Can someone tell me why my boys 57 won't shift to park. It was like this when we bought it. I lifted it and looked at linkage nothing looks jammed or bent. Any help can will be appreciated. Its our firat oldsmobile so is there something I'm over looking??

 

Possible someone has replaced the 1957's Jetaway HydraMatic with an earlier unit. 56-later have Park. 55-earlier and 1956 base 88s do not.

 

There is a long rod going from the carb linkage down to the transmission. This rod will adjust some shift duration and gear selection. It has a long nut at the bottom end of the rod, use this to start with. My experience has been that a little adjustment goes a long ways, try 1/8 turn, then try the transmission. Mark where you start with a felt pen so if you get lost you can go back and start again.

There is a chance that the park paw has been over stressed at some time and is broken. That is not something that can be fixed from the outside, but try the adjustment on the transmission first... Tedd

 

Thanks, Tedd

 

So 56 base and earlier had no park? How did that work put in neutral then apply e-brake? Very interesting. I'll have to research the tranny.

 

It was designed so that shutting off the engine and putting the transmission in R activated a parking pawl on transmission output shaft. Combined with parking brake it would hold the car stationary.

d2willys and coldwar are HydraMatic guys but not on here that often. If they see this they'll probably know right off what the issue is.

 

Early 56, mostly the cheaper post cars, sometimes came with a Slant Pan till they used up the supply, most better grades of 88's came with a Jet a Way. When in doubt, look on the right-hand side of the transmission and see if it has two hydrolic lines coming off the trans, if so it is a Jet A Way... Tedd

 

Thank you Tedd. I will look at it when I get chance.

 

The gear selector rod may be mis-adjusted.
This is the rod that runs from the column to the trans.
Do the other gears line up with their indicated positions?

 

They do line up. When I try to put in park this is as far as it will go. It stays in neutral.

 

Seeing that, I'm gonna go ahead and guess that rocketraider's theory is the right one.

 

You do know that you have to pull the lever toward the steering wheel when shifting into park.

 

As Charlie said^^^ you have to really give it a pull to lock it into Park.

 

I've tried that, but I will again, maybe not pulling firm enough. I will keep you guys posted. Thanks for all the help fellas.

 

If pulling the shift lever toward yourself doesn't get it into Park- if you can get the car on a lift, put the trans in R, make a reference mark on the shift linkage rod and disconnect it from the selector lever ON THE TRANSMISSION. Then manually move the transmission lever thru its range of travel, starting with the trans in R. This takes the steering column shift lever and detent plate out of the picture.

Move the lever on the transmission thru its range and count how many detents. If you can count only 5, (R L S D N) odds are good it's the earlier HydraMatic. If you can count 6 (R L S D N P) it should be the Jetaway. Put it back in R and reconnect the shifter rod.

If it's the early HMT, only the person who put it in there knows how or why it was done.

 

See posts 2, 7 and 15.