Talk:Preselector gearbox

Invented in 1928?
A succession of edits have resulted in the first paragraph saying: "It was originally invented... in 1928... and was first used in World War I tanks."

Does anyone know the correct dates? Perhaps Wilson used them in World War I tanks and then patented the gearbox in 1928. But this is just a guess as I'm not familiar with these details. Can anyone help? Adrian Robson 11:13, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
 * It might not be ENTIRELY accurate, but by rearranging the sentence a bit, it now describes a chronology that's at least POSSIBLE, if not terribly probable. Somebody really needs to look up what ACTUALLY happened. JDS2005 05:51, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
 * It could of course just been a typo and they meant to say WWII... I don't think there was much choice of gearbox except crash, dog clutch or straight epicyclic until synchro came in sometime in the 30s and hydraulic/torque converter autos sometime after... 77.102.101.220 (talk) 18:59, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

The Viratelle epicyclic pre-selector gearbox is the first one known designed and used from 1906, used on Viratelle motobikes with 3 speeds but also on cyclecars with 3 forward speeds and a reverse gear. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.12.35.134 (talk) 02:13, 6 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Do you have any details of this Viratelle ? There were plenty of epicyclic gearboxes around 1900 (see Lanchester in particular), but were they preselectors? Andy Dingley (talk) 12:43, 6 May 2016 (UTC)

Wilson's Chronology
The confusion arises because Wilson designed "epicyclic gearboxes" for the purpose of steering tanks long before his pre-selector gearbox.


 * March 1917, the Oldbury gearbox trials between 8 different tanks (4 being current production "lozenge" Mark IIs), each fitted with a different transmission. As well as gearboxes, one was hydraulic, two electric, one a multi-clutch design and one had Wilson's first own-designed epicyclic gearbox, although this wasn't a pre-selector and wasn't even the main transmission - his first innovation was in using the easily-controlled nature of the epicyclic brake band to provide steering for tanks. The main transmission was a standard 4-speed crash (Wrigley?).


 * June 1917, the first mock-up of the Mark V appears, with the Wilson epicyclic steering gear, largely as tested. This was the first of the heavy tanks that could be driven by a single driver, without requiring him to signal orders inside to others working the brake levers.


 * In 1918, some work went on to test a Lanchester epicyclic gearbox as the main transmission. The use of an epicyclic gearbox wasn't new, as Lanchester had used a manually-controlled a 3-speed since 1900.


 * 1928, Wilson uses his knowledge of epicyclic gearboxes controlled by brake bands to produce his pre-selector gearbox. His partner is John Siddeley, of Armstrong Siddeley.


 * 1929 Wilson has the first(?) Daimler Double Six (chassis 30661, which still exists), with a unique chassis re-designed by Reid Railton and built by Thomson & Taylor. He fits his own design of pre-selector gearbox to it.


 * 1929 Armstrong Siddeley offer Wilson pre-selector gearboxes as an option (before Daimler, but I don't know if it was before or after Wilson's Double Six).


 * 1930, Daimler acquire Lanchester and (AFAIK) the first offering is a Lanchester Eighteen, which has the manual Lanchester gearbox but the Daimler addition of a fluid flywheel. Wilson's Double Six also returns to Daimler and they like the gearbox so much they start offering it on production cars.


 * 1931, first tank with a Wilson pre-selector gearbox was the Light Tank Mk II


 * 1932, MG start offering pre-selector gearboxes (the Wilson design, made by ENV) in the racing MG K-types

Andy Dingley (talk) 00:48, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

DAF cars?
According to my dad's memory of driving one, and other things heard in passing, at least, the small cars DAF produced in the 60s and 70s used some kind of (clunky) 3-speed pre-selector... does anyone know enough else about them to add them into the article? 193.63.174.10 (talk) 10:10, 30 April 2009 (UTC)


 * The Daf system was (and still is, a friend of mine has two and drives them pretty much every day!) a continuously variable transmission, a form of automatic transmission, rather than a preselector. "Preselectors" to a broad definition are an intermediate between manuals and autos: they automate the gear-changing / clutch use process but rely on manual selection of the appropriate ratio (some preselectors, but not all, also automate clutch use for moving away from rest).
 * The Daf system has several parts: a cone pulley & belt system that varies the transmission "gear ratio", and does this automatically - mostly according to engine manifold vacuum, i.e. "shift down if the engine is working too hard". Secondly a simple centrifugal clutch (weighted friction shoes against springs) that handles clutch activation against engine rpm. There's a manual "stick shift", but this is just for Forward/Neutral/Reverse selection - the CVT part works quite well in reverse too (I believe they did add some speed limiting to this, otherwise Dutch crazies could drive them ridiculously fast backwards and little Dafs aren't the most stable chassis!). One of the more surprising parts is that the differential between the rear wheels is mounted "upstream" of the transmission and so there are actually two separate CVT units in there, one per side. Causes problems if one CVT unit starts to stick relative to the other - you could be in a different gear for each wheel.
 * At the time, Daf were also building military vehicles with a H-drive (engine/diff/separate drivetrains to each side). I've sometimes wondered if this was an influence on the split CVT system?


