and driveability. The new transmission was built around the Ravigneaux planetary of the "X" transmissions. Where many transmissions had a fourth gear added as an afterthought, Ford's new transmission was designed with a fourth gear already integrated into the gearset. Because it was based on the X transmissions, its gear ratios from 1-3 were the same, with the fourth being .67:1. The transmission featured a split-torque application for third gear, as well as a lockup in the torque converter. The project was shelved with a design that initially lacked a dampener in the torque converter, but after the project was revisited, a dampener ultimately made its way into the final design before Job 1. The XT-LOD was initially abandoned in 1966, but revisited in 1974 as a result of rising gas prices. The transmission was introduced when Ford downsized its full size line for 1979. Initially called XT-LOD (Extension Lock-Up Overdrive), its name was changed when revisited in 1974 to FIOD (Ford Integrated Overdrive) and then to its final name in 1979, the Ford AOD transmission. GAZ copy Despite the Cold War, the Soviet Union, in developing its automotive industry, would often base its products on western technology, from whom it would either purchase a full licence (the GAZ factory was designed by the Ford Motor Company, later the Lada factory would be built by Fiat etc.) or make an indigenous copy by reverse engineering. In the 1950s, as the GAZ plant was preparing to launch its new generation of cars, that comprised the mid-size GAZ-21 Volga sedan and the full-size GAZ-13 Chaika limousine, it was specified that both vehicles feature the automatic transmission. Having evaluated many models, Borg-Warner's Ford-O-Matic and Cruise-O-Matic were selected. Despite very closely resembling the American transmissions, GAZ's copies did have distinctive differences. First of all - their components were adopted to the metric units. Their gear ratios - to the car's engines. Both cars' handbrake actuated a central drum between the housing and the drive shaft, instead of the rear wheels. Thus a parking pawl was deemed redundant. Volga's transmission, based on the Ford-O-Matic, required additional adaptation to the air-cooled torque converter, as it was driven by a 65 hp 4 cylinder engine. Controlled by a steering column mounted lever, it had four regimes: Зх-Н-Д-П (R-N-D-L). In Drive the car would start in second and automatically shift to third depending on throttle position (the valve