A Fiat 850 - Automatic!!! - in the U.S??!!!!

How does that work, then?

Budgie

Sounds like a pre-selector gearbox, although I didn't know Fiat ever used them.

The gear changing is similar to an automatic gearbox, but under manual control. Rather than sliding dogs, there are brake bands and epicyclic gearsets. Moving the lever moves a cam, but the bands don't actually move and change gear until you press the pedal. Large pre-selectors ('50s English) used a "fluid flywheel" (like a torque convertor, but without the torque multiplication), small ones may have had a simple plate clutch, also worked by the pedal. Renault even had one with an electric clutch.

Aah - then presumably the seller means "one pedal in addition to the accelerator" rather than just the one pedal in total?

I know I once had a DS21 Pallas with one pedal (accelerator) and a button in the floor for the brakes. Never went wrong (thanks be . . !)

Budgie

Cars with pre-selector boxes had three pedals - accelerator, brake and gearchange pedal. The drive either went through a fluid flywheel or a centrifugal clutch unless it was in a racing car where the drive could be taken up on the 1st gear brake band. Wouldn't fancy that on a road car though. This Fiat sounds as though it is either some disabled conversion or something like a Lockheed Manumatic (?) where pressure on the gearchange knob (IIRC) worked the clutch for gearchanging purposes. Or it might have been some strange Italian version of an electrically controlled gearbox on the lines of Cotal (unlikely) or even the Smiths Queasydrive.

Ron Robinson

There were plenty of two-pedal pre-selectors, most with a manual button on the gearstick, but I'm sure I recall once driving something European that used a light touch on the brake pedal to do it. I have a feeling it was a Fiat Noddy car (the '70s Topolino), and I think those were built out of 850 running gear.

This _is_ a Fiat 850, which is only two steps up from a clockwork mouse. There are all sorts of foul clutch lash-ups you can contrive when there's minimal torque.

Mind you, I did once reach 130mph in an Abarth-tweaked Fiat 600. I was wearing a helmet to keep the noise down, as much as anything! The 850 Spyder was a good looking car too - I wonder what you could do by tuning or re-engining one of those ?

the clutch is on the gear lever: translated by google: IDROCONVERT

Semi-automatic Tansmission consisted a torque converter, a hydraulically-operated clutch, a normal gear box and a servomechanism which actuates by electromechanical way a drawer valve ordering disengaging hydraulically. The servo of the clutch is actuated by means of a switch located on the gear shift lever.

Thanks to the multiplication of the engine torque to the low mode, the torque converter makes it possible to start even on the higher reports/ratios.

The switch on the lever speeds makes it possible to change report/ratio when it is wished. With the difference of the automatic transmissions, the selection speeds is carried out with the hand, which allows a more nervous control, although with Idroconvert the performances of the vehicle are slightly decreased.

The Idroconvert transmission was assembled in 1966 on the FIAT 850 Idromatic, without however meeting the favour of the public

so it sounds a bit unpopular

mrcheerful

In article , mrcheerful . writes

Yes, Idromatic worked like Porsche's Sportmatic, Citroën's C-matic or the similar system fitted to the NSU Ro80; Essentially, a conventional manual gearbox and clutch linked to a torque converter, with a microswitch built into the base of the gearlever. When you moved the gearlever, the microswitch disengaged the clutch, for gearchanging, while the torque converter took car of smooth starting from rest and prevented stalling.

Can anyone think of an example of a pre-selector box with a torque convertor, rather than just a fluid flywheel ?

What do Routemaster buses have ?

Rover had something like this rather earlier. Like in the '50s Rover 105R

- the 'R' standing for Rovermatic. Only a two speed box, though, with an electrically operated overdrive which worked on both high and low range.

The semi-automatic (clutchless) VW Beetle from 1968 had that switch in the gearlever. It's one way to get rid the bad habit of driving with your hand on the gearlever, because it will activate the clutch!

-- Howard Rose

In article , "Dave Plowman (News)" writes

ITYM "Roverdrive"

Yes, the overdrive cut in and out automatically, depending on road speed and throttle opening, and normally you would use high range, only dropping into low for starting on hills, etc. The change from low to high was accomplished by moving what looked like a conventional gearlever, but there was no clutch pedal, the clutch being disengaged by movement of the gearlever. Like other semi-automatic systems, there was a torque convertor for starting from rest, and this was intended to allow enough performance in high range to render low almost superfluous, but apparently acceleration was very leisurely. I wasn't sure whether the overdrive worked on high and low ranges, or if it was only used on high. I thought the latter, but I could be wrong.

I suppose the Mini autobox could be described like that. You can select manually if you so wish but there's no clutch.

It was somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Andy Dingley saying something like:

Not sure whether the Routemaster originals had a mechanical clutch and conventional gearboxes. Later buses (Leyland Atlantean and the like) had a torque converter with a manually operated epicyclic gearbox, each gear being engaged with a brake band just like an auto, but selected by a pneumatic or electrical control lever in the cab.

The one I drove on a skid pan (twenty years ago) was pre-selector. I think they all were.

In article , Grimly Curmudgeon writes

I remember quite clearly that the driver would change gears using the column-mounted selector on early Routemasters, but there was no clutch pedal. I suspect the system may have been like that on the Atlantean you describe below.

In article , Andy Dingley writes

Are you sure it wasn't an RT? They had pre-selectors, but I'm sure RMs were 2-pedal.

Yup. Getting old. ;-)

I don't remember it like that. The RT series had a 3-speed pre-selector gearbox and a gear change pedal. The Routemasters were fully automatic (4-speed) but the drivers often used to work the steering column lever which operated a lock-up mechanism so that the gear position selected was the highest up-change that the auto box would make. The atlanteans had a pneumo-cyclic gearbox with each change controlled by the driver's gear stalk.

Jim

Likewise the "Standrive" version of the Standard 10 had a switch in the gear lever knob. There was no torque converter though. A centrifugal mechanism engaged the clutch as engine revs increased, and the switch on the gear lever released inlet manifold vacuum into a cylinder that worked a conventional thrust bearing to disengage the clutch to change gear. It worked very well.

Jim