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Aanderson44

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  • Birthday 07/12/1944

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  1. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I'm going to look at a 48 Ford conv. for sale today. What would be a good speed be on the highway? Thanks </div></div> When new, these cars were more than capable of 70-75mph, good enough for the day, but in today's traffic, I don't know--things like steering, brakes (arguably, 40-48 Fords had some of the best drum brakes ever built, but they don't compare to modern cars). Still, it should be a great tour car. Art Anderson
  2. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Evidently there is such a thing, but it appears to be a protoype Thunderbird in Fairlane trim. A 1955 Fairlane-Thunderbird is discussed in the following URL: http://www.classiccar.com/aci-rarebird1.php A advertisement for what is suppose to be a 1955 Ford Fairlane-Thunderbird is shown by McClellen's Automobile Literature at: http://mclellansautomotive.com/photos/H3399.jpg I remember that GM combined Chevrolets and Cadillac Elderado Barritz in 1956 and 1957 to make the Chevrolet El Morocco. Hope this helps </div></div> Ford stylists did play around with the use of the Fairlane "checkmark" chrome spear for the fledgling Thunderbird. Robert Crusoe, then head of Ford Styling actually had a '55 'Bird built for him with this trim on it, and apparently drove it for a couple of years. AMT Corporation, then deeply involved in producing promotional models for the auto industry (before they got into making plastic model car kits) actually tooled this chrome trim into their 1955 Thunderbird promotional model, ran several test shots, before Ford styling got rid of the trim--I've seen several of these test shots--they were in the AMT Corporation archives through 1979, in the boardroom display cases at their old Maple Road factory in Troy MI. As for the El Morocco, those were a private venture, customized '56 Chevies (only a few built, restyled to resemble the '56 Eldorado Biarritz, and several 57's, with restyling (pretty much Cal-custom kind of stuff), intended to make them ape the new for 1957 Cadillac Eldorado Brougham. Those used some sheet metal work on the rear quarters to make the Eldo-style raised fins, '56 Plymouth taillight lenses, and 1938 Dodge headlight "buckets", filled solidly with Bondo to make the rear bumperette "bombs". But, GM's top management found out about the El Morocco project, and cut them off pronto, in either late 1956 or early 1957. The person behind the El Morocco was a Detroit area entrepreneur by the last name of Allender, BTW. Art Anderson
  3. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Can anyone give me the text book definiton in use during the 1930s for a Phaeton and a Touring car? What are the differences between the two body styles, if any? Paul </div></div> In all this, I think it's well to remember that automakers used the term "Touring Car" on several different styles of bodies over the years. For example, pre-1910 (and even a few years after that), automobiles (usually luxury cars) having closed passenger compartments, with open-air front seat for the chauffeur, and large luggage racks on the roof, were often termed "Touring Car" by their manufacturer or coachbuilder. "Touring" as a descriptive term was also applied to otherwise conventional 2- and 4-dr sedans, certainly in the mid-late 30's, for some reason known best by the Madison Avenue types writing up ad copy. And, who could forget Mercury's first foray into the 4dr hardtop arena in 1956? You got it! Mercury Phaeton (with a fixed steel top and rollup windows). It's mostly advertising and marketing hype, IMHO--as carmakers tried to evoke something out of the past--in the 30's, for example, the horsedrawn era was just a generation and a half back in time--and Phaeton was a distinct open carriage design. Art Anderson
  4. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Does the 35 - 37 ford pickup truck use a different frame than the same model year car ? </div></div> Ford half ton pickups in the years '32-37 use the same basic frame as the passenger cars. Art Anderson
  5. West, They are out there! Saw several completely stock Willys Americars at last June's GoodGuys Rod & Custom show at Indianapolis. Not all of them got made into gassers. Art Anderson
  6. Well, The old, common way is by combining the rim diameter with the width across the inside of the lips of the wheel rim itself: Say, 7.00-15 (7 inches wide, 15" inside diameter of the tire bead). Art Anderson
  7. Barry, Your MkII is as timeless as any car ever built! Thanks for sharing! Art Anderson
