wayne sheldon

Likewise! I have a couple/few thousand era photos on my computer, and I can't seem to figure how to organize them! Your good work should stand as a well deserved tribute to you for years to come! As a hobbyist, I thank you.

An interesting insight into an era engineer's early views on the automobile! Thank you John E G!

"She is a keeper!" Both the wife and the car!

Not much information in the ad. No other photos. I am certainly not an expert on McLaughlin automobiles. Although I know the McLaughlin family business dates back into the horse and carriage days somewhat. I always found their history interesting, and have read numerous excerpts on their history in articles related to the Canadian automotive history. They had connections to General Motors, and specifically with Buick, to build in Canada versions of usually Buick automobiles, using Buick designs, and sometimes Buick made parts, sometimes Canadian produced parts to Buick designs. The quality of their cars was generally very good, and many of their models were nearly identical to their USA Buick counterparts. But not all of them. Some late 1920s and early 1930s McLaughlin models looked very much like their Buick counterpart, however, had flathead sixes instead of the Buick design over-head valve six. I do not know how many models had those, however I have seen a fair number of photos of them, and once saw one in person. Although those Canadian models rarely get as far South as California. The owner of the car was quite proud of it regardless! Purely speculation? Or maybe I am just wondering aloud? Perhaps the flathead sixes used by McLaughlin could have been sourced from Oldsmobile? Maybe that could be the cause of the Buick/Oldsmobile confusion here? I was really hoping to see photos of the engine on the kijiji ad site. But alas, there were none. Interesting automobile.

I kind of understand your feelings about the top? Part of me does somewhat prefer a real touring car? However, a longtime good friend has a 1916 Pierce Arrow with a California top, similar to this, and I have ridden in the car several times. I have gotten to the point I really like it! I wish I could be in the market to buy something like this! But, alas, I am afraid I have had my last and only Pierce Arrow.

In my opinion, you are quite correct! I won't go into details here, as it would lead down a path the moderators here do not appreciate (and for sometimes very good reasons!). History views most presidents from a hundred or more years ago, fairly correctly. However there are a few that were loved that shouldn't be, and a few blamed for the country's problems in ways they were not actually responsible for (such as Andrew Johnson).

Similar visors with colored glass were a very popular accessary in the early and mid 1920s. Forty and fifty years ago, one could go to local swap meets and see a dozen of them for sale. In recent decades, I rarely see any of those, even at significant prewar meets like the old Bakersfield swap meet. Glass came in many colors, and often had some sort of pattern pressed into it. There are modern glasses that are very close to what was used originally, I suspect they are still available. Thirty to forty years ago, I knew several people that restored put similar visors on their 1920s cars. They were available earlier than 1920, but hadn't become very popular yet. I am fairly sure I have seen photos or surviving cars with similar visors as early as 1915. The mounting brackets are different, however similar visors were also sold for open cars. The visors themselves were rather common a few years back. It is the mounting brackets, in matching pairs that fit a particular application, that are hard to find. That is a nice one! I like it. Wish I had a car that could use it

And the car looks like it could very well be a Panhard et Levassor. Thank you yet again John E G!

I imagine part of it is that I tend to be a "traditionalist". I like things preserved close to how they were way back when. And part of it is that I spend many hours looking closely at era photographs (sort of trains the "eye" in what to expect). But I tend to prefer wooden coachwork finely painted. I have been up close to horse-drawn carriage work from as far back as the mid 1800s. Talk about incredible workmanship! I see something like this Delage and picture it in an incredibly fine painted dark royal color! A really dark royal Brewster green, or maybe dark maroon/red. I saw a mid 1800s royal carriage in a private collection like that once. Really fine wooden coachwork properly painted can be strikingly beautiful! A friend had a late brass era Packard limousine like that. I was looking for something else yesterday, and ran into photos of it I took at a concourse about thirty years ago. Almost totally original, in fantastic condition. I think I spent over half an hour that day looking at that one car. He rarely took it out, and I had heard about it for a few years, but had not personally seen it before that day. That half hour at one car? Consider that at that concourse, Jack Passey introduced me to Otis Chandler! It wasn't Pebble Beach, but it wasn't some local slouch show either. Think of all the great cars there to be seen. Otis Chandler had at least a half dozen cars from his incredible collection there that day.

Larry, That touring advertisement looks about like I remember his car. I followed that beautiful Buick for many miles on club tours a few times!

This one is an eight. Two cylinders hiding under the horns. If it is in fact a genuine 1942 model (sure looks like one!)? It is quite rare. They were only manufactured for a few months. Although I do seem to recall reading that Packard ran production for a bit longer than others as they built staff cars for the military for just a bit longer? I am not convinced of that myself, just something I had read (like the internet, its gotta be true, right?) Anybody know for certain?

Fan belt off the pullies? Suggests something else needs work. The car has a model A Ford front bumper (sacrilege!)! The rear bumper appears to have a model A medallion, however otherwise is more correct for the car. I am not sure when Chevrolet made bumpers standard equipment, one might consider removing the model A front bumper and moving the rear bumper to the front where it belongs. Again, I don't know Chevrolet's timeline here, but a lot of cars were still having after-market bumpers if any, and many cars had front bumpers only. Ad mentions needing work on the brakes. Could be a problem. The photos don't show enough, however in one of the chassis photos, it appears to have hydraulic brakes to the front wheels. 1928 Chevrolet originally had mechanical brakes, with 1928 being the first year for four-wheel mechanical brakes. They were a levers and rods system with some equalization making them better than the new model A Ford's non-equalized mechanical brakes. If the brakes have been changes over? There could be issues with how it was done? The car overall looks pretty decent. The interior work looks nice, not entirely correct, but close enough and good enough to enjoy for years. Price isn't crazy high. Someone could probably do a lot worse! Provided it does actually run and drive well.

