief engineer Forest McFarland and his engineering team. The magnitude of this accomplishment is illustrated by the fact that it was the only automatic transmission developed and produced solely by an independent automaker, with no outside help. Devices like the Ultramatic were being tested and designed by Packard from 1935 on, but none satisfied the perfectionist engineer. The Ultramatic's development was halted, as was all automotive work during World War II, but resumed in earnest during 1946. After World War II, Packard's range had contracted to variants of the mid-priced Clipper l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Packard
Packard (formerly the Packard Motor Car Company) was an American luxury automobile company located in Detroit, Michigan. The first Packard automobiles were produced in 1899, and the last Packards were built in South Bend, Indiana, in 1958. One of the "Three Ps" – alongside Peerless Motor Company and Pierce-Arrow – the company was known for building high-quality luxury automobiles before World War II. Owning a Packard was considered prestigious, and surviving examples are often found in museums and automobile collections. Packard vehicles featured innovations, including the modern steering wheel, air-conditioning in a passenger car, and one of the first production 12-cylinder engines, adapted from developing the Liberty L-12 engine used during World War I to power warplanes. During World War II, Packard produced 55,523 units of the two-stage/two-speed supercharger equipped Merlin V-12s engines under contract with Rolls-Royce. Packard also made the versions of the Li ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Packard Patrician
The Packard Patrician is an automobile which was built by the Packard Motor Car Company of Detroit, Michigan, from model years 1951 through 1956. During its six years in production, the Patrician was built in Packard's Detroit facilities on East Grand Boulevard. The word " patrician" is Latin for a ruling class in Ancient Rome. It was the last "senior level" Packard until production ended in 1958. The Patrician was the last of the "senior Packards" and was briefly available as an extended length limousine for 1953 and 1954 called the Corporate Executive which found few buyers. __TOC__ 1951–1952 In 1951 and 1952, the automaker attempted to use a numeric naming structure that designated Packard's least expensive models as Packard 200 and 200 Deluxe while two-door hardtop and convertibles were designated Packard 250 and its mid-range sedan the Packard 300. The highest trim level available was the Packard Patrician 400 [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
American Motors Corporation
American Motors Corporation (AMC; commonly referred to as American Motors) was an American automobile manufacturing company formed by the mergers and acquisitions, merger of Nash-Kelvinator Corporation and Hudson Motor Car Company on May 1, 1954. At the time, it was the largest corporate merger in U.S. history. American Motors' most similar competitors were those automakers that held similar annual sales levels, such as Studebaker, Packard, Kaiser Motors, and Willys-Overland. Their largest competitors were the Big Three (automobile manufacturers), Big Three—Ford Motor Company, Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler. American Motors' production line included Compact car, small cars—the Rambler American, which began as the Nash Rambler in 1950, AMC Hornet, Hornet, AMC Gremlin, Gremlin, and AMC Pacer, Pacer; intermediate car, intermediate and full-size car, full-sized cars, including the AMC Ambassador, Ambassador, Rambler Classic, AMC Rebel, Rebel, and AMC Matador, Matador; musc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Packard Caribbean
The Packard Caribbean is a full-sized luxury car that was made by the Packard, Packard Motor Car Company of Detroit, Michigan, during model years 1953 through 1956. Some of the Caribbean's styling was derived from the Packard Pan-American, Pan American Packard show car of the previous year. Available only as a convertible from 1953 until 1955 with a hardtop model added in its final year of 1956. Development The domestic "Big Three" automakers were developing "quasi-custom" models. Marketers at the time described them as a "sports car, which usually meant anything with a convertible top, lots of performance, a few unique styling touches, and top-of-the-line price tag. The image of Packard automobiles during the early 1950s was "perceived as stodgy and old-fashioned." Packard needed a "halo car to cast a modern glow on the marque." The company prepared a concept car, the Packard Pan-American, earning positive reception at auto shows during 1952. The Caribbean was introduced for the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Packard Executive
The Packard Executive was an automobile produced by the Packard-Clipper Division of the Studebaker-Packard Corporation in 1956. It was built to fill a perceived price gap between other Packard models. The cars extremely short production year was caused by the closure of the Detroit factory, where it was built, in June 1956. Introduction The Packard Executive was introduced on March 5, 1956 to fill a perceived price gap between the prestige Packard Patrician line and the new Clipper marque, which was in its first year as a separate marque. In previous years, Clipper models had been Packards. The most expensive Clipper, the Clipper Custom, listed at $3,065 for the 4-door sedan. The Packard Executive sedan retailed for $3,465, the Executive 2-door coupe $3,560, while the top-of-the-line Patrician sedan sold for $4,160. The Executive was marketed with the invitation to “enter the luxury car class now—at a modest investment,” and was aimed at "the young man on the way up." ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nash Ambassador