  8. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Springield, Ill. sometime in the 20's. See attach </div></div> Neat picture, Randy! I would place the time frame at circa 1930-33, however, given the more rounded, smoother lines of the cars. It's very interesting to see the smaller, single-truck Birney Safety Car streetcars too! I'd have thought Springfield was large enough for their street railway system to have had larger streetcars--the single truck units tending to be popular mostly with smaller cities, such as Lafayette IN, where I live. Springfield, IIRC, was well-served by intercity transportation as well. By this time, the newly established US-66 was surely bringing automobile and truck traffic into town, both from St. Louis, as well as down from Chicago. The Illinois Central Railroad, and to an even greater extent, the Illinois Traction System (the world's largest and most extensive interurban railway) had to have been feeling both the pinch of the Great Depression, along with the coming of decent paved highways, both drawing freight and passengers from railroads by then. As a little boy, I was taken to Springfield on a couple of occasions, where my foster sister's husband worked his summers, while studying for his Bachelors and Master's degrees at University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana--I still remember the large number of older cars on the streets there. One of those trips was along US-136 (or was it US-36?) from Danville to Champaign, then Monticello, Decatur and on to Springfield, by the Illinois Traction System, rocking along in that big orange interurban car, passing every car on the highway paralleling the tracks, only to see them pass us as the car stopped at rural stop after rural stop after rural stop, then re-passing the same cars once again (this would have been about 1949 or so). Thanks for the memories! Art Anderson
  9. Back in '63, while in college in a small Iowa town, one of my buddies and I figured out how to make our Model A Fords work like Jeeps in the snow! Shoot, we just let about 10lbs of air out of those old Ford skinnies, made for fantastic traction! Why, we spent an entire Saturday night that December, a week before we all got on the train to come home for Christmas, busting snow drifts all over Fairfield IA with our A's--great fun! Art Anderson
  10. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">for low projected volumes, a cast resin model kit may be more realistic. Of course, it has a different appeal/audience that a die cast </div></div> The resins kits are sporatically available at over $150+ (sometimes little less) from Germany. They are the ones that I mentioned earlier. I really would like to see a quality die-cast in a reasonable scale to see the details. I have NO DOUBT they could easilly sell the 20,000 units most require. I am a persistant man, I just need to get in front of the right folks. I can't find MPC models. What is the complete name of MPC and where are they located? (If they still exist) </div></div> As much as I personally would like to see a diecast or even plastic model of an Amphica (or for that matter, any of several thousand cars that have never been modeled), as one who spent nearly 40 years in the hobby & toy business (retail, design, product development, manufacturing and marketing), I just don't see an Amphicar happening in anything like a popularly priced miniature or model kit. 20,000 of anything automotive, among the billions of people on the planet doesn't seem insurmountable, but often it is. It all depends on how long one wants to take to clear the inventory once produced. Most all diecast companies working in the $30-and-under simply have to see production numbers well over 100,000 pcs in the first couple of years, just in order to recoup the engineering, development and tooling costs. Go up the ladder, to the likes of Franklin Mint, Danbury Mint, Georgia Marketing & Promotions, and the required numbers become less, true--but also the potential risks grow as well--which is why they tend to go where they know their market is. As for MPC (plasstic model company): MPC, or Model Products Corporation was never in Chicago, their entire corporate life having been in and around Mt. Clemens, Michigan. MPC was owned for a long time by first General Mills, and then by Fundimensions, before the brand and its tooling were purchased by AMT/Ertl (out of Dyersville, Iowa) in 1986. That buyout effectively ended all new tooling done under the trademark MPC, MPC kits subsequently produced by AMT/Ertl having been reissues of old subjects only. Methinks the model company out of the Chicago area mentioned here, from the late 1980's was Monogram Models, which by that time was the only plastic model producer in the Chicago area (Morton Grove IL in those years) actively engaged in tooling new product. Art Anderson
