Auto trans conversion recomendation

I have a 1952 F-3 panel delivery truck with the first OVH valve I6 Ford ever made. The owner of the truck would like to have an automatic transmission rather than the 3 spd manual that is in there now. My research shows that there is not a direct bolt in available (except perhaps the fabled 1964 Fairlane 233/C4 mating). There are adapter plates available for AOD and SBF installs.

The truck will be driven locally only to 10-20 weekend events a year. The rest of the time it will sit as advertising. The rear end is a 4.90 ratio so overdrive would be nice but not necessary. The truck is in the neighborhood of a 1 ton but never loaded with much and the 90 horse motor should be pretty gentle on the trans.

What transmission would you recommend for this application? Besides the obvious "teach him how to drive a manual"!!!

Thanks,
Greg
 
The 1952 & 53 215 cars were probably pertty rare with the Auto trans. The 1954 to 64 cars did have the old Ford O Matic and Cruse O Matic's behind the 223's also some of the later model pickups used this trans behind the 223 if you could ever find some of those parts you could bolt it togeather but again it was a fairly rare option. You would have trouble with the bell housing motor mounting that the trucks used with trying to use the car type bell. With some fab work and welding you could convert the truck to the car engine motor mounting system and you could also use the later model FMX trans with the original Ford OMatic bell housing if you find one.

Some of the kits to install the C4 are real nice and they are a good trans for light duty use an AOD would be stronger and give you OD too. Good luck :nod:
 
I have a Ford-O-Matic that came off of a 1953 Ford 2-door sedan that had a 215 I-block OHV 6-cyl. It came out of a junkyard car along with the engine back in the late 1990's. I parted out the engine. The Ford-O-Matic is the older type that had the fluid filler cap at the top of the trans case on the passenger side. The cap has integral dipstick. The trans fluid pan subsequently does not have the long dipstick/filler tube that the '55 and later Ford-O-Matics had. Also, another rare characteristic of the 215 Ford-O-Matic, is that the air-cooled converter has a big flat gasket with boltholes in the flywheel plate rather than the o-ring gasket used on the '55 and later models. Yes it is truly a rare Ford-O-Matic.
Currently, the bell-housing has been dunked and stripped of all gunk and rust and is coated with metal prep temporarily. the starter plate and inspection plate were stripped and re-finished to mint condition.
The trans case could probably stand a rebuild. The only thing missing off the trans is the rear extension housing (which was a rare cast iron housing, only used with the 215's). In '55, they started making the housing out of aluminum and the aluminum ones are interchangeable with the cast iron ones as long as you get a '55 or '56 rear extension housing. Otherwise, you would need to add some expense for mounting in a truck. (the car bellhousings did not have the frame mounting tabs like the trucks had). I am selling pretty cheap.
 
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