Hudson 308 Twin H engine wanted

[Doug Barbee]

Does anyone have a good Hudson 308 engine? I would like to replace the 212
in my Hudson pick up to make it better to drive at highway speeds.
I will buy engine/trans or whole car.
Thanks,
Doug Barbee

[Bud Tierney]

Oh, Boy!! Long time away from Hudsons...personally, I always liked the little 3x5. Didn't realise until later it was more like a European engine (smaller bore, longer stroke, very light flywheel, etc, excellent gas mileage). It's been a long time since I've looked under the hood of a pickup, but it strikes me the Hornet might take a little refitting. You might consider trying to find one of the factory soup-up jobs (7X is what comes to mind). My brother, an inveterate Hudson fan, who's gone to his reward (or whatever) had one, a 54, and I recall him saying they'd beefed up everything except the U-joints, that he was always repacing them.

[Doug Barbee]

Bud,
I would love to find a factory 7x engine and o/d transmission, but beggers have to take what they can get!! The 308 is supposed to be a direct drop in swap with my trans. I would like to keep the truck looking orginal if I can. Keep your eyes open for an engine! Thanks, Doug

[Elden DuRand]

Originally Posted by Doug Barbee

Bud,
I would love to find a factory 7x engine and o/d transmission, but beggers have to take what they can get!! The 308 is supposed to be a direct drop in swap with my trans. I would like to keep the truck looking orginal if I can. Keep your eyes open for an engine! Thanks, Doug

Doug:

I had a friend who had a '54 Hornet with the factory 308 Twin H. Only problem was that it had Hydra-Matic. It ran like a stripedl ape but he wanted to changeover to stick. He bought a rusty '51 Pacemaker (I think) that had a stick and pulled all the parts out and found, to his dismay, that the Pacemaker tranny wouldn't bolt to the 308. I'm not sure (can't remember after all these years!) if the trannys were different or it was just the bellhousings.

He was so determined to have a stick in that Hornet, he swapped the engine/tranny combo from the Pacemaker. I think the engine was something like 260 cubic inches. Needless to say, because of the axle ratio and the size of the engine, he was NOT happy with the performance and ended up trading off both cars and all the parts.

That's my story and I'm a-stickin' to it!

Take care - Elden

[Doug Barbee]

Elden,
The engine was a 262. They made the 232, 262, and 308 and a in line 8 that was 250 something.The 262 with the stick should have had the fluid clutch and used a strange bellhousing setup.
My pick up has the 212 engine with babbit brgs and a stock 5.11 rear end .
Kinda hard to drive on todays highways at speed.
Doug

[Bud Tierney]

That wasn't technically a fluid clutch like a "Fluid Drive", but a wet clutch: the clutch plate had a bunch of round cork pieces attached and ran enclosed with "Hudsonite" clutch compound/fluid; the theory was it gave a smoother clutch engagement/disengagement, etc. We had a local mechanic convert to a standard clutch (don't recall if he used another clutch plate) when our 36 sedan clutch went out (he'd converted several before ours).
Doug: if you're putting even a standard 308 onto that transmission designed for the 212, you'd probably better go easy on the pedal; the 308's had lots of low-end torque and the trans might not handle it well. That's why the Hornets did so well on strictly-stock oval tracks: they'd pull away from the 88's coming out of the curves, and while the 88's'd catch them on the straight they'd fall behind again coming out of the corners.
Suggestion: Since you have a pickup I assume you belong to the H-E-T club; the step-down ("fall-in") Hudsons were sweet road cars, and sold well in the open-space states; you might try posting to craigslist auto parts in the various midwest and western states.

[Elden DuRand]

Originally Posted by Doug Barbee

Elden,
The engine was a 262. They made the 232, 262, and 308 and a in line 8 that was 250 something.The 262 with the stick should have had the fluid clutch and used a strange bellhousing setup.
My pick up has the 212 engine with babbit brgs and a stock 5.11 rear end .
Kinda hard to drive on todays highways at speed.
Doug

Doug:

You might want to consider an overdrive setup. Borg-Warner made a really strong "Ummmmm-Clunk" overdrive unit (about 30% RPM reduction) that was used by several manufacturers, including Hudson. Maybe you can find a Hudson expert who can guide you to either a tranny like yours with the overdrive attached or find the unit, tailshafts, etc. so you can convert yours. You will decrease your RPM by about 30%.

Now, the hard way to do it is like I did with my '50 Chevy before I got smart after 50K miles and got a later model overdrive tranny and open shaft rear. I'd put a Perkins Diesel in the Chevy and it would only do 60 with the engine against the governor at 3,000 RPM. It also sounded like an insane sewing machine.

In the first try, I got another third member and driveshaft (they were closed, you know) and spliced an overdrive assembly from a junk tranny into the torque tube close to the gearbox. It worked fine but the unsprung weight was high enough to cause axle tramp but lowered the ratio from 4.10:1 to 2.5:1 and made the 'ol Chevy into a cruiser.

When I changed out the torque tube setup to a '56 Chevy overdrive tranny and open shaft, the rear ratio was around 3.7:1 and I thought the little 154 cubic inch 4-banger Diesel wouldn't be able to pull it. Boy, was I surprised! It ran like a champ and got as much as 44 MPG on the road!

My vote is to go for the overdrive.

Take care - Elden

[ELIDAS]

Originally Posted by Doug Barbee

Bud,
I would love to find a factory 7x engine and o/d transmission, but beggers have to take what they can get!! The 308 is supposed to be a direct drop in swap with my trans. I would like to keep the truck looking orginal if I can. Keep your eyes open for an engine! Thanks, Doug

The engine is not quite a drop in. There are some clearance issues with the steering box. The place I work at was originally a Hudson dealer with the now dead owner being a BIG Hudson collector.

[Bud Tierney]

This's a little (well, a lot) OT...but a lot of Hudson enthusiasts aren't aware Hudson had a respectible presence in England in the prewar years. The saloons (sedans) were considered quite roomy and well-appointed for their price range, a big step above the smaller Brit cars in that price range.
There was a sports car builder (Reid Raillton?) who built Hudson-Raillton's with both the 6's and 8's, if memory serves (I've got a Hudson book here somewhere, but it's buried in the Christmas scramble).
There was also a Hudson Safari Wagon used in Africa, I assume built on the pickup chassis/body, that was apparently pretty well liked at the time.
Hudson also tried a number of innovations; our 36 had an "axleflex" front axle: the outer portions rotated slightly on needle-bearing? connections. Unfortunately, the tie rod went thru holes in two torsion arms, which was OK in the summer, but if you drove in slush, and parked it in freezing weather, the next morning you found the steering frozen!! Ahhh, the good ? old days...

[Bill Geyer]

Doug,

Here is a fellow that is advertising Twin H engines complete with OD Trans. Eric R. Kindervater Ph 609-296-1659.

[peter witte]

If you are still lookinf for the hudson egine/trans i may be able to help.please email me- Pete