Camaro Research Group Discussion > Originality
The straight skinny on post '65, pre-mid '70, Hurst shifter plating
Shadow Ahead:
Are there engineering sheets available from GM's historical services that back up what you gentlemen are saying?
I wouldn't be asking about what plating was either specified by manufacturers or aftermarket if there were readily available documents for the period of time indicated. There are precious few documents surviving that period when Hurst was in Pa.
If those specified documents exist they exist from the OEM's. Does Pete Serio provide hard data as to why concludes that all Hurst shifters from '60-'70? Individuals on various forums. Gravitate between ear zinc and silver cadmium. You can argue till the cows come home about what GM specified but I'm interested in hard data, and only hard data. Not what individuals say or write. I'm here because what people say, doesn't agree. What people have stated, as fact, thus far has no proof behind it. That is what I'm looking for. Not opinion, not argument, not declarative statements, fact.
We're the shifters zinc of cad or were they specified as zinc or cad. Either situation works for me.
Thanks.
Steve
firstgenaddict:
ok, correct me if I am wrong I think the actual question is are people being led to believe that zinc is correct because environmentally true cadmium plating is near impossible to have done, or is their documentation from the oem to back up the claims?
Which is a good question.
Shadow Ahead:
^ Thank you. Yes,that is the simple question. I don't care if it's zinc or cad or some came that way and others were cad because Hurst sent the shifters out to have the plating done. I strongly suspect after talking to people and after others have done individual testing, that there is no absolute. There's the standard, and then there's the reality of having job shops do outside work for an aftermarket company.
Around '68 things changed rapidly at Hurst and unless they inspected the plating baths as the parts were getting done, how would they or GM or any other OEM customer know? Looking at it? Zinc with the right chromates can look almost exactly like silver cadmium. Destructive testing with acid to find out? Really?
It's really two questions: 1)What was the plating spec?
2) what has subsequent spot checking of original, unmolested items shown?
My interest is purely historical.
On the judging field for original and restored cars, who is going to a) check the shifter box and hardware?
b)and who is going to know, or care, what they are looking at?
c)If they are qualified experts, how would they ever discern beween silver cadmium and the various zinc processes that can look almost exactly the same?
So the last three questions are not a problem that needs addressing.
Steve
Shadow Ahead:
--- Quote from: firstgenaddict on January 21, 2015, 08:30:49 PM ---You are making statements regarding specs in a 1962 advertisements for Hurst Shifters, yet asking questions about 65-69 Hurst supplied OEM shifters.
Apples to Oranges
GM's specs may or may not have been the exact specs for what Hurst supplied to the aftermarket.
Example elimination of the positive stops in the comp plus, the bayonette handle and rubber insulator were not used, nor were the rubber bushings in the shifter gates for the rods, these were done to accommodate the OEM's, not for performance.
--- End quote ---
I was establishing what I do know and what the company said about all their shifters in '62 and '63.
I thought Hurst established their first OEM relationship with Pontiac and that was in '61.
What Pontiac, and subsequent clients such as Oldsmobile, specified for the rods and linkage, is another story. I'm quite well acqianted with the floppy linkage on my '69 Z-28 in the seventies. I'm acquainted with less than perfect crispness on my '70 AMX with factory Hurst.
I get your point about the OEM's and entirely agree. Nevertheless leaving out shift arms and rods and rubber vs steel bushings, then the standard, at least through '63, as per their ads, was cadmium plated shifter box and hardware.
After that time, I have found no ads, no engineering papers from OEM's, and no proof that cadmium lit the way through mid-1970.
Steve
KurtS:
Find proof that the rear axle was painted. I doubt you can, but it was.
My point is you have a high standard that very few could answer in the day, let alone now.
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