Lincoln and Buick update - off topic

[58limited]

When I bought my Lincoln last month, I couldn't see over the dash too well but as I drove it and found all the controls, I adjusted the seat and can now see perfectly. The previous owner was shorter than me, so I don't know how he could have driven the car with the seats adjusted that way.

One thing that impresses me about this car is the brakes: they are hydralic assisted, not vacuum assisted like most cars. The hydralic pressure is supplied by the power steering pump. This car, for all of its weight, stops better than anything I own, including my 1998 Olds with antilock brakes (which I hate). I wonder why this wasn't used on Ford's other products. When I test-drove the Lincoln, I hit the brakes to test them and, if not for the seatbelt, it would have thrown me into the steering wheel, and I was going less than 10mph.

 

[hydralique]

Hydraulic Assist . . .

Oh, how I hate spongy vacuum boosted brakes! Through the years Lincoln has occasionally used a hydraulic assist, as have some other companies. Lincoln also used a hydraulic wiper motor for years in the '60s, again driven off the power steering pump. One interesting factoid about Lincoln brakes is that they briefly offered a primitive anti-lock system on the rear brakes only of the Mark III in about '71. I think it was the first anti-lock system outside of the pioneering Jensen FF of 1966, which of course had full four wheel anti-lock courtesy of the Ferguson four wheel drive system and Dunop Maxaret brake controller. I don't know much about the Mark III anti-lock, as almost nobody bought it and it wasn't offered for long. About the same time Buick briefly offered a simple traction control device for the Riviera, but again it wasn't promoted and didn't last long. Two sad examples of Ford and GM actually offering some advanced safety technology only to cheap out when they couldn't turn an immediate profit on it. Ultimately others (can you say Bosch?) spent the time and money to develop the concepts into really useful products.

Hydraulic assist doesn't necessarily provide better brakes, just better feel in my opinion. Alfa Romeo in particular has a history of providing spongy, over-boosted assist but excellent brakes so the cars stop very well but to me feel nasty. I always hated that on my Alfetta coupe. The reason for the superiority of hydraulic assist is simple: vacuum boosters use air as their fluid, and air can compress and expand, while hydraulic fluid by its' very nature doesn't compress and therefore provides better feel.

My favorite power brake design of all is the traditional Citroen system, which is true power and not power assist. It uses no master cylinder, but rather a proportioning valve which distributes brake fluid at high pressure to the front and rear brakes when you push the pedal. The actual amount of fluid is determined by both how hard you push the pedal and the relative loading of the front and rear suspension . . . more weight in the rear means more power to the rear brakes. The high pressure fluid (approximately 2000 psi) is provided by the engine driven high-pressure pump and accumulator system, so the pedal feel is always nice and firm and travel is very short, maybe 1/2" or so, giving reduced reaction times.

 

[volvoguy87]

Brakes.

The strangest, and best, brakes I have ever encountered have been on Volvo 240s. Volvo introduced the first car for sale in the US with 4-wheel disc brakes. I think it was the 140 series, introduced in 1966. The 140s were updated for 1975 and the model was changed to the 240 series. I know all the 240s had 4-wheel disc brakes. A 240 brake pedal has relatively little travel. You press the pedal a tiny bit then WHAM! the brakes are engaged. The pedal will travel a little bit beyond that point, increasing the braking pressure, until the pedal seems to not move any further. It's not like the pedal hits a wall, that's just as far as it needs to go. Any furter braking necessary almost seems to take place with increased pressure on the pedal with almost no pedal movement.
Having driven my, and other people's, Volvo 240s for about 10 years, my experience has been that they all feel this way. It takes some getting used to, but I find that it's the most comfortable braking system I have ever encountered. I have yet to find another car that comes close. My mother's Volvo 740 couldn't even hold a candle to my 240. My 240 will stop on a dime and give you 9 cents change, even without anti-locks.
A friend of mine who drove a 1971 VW Beetle was driving my Volvo once and I told him to test the brakes to get used to them. He locked all 4 wheels at under 15 mph! The '71 Bug was pretty good to drive, but its 4-wheel drum brakes with no power assist were, at times, frightening.

