Hey guys, Just thinking of installing a floor shifter instead of leaving it on the column... It's not like there's not enough room. But before I fab one up, anyone hear of a kit? Oh yeah, it's a 1958 Special, 364 Nailhead with a three speed. Thanks.
Someone can help you around here. I just picked up a 64 Special with 3 on the tree. Might be cool to move it down to the floor.:beers2:
The '37-'60 trans with the 6-bolt top cover are all similar and are a selector type trans. The only ones who made a shifter for it where Ansen and Drag Fast. The '37-'38 trans had a floor shifter and hot rodders used to use this trans behind the Nailheads by switching the tail shaft, but I don't know the details on this. I don't know of any kits, but I've been looking for a way to do a floor shift too. Here are a couple of links that might help: http://www.webrodder.com/article.php?AID=84&SID=4&CID= http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=123830 http://members.tripod.com/starchief57/techtips.htm#gear The article on Webrodder has a picture of the Ansen shifter and mentions the '37-'38 swap, but I think you have to use the whole case and not just the top cover.
I found an article on how to do the '37-'38 Buick floor shift conversion. It is in the August 1956 issue of Hot Rod Magazine. You can get it in a book called "The Best of Hot Rod Magazine 1949-1959". The title of the article is "Big Gears for Any Engine" (starts on page 164 of the book) and it describes using the '37-'38 case and gear shift mechanism with the gears from a '41-'48 trans. Again, this is only for the manual trans with the 6-bolt top cover that came in the Century, Roadmaster, and Limited cars. I'm not sure how this would work using the gears from a '57 or a '58, but since the manual trans was basically the same for '37-'60, I would think that if you could use '41-'48 gears that you could also use '57-'58 gears and tail shaft. Here is a link to the book: http://books.google.com/books?id=UX...ts=A279vyspN5&sig=2e81kZ9_5KCiFHOZvP7Z2yx5w-E
If you get onto the JalopyJournal site, go on to the HAMB section (board) and look up 'Heathen'. He sells old speed parts and at times has had floor shift 'conversions' for the selector type. It would be worth pm'ing him for info etc...