 * Thanks for raising this, it's an interesting point and well worthy of Wikicoverage. However it would belong under CVT, not preselector. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:32, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Tiger tank
The Tiger tank of World War Two used a form of pre-selective gearbox, offering 8 speeds

Actually the Tiger used a copy of the Churchill tank's Merritt-Brown regenerative gearbox. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.40.254.31 (talk) 21:40, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Tiger used Henschel regenerative steering mechanism and Olvar-Maybach binary gearbox.

Cotal
Where does the Cotal pre-selective gearbox fit in? It was used in many French high-class automobiles in the 1930s like Bugatti, Delage etc. and even in the Cord 810 / 812. Salmson built it under licence for it's own use. --Chief tin cloud (talk) 13:34, 9 February 2011 (UTC)


 * AFAIK the Cotal was more like a semi-auto, with electromagnet clutches operated by a small lever operating in a gate next to the steering wheel.


 * The Cotal of the 1930s was a manually controlled epicyclic, like the Wilson. The difference is that instead of band brakes, it used electromagnetic clutches. These two clutches each consisted of a central rotating disk (a simple steel pole piece) and a pair of coil-carrying rings, one rotating and one fixed (this coil could be considered as either a clutch or a brake). Slip rings were used to transmit electrical power to the rotating clutch elements.
 * Unlike the Wilson, these clutches were controlled by a simple dash or column-mounted switch and relays. There was no mechanical servo action, so no need for the Wilson's cam or toggle arrangements and the change gear pedal. It wasn't really a pre-selector as such, as the gear was selected as soon as the lever was moved.
 * In the 1950s, Cotal used this same technology to provide an electric clutch (full manual changes through a normal gearbox, but no clutch pedal) for small Renaults like the Dauphine, but it was relatively unsuccessful - it needed to transmit the entire engine torque through the clutch, requiring a relatively large and powerful clutch that tended to give trouble with the sliprings. There was also a similar transmission to the 1930s Cotal, built by Ferlec and used in the Dauphine, with a dashboard button shift. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:21, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Maybach
To my knowledge the Maybach gearbox is some preselector kind (gears are dialled in with two little studs on the steering wheel, and I think switched by pedal). It had its first production appearance in the W 6 of 1929 and shortly after in the more luxurious 12cyl Zeppelin of 1930. The basic design was used in all models until production stop in 1941. I don't know whether this was an in-house invention, or whether it has any connection to "Merritt-Brown" as mentioned above under "Tiger tank", but since the Motor of the Tiger came from Maybach, I would expect the Tiger gearbox to be closely related to Maybach's automobile gearboxes. Sorry if this all sounds a bit vague, but maybe it provides hints for further investigation. If you haven't heard of Wilhelm Maybach look him up. In some ways one might argue that he was the inventor of the automobile engine, the motorbike, the four-speed gearbox, and maybe even the automobile itself, so I wouldn't be surprised if the preselector gearbox was one of his many inventions. --BjKa (talk) 17:26, 11 March 2011 (UTC)


 * The Tiger gearbox (hardly surprisingly for something handling so much power) didn't bear much relation to either Maybach gearboxes, or even the Merritt-Brown. The steering gearbox was Merritt-Brown like, but not the gear changing mechanism. IMHO, Maybach's claim for engine inventions are way overblown. What he did was to make lighter versions of things already being done for heavyweight stationary engines, so that they could be applied to automobiles. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:37, 11 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Re:Tiger: Ah thanks for clearing that up. Very interesting.
 * Re:Maybach: I pretty much agree with what you're saying, I'd just like to add that the way I've heard it, Maybach's greatest achievement was to develop the "Otto"-Engine with its rpms in the hundreds into something higher revving (thousands) and that's what was needed for cars.
 * Still, some contributor mentioned preselector gearboxes coming up around 1928, which coincides with the development of the Maybach W 6, so it might be worth looking into... --BjKa (talk) 10:50, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The Maybach transmission was called the Doppelschnellgang. Thirty (or seventy, depending on source) Lagonda 3 litres were also fitted with this transmission.  It combined a 'low' and 'normal' range selector with a four-speed operated with steering wheel controls; the selection of the gears was made by servos in the box, with operation from a partial vacuum generated from the engine and atmospheric pressure. The driver merely had to lift the throttle to engage the next selected ratio.  Later versions put control of all eight ratios on the steering wheel so that the floor-mounted lever just controlled forward, reverse and neutral.  Which gave the driver eight speeds in both directions.  Who says the Germans have no sense of humour? Mr Larrington (talk) 08:17, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Recent changes
I note a significant (uncited) re-write. Apart from other issues in there, it's really incorrect to describe pre-selector gearboxes as epicyclic. The Wilson pre-selector was epicyclic, but others weren't and it's certainly not a requirement for a pre-selector gearbox. Andy Dingley (talk) 09:36, 31 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Hi, hoped you are about. All the names and numbers please of those mysterious non-epicyclic pre-selectors asap! Eddaido (talk) 10:37, 31 July 2011 (UTC)


