After a childhood spent being gaga over cars, through my wonder years and into my later teens I had all but lost interest in them. How else to explain how such a dyed-in-the-wool car guy could settle for 1974 Mercury Comet four-door as his first car? In retrospect I can't say I blame myself seeing that when I was thirteen, GM started "The Great Downsizing Epoch" that may have resulted in better cars, but also began an era when cars began to become soulless, appliance like transportation conveyances. However, when I first saw a black, 1983 Oldsmobile Hurst Olds Cutlass, my childhood love affair with all things automobilia was re-kindled. '83 H\O's were black while the '84's, like this one here, were silver.
The 1983 Hurst\Olds Cutlass was offered as celebratory fifteenth anniversary edition of the 1968 Hurst\Olds Cutlass; the '84's kept the party going for another year. From 1985 through 1987, what was essentially the Hurst\Olds became the 4-4-2 hearkening another Oldsmobile moniker of yore.
The original H\O's featured a high-performance version of Oldsmobile's "Rocket 455 V-8" that got around General Motor's mandate that no intermediate model could have an engine larger than 400 cubic-inches; Oldsmobile claiming that Hurst Performance installed the engine although in reality, Oldsmobile installed the engines along with a Hurst Dual-Gate shifter that allowed drivers to shift the automatic transmission manually. Or semi-automatically since the cars did not have a clutch. Oldsmobile partnered with Hurst on Hurst\Olds Cutlass' in 1968 and 1969, 1972 through 1975, 1979 and 1983 and 1984.
The 1983 and 1984 H\O's and the 4-4-2's from 1985-1987 cars featured a performance version of the last Oldsmobile "Rocket V-8" that displaced just 307 cubic-inches. These "Rockets" had little in common with the vaunted Rockets of yore like the original H\O's 455 cubic-inch heavy breathers. Based on the Oldsmobile 260 cubic-inch V-8 that Oldsmobile offered from 1975-1982, these 307's had a "hotter" cam, stiffer valve springs and richer jetting of the secondary-barrels on the over square Rochester Quadra-Jet. The modest modifications helped bumped horsepower to one-hundred seventy; a thirty horsepower increase over a base 307 engine. Certainly nothing to really write home about but back in the early '80's, any increase in horsepower was a welcome one.
The star of the show on the '83 and '84 H/O's were these Hurst-supplied "Lightning-Rod" shifters. The "rod" on the left allowed normal, automatic shifting if the driver selects OVERDRIVE. Put it in D and the shifter on the right takes care of the one-two up-shift, the middle shifter the two-three shift and when it's time to up-shift to over-drive or fourth gear, the driver slides the shifter on the left to OD. Certainly cool looking but rather cumbersome and bulky to operate none-the-less.
Similar to today's "manumatics", I can't imagine many driver's used the "Lightning-Rod's" on a regular basis. Case in point, on my son's 2017 Chevrolet Camaro which has an automatic, he can "row-his-own" from the shifter or use paddles behind his steering wheel. He's told me that the only time he's used the shifters is when I've been with him in the car while he's driving.
Pointless baubles and bits, though, are all part of what makes a "specialty-car" like this actually special. Certainly worked on me. Still does. I love these cars; the similar looking but "Lightning Rod" shifter less 4-4-2's that came after it too. The flashy paint jobs, the chrome wheels, the snarly sounding engine that really didn't have that much go and of course the shifters all coming together to re-stoke my automobile fire that hasn't been extinguished since.
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