gyro-matic transmission

i just bought a 51 dodge coronet 2 door coupe with a flat head six and a gyro-matic trans. how does the trans work? is the shifter for forward and reverse? do you press the clutch in to get moving them it shifts automatically?

http://www.fridrichdesign.com/dodge/mechanical.html

At the time, Chrysler still had a rep for being the engineering-oriented company, but the whole fluid drive idea shows you that engineers can come up with some truly goofy stuff.

I remember someone describing the gyro-matic trans as combining all the worst features of automatic and manual trannies, and I think that's pretty accurate.

Not to repeat everything laid out in the link above, but to sum up: the Gyro-matic has both a clutch and a torque convertor; the gearshift lever accesses two forward positions (each having two gear ratios via planetaries) and one reverse position; you need a clutch to start the car, or to change gears with the shift lever, but otherwise you don't have to touch the clutch - the torque convertor allows you to idle at a traffic light with the clutch pedal out, and shifting up or down within either of the two forward gear positions is handled by the planetaries.

In either of the forward gear positions, you can upshift from the lower ratio to the higher ratio by letting off the throttle for a couple of seconds, or kickdown from the higher ratio to the lower ratio by flooring the throttle - pretty much identical in operation to the way early overdrives operated going into and out of overdrive.

An an engineer I agree. However, keep in mind that engineering design criteria are usually driven by perceived customer requirements that come from marketing and sales departments.