 * All the names and numbers please of those mysterious non-epicyclic pre-selectors asap!
 * I do not appreciate your tone here, especially not the "ASAP" part. The onus is on the editor making the changes to provide supporting evidence. Nor am I expected to work under an "ASAP" timescale of your choosing. I particularly do not care for your accusation of dishonesty on my talk page, If you are to show yourself honest when you are the one making the claim at Commons that the Jowett Bradford was an independent maker from Jowett. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:58, 31 July 2011 (UTC)


 * The p means possible, the ! means lots of (friendly) laughs.


 * Anyway, you acknowledge that, in both cases i.e. including Jowett, there is no evidence for your claims? You cannot show us something that does not exist, can you. Eddaido (talk) 21:16, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Clarification needed
Request for explanation/Clarification needed: Is this sentence the problem for you? ". . . while a semi-automatic transmission uses a clutch (or multiple clutches)???, like a traditional manual transmission" - from Manumatic. Eddaido (talk) 12:46, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Multi-clutch gearbox vs Single ratio per clutch
Reading these two sections, they seem to describe the same thing. Either I missed something, or the descriptions could be made better, or they should be one section. Comments?  Stepho  talk 09:30, 12 August 2011 (UTC)


 * There are several multi-clutch designs: one per ratio, binary selection of serial gearboxes, and dual clutch selection between two multi-ratio gearboxes. Until recently there was a hierarchy that made this clear. The distinction was trashed in this edit. I've now restored it. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:04, 12 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks, that makes it much clearer.  Stepho  talk 23:56, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

auto union mention
Mercedes made the silver arrows, not auto union. This is even mentioned on their respective Wikipedia pages. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.137.149.196 (talk) 22:45, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * While it's true that the term was originally applied to the Mercedes GP cars of the 1930s, it has come to mean both the Mercedes and Auto Union cars of that period. See, for example, Chris Nixon's very marvellous book "Racing The Silver Arrows", covering both marques.  Plus they were supposed to be white, only turning silver when the paint had to be removed to save weight.  Allegedly. Mr Larrington (talk) 02:38, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

