Oldsmobile...started that shit..geah!

keep it on topic

first mass produced car and the oldest american car company

Oldsmobiles were first manufactured by the Olds Motor Vehicle Company in Lansing, Michigan, a company founded by Ransom E. Olds in 1897. In 1901, the company produced 425 cars, making it the first high-volume automobile manufacturer of the day. Olds became the top selling car company in the United States for a few years. Ransom Olds left the company in financial difficulties and formed the REO Motor Car Company. The last Curved Dash Olds was made in 1907. General Motors purchased the company in 1908.

The 1901 to 1904 Curved Dash was the first mass-produced car, made from the first automotive assembly line, an invention that is often miscredited to Henry Ford and the Ford Motor Company. After Olds sold the company in 1899, it was renamed Olds Motor Works and moved to a new plant in Detroit. By March 1901, the company had a whole line of models ready for mass production. Unfortunately, a mistake by a worker caused the factory to catch fire, and it burned to the ground, with all of the prototypes destroyed. The only car that survived the fire was a Curved Dash prototype, which was wheeled out of the factory by two workers while escaping the fire. A new factory was built, and production of the Curved Dash commenced

automatic tranny

Oldsmobile was the first auto manufacturer to offer a fully automatic transmission, called the Hydramatic, which featured four forward speeds.

Notable achievements included the introduction of the first turbocharged engine in 1962 (the Turbo Jetfire), the first modern front-wheel drive car (the 1966 Toronado),

Oldsmobile Toronado (1966-1992) - a front-wheel drive coupe in the personal luxury car category, introduced in 1966. At the time, the largest and most powerful front wheel drive car ever produced, and one of the first modern front wheel drive cars equipped with an automatic transmission. The original Toronado was powered by a 425 in³ Super Rocket V8 engine rated at 385 hp, mated to a three speed Turbo Hydra-Matic transmission. The Toronado was Motor Trend magazine’s 1966 “Car of the Year.”

Oldsmobile sales soared in the 1970s and 1980s based on popular designs, positive reviews from critics and the perceived quality and reliability of the Rocket V8 engine, with the Cutlass series becoming the North America’s top selling car by 1976. By this time, Olds had displaced Pontiac and Plymouth as the #3 best selling brand in the U.S. behind Chevrolet and Ford. In the early 1980s, model-year production topped one million units on several occasions, something only Chevrolet and Ford had achieved.

TURBO

The first production turbocharged automobile engines came from General Motors in 1962. The A-body Oldsmobile Cutlass Jetfire and Chevrolet Corvair Monza Spyder were both fitted with turbochargers. The Oldsmobile is often recognized as the first, since it came out a few months earlier than the Corvair. Its Turbo Jetfire was a 215 in³ (3.5 L) V8…

In 1962, Olds, along with AiResearch, introduced a ‘turbocharged’ (called Fluid Injection) version of this engine, which put “Turbo Rocket Fluid” (½ distilled water, ½ methyl alcohol) into the carb. Along with a 10.25:1 compression ratio, yielded 0-60 in 8.5 seconds (with the manual tranny). The turbo was a Garrett TO-3 with an integral wastegate, the first. Unfortunately, due to the 10:1 compression ratio, boost was limited to only 5 psi, not the best use of a turbo.

The induction setup itself is fairly sophisticated (especially for 1962), with something like 54 separate connections to the intake system. The turbo has an integral wastegate, being the first mass production turbo application to use a wastegate. The turbo has a large oil line running directly from the oil pump to keep oil present to the bearings. If they get hot (running hard) they must not be shut down without a cool down period. This was arguably the most complex induction system build to that time, with something like 50 different hose connections in the intake system (pressure sensors, wastegate, fluid injection, fuel, etc).

Olds attempted to get around the boost lag problem by using a high compression ratio (10:1!), which limited boost to only 5 psi. Fluid injection (Turbo Rocket Fluid) was used (a water/alcohol mix) to suppress detonation. Properly running cars will not go into boost if the “Turbo Rocket Fluid” resevoire is empty. There is an automatic shutoff for this.

first to have on star

1998: Also new was an optional satellite navigation system/cellular phone called OnStar.

Oldsmobile also is the first to use chrome decoration on its cars. In 1926, the shiny metal plating was used on Olds radiator shells.

Yeah so… where are they now?

cool

that 3.5 liter V8 is used today. It was an aluminum V8. Range rover bought the molds and updated it for my understanding.

May have been the first american car to offer front wheel drive, and perhaps the first v8, but Audi started making FWD v6’s in 1933…

Well, since my posts constantly disappear…

So… Where are they now? :ugh:

they were the first to mass produce it… the early tornado axles are virtually indestructible, it was extremely over engineered. i talked to a old dealer tech and he said he never had one of those cars in for service to the axle.

not that I have a problem with Olds, I’ve owned em before and enjoyed em… the closest I’ve had to a V8 hot rod was an 83 olds 88 coupe, previous owner built a “built” 350 in it… It smoked the tires, I smoked the motor within 9 mos…

I used to have a friend with a toronado, who thought they were the shit for being the “first” front wheel drive, which is when I found out about the audi (this is back in 93 or 94)

check out this link
http://www.audiusa.com/audi/us/en2/Company/history/technical_highlights/front_wheel_drive.html
Audi considered it to be high-volume, with close 5,000 produced in the 30’s

Ex’s sister has a 1991 Toronado Trofeo with the Vehicle Information touch screen in it. It’s crazy how much shit Olds caem out with in their cars that long ago. They really were ahead of the curve, it’s just a shame that all American cars took a turn for the worse and are just such poor build quality.

The leather seats in that bitch were awesome. Like big ass pillows.

ya its a shame they scrapped olds in favor of saturds. olds was the expiremental division… they clearly had the best engineers.

The first to do alot, Also a big time company go flop

funny thing is they didnt flop. while they did peak in the late 70’s and early to mid 80’s, it was GM who casued the decline in olds sales. but even then their sales were steady, they always were turning a profit unlike saturn who bit the bullet its first ten years. corporate GM killed olds. coporate powerplants killed olds, the end of the g and b-bodies killed olds…

tards