The Waterbury Democrat., 1940-10-14
Hydra-Matic Drives,
 Oldsrnobile Feature
lnter-Lock Control Only Minor Change Added Mo
 tOrsts Like Cars Without Clutches and Gear Shifts
American mechanical genius.

A4A$OAAeNAAASeSA Oldsmobile last year experienced another striking manifestation of that faith when Hydra-Matic Drive was first announced as an optional feature of equipment at extra cost. For eight years Oldsmobile engineers had been steadily working to im- prove transmission design-a unit of automotive construction that had been virtually unchanged for forty years. Late in the 1887 model year they had released their first step toward such improvement-a semi automatic transmission that reduced very considerably the labor of changing gears and use of the clutch. For more than two years this was a popular feature of op- tional equipment.
 Last year, however, when Hydra: Matic Drive was announced as an outgrowth of this, it was a still more startling forward step. Clutch and clutch pedal had been done away with completely, gears now shifted themselves entirey automati- cally, and the oil-smooth action of a fluid coupling replaced the fric- tion of clutch plates. It was an innovation in transmission design so complete that it would scarcely have seemed surprising if the public had been slow to accept it. On the contrary, Oldsmobile was from the outset literally flooded with orders for Hydra Matte Drive.
 It was demand that came from every section of the country, and for every sort of usage. It came in such volume that it literally swamped production facilities for the new device. Because of the compete newness of Hydra-Matic Drive, the utmost care was exerted in its manufacture and in the test ing of completed units, which tended, of course, to slow produc- tion.
 By spring, Oldsmobile dealers had received literally thousands of or ders. People waited months in or der to get delivery. For the model year of 1940, the sight of a Hydra Matic equipped Oldsmobile on a dealers salesroom floor was almost unknown. Every car possible to build went immediately to waiting customer. How many more could have been delivered, had it been possible to make them, is a matter of conjecture, but it would have been huge number.
 It is matter of the greatest qualification to us that the faith so generously expressed in Hydra Matte Drive has been so completely borne out by the performance of 10000 cars now in the hands of owners all over the United States. Cars equipped with Hydra-Matics have now been driven by owners more than one hundred million miles, at the most conservative es- innate. Oldsmobile service experts all over the United States watched their performance closely. Factory engineers continued to test and re- test all year.
 When it came time to go into pro- duction for 1941, it was possible to find exactly one minor change in the Hydra a-Matic Drive that had been dictased by all this experi- ence A simple lock control was added, to put the control lever in neutral automatically as the starter plunger was depressed. It was a minor safety factor that re- lieved the driver of one detail of operation.
 Our production problems on Hy- dra-Matic Drive for the coming year are solved to a degree that we believe will make possible equipping perhaps 50 per cent of our cars with it. Many of our dealers believe that even this will not be sufficient to supply the potential demand from motorists who are tired of shifting gears and working a clutch.