Talbot design
Hi Andy Dingley. Regarding this revert of yours with the description "The Roesch gearbox in the Talbot wasn't a Wilson", references 12 and 14 state that it is a type of Wilson gearbox. Do you have sources suggesting they are incorrect? Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 23:58, 24 January 2020 (UTC)
 * [14] doesn't even mention it (it's about Cotal gearboxes in Wickham railcars)
 * The Roesch gearbox is a Roesch, not a Wilson. It's a pre-selective epicyclic and it used the Wilson patents (for which Roesch presumably paid some licence fee) but it was otherwise a clean-slate design. Roesch saw Wilson's gearbox as clumsy, overweight and underpowered, so he designed and engineered his own version from scratch (ENV later did something similar, but less sophisticated). By paying particular attention to the metallurgy of the gears, their surface finish, and running them on roller bearings, he achieved about three times the power through a gearbox of the same size.
 * As to the other ref, [12], that's about the centrifugal 'Traffic Clutch' which Roesch developed to cut out the noise (and that's about it) of the gearbox when idling. It's not about the gearbox itself. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:23, 25 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Hi. I mean refs 12 and 14 in this version. Sorry for the confusion. Those changes do amount to a very different gearbox; do you have any sources about this? Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 21:21, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
 * If the Blight book is specifically on Roesch in his time at Talbot, it would surely cover this (although I don't have it). It's not in any of my gearbox books (AFAICS), but it is in some 1930s general garage handbooks, under the Talbots (so that's production Talbots, rather than Roesch's racing one-offs, although I don't know how many Talbot sold).
 * Motor Sport is usually a good start for searching otherwise. They'll have covered it in the 1930s, but they also did a lot of very good retrospective articles in the 1950s, about the 1930s, and those are at a useful level of detail for our purposes here. There's one piece for December 1952. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:45, 25 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Thanks Andy. The 1952 Motor Sport article has some really useful info. Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 00:26, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Multi-clutch gearboxes
Hi Andy. The reason that I replaced this section with links to the other transmission types is that it potentially confused the reader by implying that the Maxwell and dual-clutch transmissions are considered preselector gearboxes. The section also goes into excessive detail about transmissions which are not preselector gearboxes. If you believe this content is necessary for context, could you please address these issues? Personally, it seems like a case of WP:COATRACK to me. Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 06:49, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * "Preselector" was not the common name for these gearboxes at the time, they were just as often (more?) referred to as "self-changing". This was particularly the case outside the UK, the home of the Wilson (which ironically was made by the Self-Changing Gears company), because it was the Wilson and its offshoots which really relied on the force behind the "change gear pedal" to operate. Many of the others were a bit more refined and had fingertip or electric controls.
 * The point is that the group of gearboxes described here have a scope which is "semi-automatic". The driver is the only control of ratio choice, but the complex dexterity of changing gear (which wasn't easy in the pre-synchromesh 1930s) was done for them. Once self-controlled automatic gearboxes come in post-war, mainly from the US, this group largely disappears (except on large vehicles, such as buses). Within this group the Maybach types (both car and tank) fit perfectly well, even if they don't have the Wilson's same concepts of selection-before-change and the pedal for activating the change. The grouping here is by application (easy changes for a difficult box in the 1930s) rather than technology (band brakes and toggle levers with a busbar).
 * There is some disconnect between the scope and the title. But that's COMMONNAME for you. Readability would take too much of a hit to arrange it any other way that I can see. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:16, 14 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Hi Andy, I believe that the disconnect between the scope and the title would be better solved by discussing the various types in Semi-automatic transmission. This is a more appropriate place for the content, and avoids confusing the reader about what a preselector gearbox actually is. Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 23:15, 14 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Tell you what Simon, have it your way. Redirect the lot to Semi-automatic transmission.  You've trashed all the other articles, have this one too. I give up.  No-one else cares, and I already know what a preselector is. You win. Congratulations. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:30, 14 February 2020 (UTC)


 * WP:FAITH please. It sounds like you don't care any more, but for the record I think there was a misunderstanding. I'm not trying to trash the article by replace it with a redirect, my intention is for the article to be clearer about what is and isn't considered a preselector gearbox. 1292simon (talk) 22:26, 15 February 2020 (UTC)


 * "You've trashed all the other articles". 1292simon its too, too true. Eddaido (talk) 09:42, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Reference formatting

 * WP:CITEVAR And now you're just going out of your way to piss people off for the sake of it. Andy Dingley (talk) 12:31, 20 February 2020 (UTC)


 * That's not true. The article had an inconsistent mix of citation styles, so I made them all the same style. If you don't like this citation style, you're welcome to change all the refs to the other one. Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 08:36, 21 February 2020 (UTC)
 * OK, done now. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:38, 21 February 2020 (UTC)


 * No it's not. You merely reverted my edit yet again. 1292simon (talk) 21:34, 21 February 2020 (UTC)


 * You're at 3RR now. Do it again and it's ANI.  Your damage here, and elsewhere, is beyond a joke. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:40, 22 February 2020 (UTC)


 * That's incorrect. WP:HARASS, please. Again you have ignored my Talk page reply above, instead reverting my edit again. 1292simon (talk) 02:20, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
 * 4RR edit-warring against WP:CITEVAR. No discussion as to what is wrong with the citations here. Reflex insta-reversion here, when (yet again) someone has to fix all of your errors (4 factual errors in one para?). Just what is your problem?  (Apart from a massive case of WP:OWN) Why do you keep inventing the most obscure rubbish (Alvis Stalwarts having preselector gearboxes?) and why do you never bother with any robust sourcing? Andy Dingley (talk) 02:36, 23 February 2020 (UTC)


