No ones argueing that the M5 was a major player in WWII nor the total numbers of straight shift military vehicles in in WWII.
As stated, I originally posted that a WWII Vet, who is no longer with us, claimed to have put automatic trans fluid down the carb of gasoline engines and intakes of diesel engines because they believed that it cleaned the carbon out of the topend of those ICE's.
You stated that automatic transmissions were not used in the miltary until the 50's and you were obviously wrong.....
He served during WWII and one of the stories he shared was that he was a driver w/the Red Ball Express which anyone with any miltary knowledge of WWII will know what that was. He served up into the 50's in motor transport and they definitely had automatic transmissions in many military ICE propelled vehicles that used either Type A, Type F or equivalent oils during that time frame.
I read your linked pdf on servicing of the auto trans in the M5 (and various other military machinery that used the auto trans during WWII, btw) and saw that they used heavy duty engine oil at the time when that spec was wrote. I'll grant you that but, at some point in 48/49 GM finally spec'd the requirements for automatic transmission oil that met their requirements and it was for Type A trans oil.
At what point did GM change from engine oil to Type A or some equivalent oil such as an aircraft hydraulic oil that "may" have been used by maintenance crews to get better performance out of those auto trannys before the spec I can find no documentation. But I have found several on-line sources that indicate even the oldest known Hydra-matics still in service today by antique collectors such as ourselves use Type A, Type F or the modern Dexron equivalents. Nowhere is engine oil even considered an option. So obviously the spec changed for the Hydra-matics oil.
So the argument seems to have morphed from you being wrong on auto tranny use during WWII to still trying to debunk that military service personel used auto tranny fluid to clean carbon out of ICE's. The time frame "may" be wrong when they started useing it but the fact remains that I was told by more than one WWII era Vet that they did use it during the times they served which was in the 1940's/50's.
re. pouring engine oil down the intake of an ICE to clean out carbon. I don't know of anyone that would do that as it would not only contribute to carbon contamination but would also foul out the sparkplug, I wouldn't recommend it.
Dave