Why manufacturers still use rear drum brakes is beyond me,
Dave

 

[hydralique]

Four Wheel Discs . . .

There were plenty of cars for sale here in the US with four wheel disc brakes before '66. I don't think the 122/Amazon series had front discs until '62, and don't know if it ever got four wheel discs. That said, Volvo can be commended for having four wheel discs in '66 before many manufacturers.

The Jaguar XK 150 had four wheel discs for the '58 model year, and it is worth noting that Jag's excellent independent rear suspension, introduced on both the new E-Type sports car and Mark X sedan for '61, had inboard discs as an integral part of the differential assembly. Jaguar had pioneered disc brakes in racing in the early '50s and thus it isn't surprising that they were early adopters on road cars as well.

Renault took the lead in small cars by putting four wheel discs on the R8 for '63. The first American car to have four wheel discs was the Corvette in '65. The 'Vette system is really very good, and has quite nice pedal feel and not too much effort even without a power booster. I was once rear-ended while driving a '66 on a traffic choked freeway by a Dodge truck. When I felt the bang I stayed on the brakes hard to keep from hitting the car in front, and the poor Corvette hardly moved at all. It did suffer major damage to the rear, but at least the front wasn't hurt too. The fact that GM continued to produce big, expensive cars like Cadillacs and Buicks with four wheel drums in the mid '60s is sad testament to their undying cheapness when they had demonstrated the ability to do so much better.

 

[selectomatic]

Lincoln Hydraulic Brakes

As I understand it, the reason that the late-70s Lincolns had hydraulic brakes was that Ford had overtaxed the vaccuum system with such things as the Automatic Temperature Control system and the headlamp doors, etc. to a point where the brakes couldn't be made terribly reliable without seeking another power source.

My 1976 Town Car had hydraulic brakes, and they worked great.

The problem with hydraulic is that all of the power assist completely disappears as soon as the engine stops, the steering fluid leaks out, or the steering belt breaks. With a vaccuum system and a reservoir, you still have power assist for one or two stops after the engine quits.

As to the 1970-or-so Ford antilock-brake system, it was called Sure Track, and it was available as an option on Mark IIIs and Thunderbirds (the same basic car with different sheet metal). I had some Thunderbirds from that era, and I've been told that I was lucky they weren't equipped with Sure Track -- I guess it wasn't particularly reliable.

-kevin

 

[hydralique]

Hydraulic pressure doesn't necessarily disappear when the pump stops for whatever reason. I don't kow much about the technical aspects of the Lincoln system, but Citroen has always had accumulators in their systems. On the DS and SM, the front brakes have their own accumulator, while the rear brakes receive pressure from the main system accumulator. The result is that you can kill the engine and have enough pressure for several stops, plus the main accumulator also supplies the power steering so that keeps working for awhile as well. I'm surprised Lincoln didn't put at least a small accumulator in their system, but since their brakes have a master cylinder (unlike Citroen) maybe they thought it unnecessary, since in theory you could stop the car without any assist.

My sister actually had a minor accident years ago due to the engine stalling in a car with vacuum boost. She was going up a hill in Austin in a DeTomaso Pantera, and when the engine stalled there wasn't enough vacuum left to allow her to keep the car from rolling backwards into a parked car. She leaned hard on the pedal, but still couldn't stop the car. A Pantera expert later confirmed that it was hard for him to stop one without any vacuum assist, and at 6'-2" and 210 pounds he was much larger than my sister!

I'm not surprised that Sure Track didn't work well. I really think it was the first electronic anti-lock system, and even into the '90s some anti-lock systems weren't totally reliable (the crappy Chrysler-Bendix system for starters). The Dunlop Maxaret used by Jensen was mechanical and quite clever, but not applicable to two wheel drive cars and therefore a technical dead end. Imagine how nice it would have been if Ford had spent the time and money to develop the system instead of giving up and leaving it to Bosch to make it work right.

 

[drmitch]

Love that Lincoln, Decodriveboy! This was my favorite. Galaxie 500 from 1959 with the 352ci automatic. When I first got it I would get the shakes just sitting in it.

