Tired iron

I purchased a nicop brakeline kit that came with all the fittings i needed for 20 bucks on ebay. There was enough tubing in the roll to do my whole car.

Heres a picture of what I was referring to

Thanks. But, to be clear, changing the input shaft requires taking the transmission apart and dropping the layshaft and cluster gear.

Hey all, I have meadowbrook with fluid drive in front of the 3 speed transmission. My tranny was so bad it wasn't even worth rebuilding. I found another tranny in great shape but it was set up for a conventional clutch, not fluid drive. I searched this forum and others for answers to if and how to adapt my new transmission to accept a fluid drive. There were lots of opinions but not definite answers. So, now that I have accomplished this task, I thought I'd mention it here on the forum for others in the future who might be trying to figure this out The input shaft on for the fd set up is quite a bit longer than for a regular clutch, this is due to the thickness of the fd torque converter. As is the front bearing retainer. That's the bad news. The good news is that everything else in the transmissions are the same. So, All you need to do is obtain the right input shaft and snout for your desired application. So in my situation all I had to do was take off the input shaft and bearing retainer from the old bad fluid drive tranny and put it on the new transmission.

My oilite brass filter in the tank was plugged as well. To fix, I unsoldered the small rectangular patch where the outlet tube enters the tank. Then removed the filter and resoldered the patch back on. And run an external filter.

I got lucky on ebay and just got a NOS input shaft, fluid drive length, for 74 bucks!

Hey thanks for the tip. They're an interesting company and I did an inquiry.

Thanks, guys, for the transmission offers, but i have a great tranny now with over drive as a bonus! Its just that this new transmission is set up for a regular clutch and my car is fluid drive. Now that I'm realizing how much work it would be to convert my fluid drive set up to reg clutch, I'll keep things fluid drive. Ill be able to use the good new tranny by swapping input shafts. I'm in Washington state, by the way.

Is there more to it than a new flywheel, clutch, bell housing and lengthen the driveshaft? Probably have to fiddle with the clutch linkage and, wow, come to think of it the shifter linkage...hmmnn. I guess I'm answering my own question.

Yep! A bit longer.

Hey gang, My 1950 Meadowbrook has a fluid drive and the transmission is shot (as I lamented about earlier this spring). Now I've got a good tranny but its for a standard clutch. How difficult would it be for me to get a regular flywheel and bellhousing? I am assuming that I will need a thinner bellhouse...right? Thanks. ~martin

Great! Thanks much.

Hi all, Just acquired this 3 speed with OD for my dodge meadowbrook brook. Theres a series of numbers stamped, not cast, into the edge of the front plate (see picture). I'm wondering if that's a date code? Makes sense that the 53 would be a 1953...

Thanks you guys. I will follow up on both of those suggestions.

I always use a sealer, both so the paint takes consistently and I notice I end up using less paint. And you'll probably find it helpful to find an automotive paint shop and buy your products from them. You'll be ensured of compatibility and you can pester them with lots of questions about how to do things!

So I haveta tell you all about this cause my wife doesn't seem to be as excited as me... As some of you may remember, the 3 speed transmission in my meadowbrook im restoring is totally shot. Was full of water, instead of oil, for years. Needle rollers brinneled most wear surfaces. 1st and reverse have major tooth loss. So bad....never seen a transmission this bad. A friend remarked that he thought he knew where one might be, but wasnt sure if it was even the right model. I gave him a hundred bucks and asked him to grab it next time he was in that town. I figured it was worth the gamble. Well, yesterday he showed up at my place with the transmission. I could see right away that it was a the correct 3 speed. But, I didnt recognize what was going on with the weird extension in the rear of it. I got out a wire brush and cut thru the gunk and lookie what I saw (see pic below) A R10 G-1 model overdrive! So I not only got a parts source for my old gear box (forget that!) I've got a transmission with overdrive and it looks to be in pretty good shape. I'll know more tomorrow when I open it up. I will have to swap input shafts, tho, I can tell already. Sometimes you do get lucky

You made the right choice. I used to rebuild starters and electric motors for a living and i would have put that one in my parts barrel! Often when you press a new end bushing in, the armature shaft wont fit and you need to ream the bushing to fit...special tool. And your shaft end had so much brinneling that it would be questionable how long it would last even with the bushing clearance done right. All of that happened from lack of lubrication...

Ah, so that's what it looks like inside! Thanks for the picture. I may eventually weld it up, but for now, im going to do this single bolt trick.

Thanks for the info. I think, fir me tho, an even easier option is just to make the fluid drive so it cant spin inside.

James, thanks for the tip about the bolt into the filler hole. Simple and elegant...and reversable!

Interesting. So apparently, the non fluid drive "regular" clutches were bigger. Thanks for looking that up. Ive run across a number of strategies for locking up the fluid drive...everything from welding to screws to filling it up with hot tar! Im going to weld. first ill drain it. Then I'll drill 3/8" holes equidistant around the body of it, then rotate it just a bit so the outside holes arent lined up with the inside holes. Then ill carefully mig weld in the holes, which will fuse the inside drum to the outside drum.

I love your paint strategy, belvedereman! I am doing the same thing with my 1950 Meadowbrook: making all the mechanicals good, re-doing the interior to look great, and...leaving the rust and black patina just the way it is! Im going to even shoot some clear on it to protect it. My family thinks I'm crazy. Well, I'm glad crazy has company.

Im wondering what the clutch disc that goes in a conventional 3-speed w/o a fluid drive looks like or measures. Anybody know how/if they differ?

I dont know, but would sure like to hear information or experience about this. The fluid drive clutch disk sure looks just like a regular disk to me, but, come to think of it, Bernbaum listed a clutch disc that was specifically for FD models. I'll have to call and ask them about that.

You're right about the size, the clutch disc in the FD models is 9 1/4. What is the diameter in the non fluid drive models?