 * WP:CIVIL, please Andy. Please see my reply above regarding CITEVAR. The Alvis Stalwart was added to the article by someone else. Regarding the sourcing, I think you will find that my edits have actually added references to the article. 1292simon (talk) 04:37, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
 * You have given no reply. You claimed, "had an inconsistent mix of citation styles" (It didn't. Any variations were appropriate, because of things like multiple cites to one large book, vs. a single web site. If you have a real point about a specific citation, then say what it is and then it can get fixed, if needed.) and then you state, "you're welcome to change all the refs to the other one" when you simply revert to your own version afterwards anyway.
 * "The Alvis Stalwart was added to the article by someone else. "
 * No, you did it here, here and here. Now maybe you weren't the first to, but if you're going to keep edit-warring over another editor, it's on you to make sure that your version is at least better, not just the one you WP:OWN. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:11, 23 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Hi Andy. The reference formatting was previously a mix of bibliography-style referencing and direct references, so I changed them all to the direct style. If you want to change them all to the bibliography-style instead, of course I would not revert it. Apologies for restoring the Stalwart line, I did not notice that this correction was combined with your reverts. 1292simon (talk) 07:29, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
 * "a mix of bibliography-style referencing and direct references,"
 * Yes, this is how we regularly format refs when they're a mix of half repeated citations to the same large ref (usually a book) and half single references to websites. Are you suggesting that we repeat the whole reference to a book every time we cite a different page? Andy Dingley (talk) 08:49, 25 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Why would you think that I'd want a whole new reference for each page of a book?? My preference is to use the 'refpage' template, as per the current revision. 1292simon (talk) 09:57, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
 * My preference
 * And that's all this is. Your preference, to use a format which is obscure on WP (just how often is it used?), which bloats the reader's text, which doesn't indicate which citations are in common and is right against CITEVAR, yet you're happy to persistently edit-war it into place. No. Enough. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:37, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Andy, you missed my previous question: "Why would you think that I'd want a whole new reference for each page of a book??" Did you genuinely think I wanted to do this, or was it asked to ridicule my position? How often a particular style is used is irrelevant. Why do you think it is against CITEVAR? This method actually does "indicate which citations are in common", in fact it makes it easier for the reader to see which citations are from the same book. 1292simon (talk) 22:01, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Your last change was no sort of improvement. I've reverted it to the previous.
 * And it is inconsiderate to revert an edit in the middle of a Talk page discussion. Have you heard yourself? Just how much edit-warring have you been doing across all of these articles? From the 6 litre E-type Jag onwards. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:43, 26 February 2020 (UTC)


 * I don't think that insults and vague accusations are helpful here. Please see my previous questions about the actual article content. 1292simon (talk) 07:30, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I thought I'd been very specific with the accusations. If you'd prefer every single one of the unfounded errors you keep introducing to be tabulated for easy reference, I can do that too. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:26, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Intro and Advantages sections
Hello Andy. Regarding the edits of mine that you recently reverted, could you please be more specific about what the "confused changes" are? Also, I am still waiting for you to answer my questions in the previous section please. Cheers, 1292simon (talk) 21:49, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I've never seen one of your edits to these articles to be an improvement. Here's your latest: replacing a list of cars with a link to a category. Fair enough? Except that it's not even a list of cars, is it?  It's a list of engines. And not even car engines.
 * Your edits are a mess. Clueless, regularly inaccurate, bringing no new information or sourcing to an article, never making anything clearer, more accurate, or more comprehensive. Yet you just keep banging them in regardless.
 * What are the changes you've made here?  Taking the "dubious" tag off the Viratelle gearbox even being a preselector, without doing anything to address the problem of whether it even belongs on the page. Turning the illm link into an invisible wl to a foreign language wiki (we don't do that). Stripping out the footnotes, turning a structured and clear list into an unclear snippet of prose, but at least you pointed out that the Tiger was an "armoured tank", as opposed to the other sort. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:49, 7 March 2020 (UTC)


 * The "dubious" tag was removed because the 2nd reference states that the Viratelle was a preselector gearbox. Thanks for pointing out the issue with the French wiki link, I have now fixed that. Could you please stop ignoring my questions above? 1292simon (talk) 06:58, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
 * You ask too much. Your approach of "scatter-gun random unsupportable changes across everything, then ask to have each one explained to you and individually corrected" is asking too much of other editors to clean up after you. If you can't defend a change, when you make it, with enough sourcing to back this up, then per BURDEN you just shouldn't be making that change. You keep restoring the Viratelle gearbox (on the basis of repeated refs to a Google blog site) and yet we still have nothing to distinguish this as a preselector gearbox from just a bigger version of the Sturmey-Archer, with immediate engagement of ratios. It doesn't even belong here. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:57, 8 March 2020 (UTC)


 * My unanswered questions are specifically your claims regarding CITEVAR and page numbers, which isn't really asking that much. I agree that the referencing for the Viratelle is shaky, and I would not object to the section being removed if you have concerns about it (I think there was some confusion here, because there was previously a "dubious" tag relating to a statement that it was the first of its type). 1292simon (talk) 06:17, 9 March 2020 (UTC)