 

[gyrafoam]

Drmitch-----

That 352 made classic sound! The '59 Galaxy (Sunliner?) I remember was a Two-Tone Coral and Black Hard-top Convertable. It had a 352 in it that was very powerful for a V-8 in those days, so I know your blue beauty was a rocket as well. Do you still have it? I really liked the steering wheel Ford put in those from 57-59. Very classic.

 

[danemodsandy]

Gyrafoam:

"We used to FLY down Mt. Paran with that thing and that was an accomplishment as Mt. Paran is a very winding road! Ohhh--- how did we ever survive?!"

Egad! How, indeed? One of the few true improvements on today's cars is suspensions. As much as I loved those cars of yesteryear, their suspensions were set up for ride quality on a boulevard surface, not control. There was a fair amount of wallowing and tyre-squealing in those days if you pushed the car at all.

Mt. Paran Road at speed in a 1970s car! I pale and tremble.

Sandy (Mayretta, Jawjuh)

 

[gyrafoam]

My 1968 Lincoln Continental.

 

[drmitch]

Hi Gyro, no I sold it back when the prices started going up. It was actually a beautiful Aqua with an aqua interior, and yes i loved the white steering wheel and the tube radio. Hated the vacum powered wipers.

 

[drmitch]

Same garage different car! 1981 Eldo, smooth running 4.1 but not a lot of horsepower.

 

[drmitch]

Oops! Sorry Gyro, Missed the pic. Georgous Lincoln! Love the suicide doors. I had a 1968 T-Bird 4door and somebody always try to open them while going down the road. That car had the hefty 429, smooth and powerful!

 

[58limited]

That '68 Lincoln is nice. We had one in our club, a 22 year old bought it and, unusual for youngsters today, wanted to keep it all original. The car is still around, but the guy left the club - too busy to make meetings and events. It is gold inside and out and has very few flaws - so few that it is not worth the effort to fix them as he might cause more damage doing it.

The '59 Ford hardtop convertible was called a "Skyliner" and was made in 1957-59. The Sunliner was what Ford called the soft top convertibles in the fifties (don't know if it was called that in '59). There are a few Skyliners in my area and they are neat cars. Now several newer cars have a convertible hardtop - interesting how these ideas keep returning.

I have wanted an early eighties Eldorado convertible for years, as well as a Buick Riviera convertible from the same time period (see below). I think the early to mid-eighties Riviera convertible is one of the prettiest cars from that decade.

 

[gyrafoam]

Drmitch-----

I like the looks of that body style Eldo. and know what you mean about the horsepower. I especially liked the biscuited leather seating on the Biarritz. Lots of those with the SS roof too.

IMO the last of the truly "earth-pounding" Eldo's (IMO) was the 1970. 500CU V-8 cranking out a true 400HP at 4400 rpm! Good thing 93 octane Premium was under .50 cents a gallon!

My favorite Convertible ever was the 1966 Eldorado in Silverpine Green Firemist with White Top and White Leather Bucket Seats.(Last of the rear-wheel drive models). These had the old 429 CU V-8. Cadillac finally added the varible-ratio power-steering this year so you could keep it in one lane (after a visit to the bong) without too much effort and parking was MUCH easier!

 

[drmitch]

My last car, 1989 Rivera with only 60,000 on the od.

 

[drmitch]

And a few months later after the tornado!

 

[customcadillac]

The "chrome mandate"

I think it was in 1958 that GM head of design, Herley Earl dictated that every full-sized GM model "must have" a "minimum" of 58 pounds of chrome on it. How they measured that 58 pounds, I don't know - given the cars, ya' think a measurment in acreage would've been simpler.

 

[hydralique]

Someone once said that when chrome was available by the mountainful, Harley Earl was there with a shovel!

 

[scott55405]

Speaking of brakes

what sort of brakes were used on cars such as mid 70s Buicks, as compared to the brakes/power brakes used today? I don't know how many times I nearly put my poor father through the windshield when I was learning to drive, but I have to say since that time I've never experienced brakes that were that touchy and sensitive.