The Nash Ambassador is a luxury automobile produced by Nash Motors from 1927 until 1957. It was a top trim level for the first five years, then from 1932 on a standalone model. Ambassadors were lavishly equipped and beautifully constructed, earning them the nickname "the Kenosha Duesenberg". Between 1929 and 1934, Nash produced a line of seven-passenger saloons and limousines; the Ambassador series was the automaker's "flagship#Automobiles, flagship" car. This distinction remained following the Nash-Hudson Motor Car Company, Hudson merger in 1954 that formed the American Motors Corporation (AMC). The ongoing use of the Ambassador model name by Nash, and then its successor AMC through the 1974 model year, made it "one of the longest-lived automobile nameplates in automotive history" as of the late 1970s. 1927-early 1932 Nash Motors' first use of the name Ambassador was during the 1927 model year when a specially trimmed four-door, five-passenger club Sedan (automobile), se ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hudson Hornet
''For the NASCAR car, see Fabulous Hudson Hornet.'' The Hudson Hornet is a full-size car manufactured by Hudson Motor Car Company of Detroit, Michigan from 1951 until 1954, when Nash-Kelvinator and Hudson merged to form American Motors Corporation (AMC). Hudson automobiles continued to be marketed under the Hudson brand name through the 1957 model year. The first-generation Hudson Hornets featured a functional "step-down" design with dropped floor pan and a chassis with a lower center of gravity than contemporary vehicles that helped the car handle well — an advantage for racing. The Hornet's lower and sleeker look was accentuated by streamlined styling, sometimes called " ponton" styling. Following the merger forming AMC in 1954, Hudson cars were built on the newer factory assembly line for Nash Statesman/Ambassador unibody chassis; therefore, all second-generation Hudson Hornets were restyled Nash automobiles that were badge engineered as Hudsons. First generati ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Torque Converter
A torque converter is a device, usually implemented as a type of fluid coupling, that transfers rotating power from a prime mover, like an internal combustion engine, to a rotating driven load. In a vehicle with an automatic transmission, the torque converter connects the prime mover to the automatic gear train, which then drives the load. It is thus usually located between the engine's flexplate and the transmission. The equivalent device in a manual transmission is the mechanical clutch. A torque converter serves to increase transmitted torque when the output rotational speed is low. In the fluid coupling embodiment, it uses a fluid, driven by the vanes of an input impeller, and directed through the vanes of a fixed stator, to drive an output turbine in such a manner that torque on the output is increased when the output shaft is rotating more slowly than the input shaft, thus providing the equivalent of an adaptive reduction gear. This is a feature beyond what a simple fl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John DeLorean
John Zachary DeLorean ( ; January 6, 1925 – March 19, 2005) was an American engineer, inventor, and executive in the U.S. automobile industry. He is widely known as founder of the DeLorean Motor Company, as well as for his work at General Motors. DeLorean managed the development of several vehicles throughout his career, including the Pontiac GTO, Pontiac Firebird, Pontiac Grand Prix, Chevrolet Cosworth Vega, and DMC DeLorean, which was featured in the 1985 film ''Back to the Future''. He was the youngest division chief in General Motors history, then left to start the DeLorean Motor Company (DMC) in 1973. Production delays meant that DMC's first car did not reach the consumer market until 1981, when a depressed buying market was compounded by lukewarm reviews from critics and the public. After a year, the DeLorean had failed to recover its $175 million investment costs, unsold cars accumulated, and the company was in financial trouble. In October 1982, DeLorean was charged wit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Automatic Transmission
An automatic transmission (AT) or automatic gearbox is a multi-speed transmission (mechanics), transmission used in motor vehicles that does not require any input from the driver to change forward gears under normal driving conditions. The 1904 Sturtevant "horseless carriage gearbox" is often considered to be the first true automatic transmission. The first mass-produced automatic transmission is the General Motors ''Hydramatic'' two-speed hydraulic automatic, which was introduced in 1939. Automatic transmissions are especially prevalent in vehicular drivetrains, particularly those subject to intense mechanical acceleration and frequent idle/transient operating conditions; commonly commercial/passenger/utility vehicles, such as buses and waste collection vehicles. Prevalence Vehicles with internal combustion engines, unlike electric vehicles, require the engine to operate in a narrow range of rates of rotation, requiring a gearbox, operated manually or automatically, to drive t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chrysler PowerFlite Transmission
PowerFlite is a two-speed automatic transmission engineered and produced by the Chrysler Corporation and used in their passenger cars from 1954 to 1961. Production began in late 1953 and the simple and durable PowerFlite remained available on Plymouths and Dodges through the 1961 model year. Background Chrysler was the last of Detroit's Big Three automakers to introduce a fully automatic transmission, some 14 years after General Motors had introduced Oldsmobile's Hydramatic automatic transmission and nearly three years after Ford's Ford-O-Matic. Packard's Ultramatic debuted in 1949, and Studebaker's Automatic Drive was introduced in 1950. The PowerFlite was lighter and simple in its construction and operation, with fewer parts than competing transmissions. It was also durable, being used behind every Chrysler Corporation engine from the Plymouth Six to the Imperial's Hemi V8. Chrysler introduced a three-speed TorqueFlite automatic in 1956, but the two-speed PowerFlite ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