Thank you Larry for the information. I knew some of the Buick sport models for those mid to late 1920s cars had bright colors. They were one of the early major producers to venture down that path. A longtime good friend had a 1927 master sport touring car (I don't offhand know the model number?) which was painted similar colors. He was also one of the local Buick experts, and quite adamant that his Buick had been painted in its correct original colors! The OP car does appear to be the smaller standard series. Note the engine's upper radiator connection on the front of the engine head rather than the piping on the top of the head as the master series cars had. I did not know whether the standard series came in those colors or not.

Thank you John Bloom for posting this, and kar3516 for your comments! Cars like this should be discussed more for the benefit of all.

John B, It may not be your cup o' tea? But I love it! I have been seeing this showing up in several places lately. Every time I see it again I like it even more! It needs a lot of work to get back onto the road, and being a moderately rare European luxury automobile would make it costly to do almost anything to it properly. If I had money (I never had that much!), was twenty years younger (like there is any way to make that happen?), this is a car I could really go for! I expect that the wooden body was originally painted, not left natural. I sure would be curious what colors it may have been?

Overland, on most models in the mid 1910s, famously had their "signature" in the lower front corner on both sides of the top hood panels. You can see that signature in both photos. So yes, it is an Overland.

One doesn't run into them very often, however, five spoke steering wheels were used on several American early automobile manufacturers. I don't recall marque names offhand, just that I have seen them several times over the years. The use of five spoke steering wheels generally seemed to end on cars around 1907. A number of heavy trucks also used five spoke steering wheels, and for some years later, even into the early 1920s. They were often heavy duty and larger around.

That is precisely why I earlier tried to tap-dance around some of the possible reasons for a misunderstanding of the words. I was trying to point out possible reasons for the words he used, as well as keep the door open for further comments from the OP. I do keep hoping. It looks like a really fine example of an early electric, I would like to see more photos of it! (Egregiously self-centered selfish reasons!)

I personally would want the photos and any pertinent discussions preserved for future reference. And the whole thing could later become relevant in a future search as a segue for another newcomer. Perhaps after several days of "deaf ears", such a thread could be temporarily locked and allowed to fall out of sight, and then unlocked for future reference. However, I tend to not want to impose too much on our fine moderators with extra requests. We do not want to scare newcomers away. However those of us that have been active on forums such as this for many years (more than 25 years for me participating and answering questions on other antique automobile forums!), have seen this phenomenon getting much worse in recent years. And nobody wants me to get going on a few diatribes over the socioeconomic and political forces behind this behavior. Of course what we really want is for people interested to join in and add to the discussions about antique automobiles!

I prefer chewing gum myself. Actually I dislike chewing gum, so when I need to make a repair, I have to borrow used chewing gum from someone walking by.

I really miss talking with and listening to people of that and an earlier generation or two. One could get such a feel for what they went through so long ago. I had great uncles that fought in the first World War, other uncles that were in Europe for World War Two. I met and had a couple antique automobile mentors that drove racing cars in the 1920s and 1930s (no well known names). All long gone now. I started asking questions of people when I was very young. A lot of them couldn't believe a kid my age could really be interested. But I was. I still like talking with strangers, and listening to stories they want to tell.

Chevrolet also offered a V8 in 1917 and 1918. However, the vast majority (probably close to 99 percent!) of Chevrolet automobiles from 1916 through model year 1928 were four cylinder engines! There is the rule, and then there are the exceptions to the rule. And I could be wrong. It "might" be possible that it could be an Oldsmobile? However their last four cylinder was about 1924. Although the chassis and engine were very similar to some of the Chevrolet models of similar years, I suspect this chassis it later than 1924. I have known a few people with early 1920s four cylinder Oldsmobiles. But i never really worked on one to get close enough to the chassis myself.

Most people are too busy arguing about how "right" they are to actually learn what "is right". That includes most of my family.

A very good friend about fifty years ago bought a 1924ish Mack three axle Bulldog (HUGE!) truck. He drove it home a couple hundred miles from Southern California into Northern California! It had the original optional pneumatic tires and wheels, which generally meant it would have one of the "higher" gear ratios. He loved to tell people that it had a top speed of "sixteen miles per hour, NOT seventeen, SIXTEEN!"

Years ago, I had a 1928 Chevrolet chassis that looked very much like that! I had saved it from a scrap yard, and parted out the pieces. It was in pretty bad shape, I sold pieces cheap. I was really pleased when a fellow restoring a 1928 had a mechanically good rear end with a bent housing (apparently a common failure on that series Chevrolet?), came along and found my housing straight but with the rear cover missing most of the insides were useless or missing. We were both glad I had saved it from the scrappers! He actually offered to pay me more than I wanted, I said I was happy someone that needed it got it. 1928 was the first year for front wheel brakes on Chevrolet, which my chassis had. Parts may be missing, but I don't see brakes to the front, so I would guess about 1926 or 1927. Front cross member and rear cross member/gasoline tank cover look nearly identical to what I had.