  11. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Does anyone know whom I would speak to in the various companies (Franklin Mint, Danbury Mint, etc) about getting a nice die cast model done? As the new president of the Amphicar club, I think it is time that an Amphicar was done. I want to try to get this to happen for our club and the others who want but can't afford to own an Amphi. We only have some hard to find, lower quality (OK for the scale 1:43) model available, quite often in incorrect colors. I would like to see a quality 1:18 or 1:24 scale model produced. In the past I was told by Franklin Mint that "we do not accept ideas from customers" in a real matter of fact way. I thought they came across rudely. There has to be some company who sees the potential of an Amphicar model now that they are getting respect they really deserve. I know most want to sell 20k units to be profitable, I see no problem in that with the popularity growing everyday. </div></div> John, As a model car collector (well over 4000 model car kits, and perhaps 500 diecasts in my collection), I'd like to see an Amphicar, but as a now-retired product development specialist for a well-known diecast brand, I'd have to say, unfortunately, that Amphicar is one of those unlikely to "make the cut". Sadly, like so many potential subjects, it's pretty obscure nowadays, outside the enthusiast population, and diecasts, by their very nature, depending on mass production and mass sales, almost always have to have pretty massive visibility. Art Anderson
  12. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Art, I hope you still have that "$50 dollar car". <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> Wayne </div></div> Uh, what the hey! I did with it as I was supposed to do--played with it, wore it out! But, those early promo tires, with that flywheel motor--talk about black tire streaks on Mom's clean kitchen floor! <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" /> Art
  13. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Here Goes Kids, This attachment comes from my extensive archive and may put an end to the lengthy repartee about when promos began. Look to the Hudson article (Automotive News, 9/27/48) and the Chevy piece to give an idea of the ACTUAL origins of promos. The OK Used Car deal is unatributed. While I agree completely about scale models built by manufacturers for publicity purposes (Cord, Tucker, etc.), perhaps this article will answer the lingering question; When did it all begin? The Hudson model in question cannot be verified by my long-time friend in Orlando (the mentor of my meager multi-scale collection), but they most certainly made the Ford, Buicks and Chevys. Care to venture a guess as to the value today contained in this attachment? Best leave that to those with deep pockets and the need to have EVERYTHING. Be proud of what you have and share it with others; can you take it with you? Happy collecting, Tom Gibson </div></div> Tom, Those Hudson Commodores were done in plastic, in, I believe, 1/12 scale or thereabouts. Rather than being painted, the body shells were done in two different colors of plastic, the second color replicating the lower body color (below the character line) as painted by Hudson. They weren't promotional models as such, but rather tended to be showroom display pieces (although I suspect that if someone really wanted one, they could be pried away from dealers for a price). These are pretty scarce--in all my years of hitting up model car shows and swap meets, I've seen but 2 or 3 of these, at the legendary Toledo Collector's Toy Fairs in Maumee OH--saw one of them change hands for something in the neighborhood of $800 back about 1993 or so. Promotional model cars, as we've come to know them, pretty much got their start when an upstart new venture, Aluminum Model Toys, out of Birmingham, MI began producing a 1947 Ford Tudor Sedan in 1?15 scale, "slush cast" (slush casting was done by pouring molten metal into a steel mold, the machinery "rolling" the mold around, allowing the molten metal to cool against the tool, then the excess poured out into a vat for remelting--resulting in a casting with a very crude, slushy looking inside surface). These were available, at your friendly neighborhood Ford dealers, a display piece being mounted in a printed cardboard display, under Ford's advertising slogan that year "Watch The Fords Go By". Aluminum Model Toys produced this car but one year, moving to Tenite (acetate plastic) for 1949, and shortening the company name to its initials "AMT". The aluminum used was from the melting down of the fast air armada of WW-II. I was given one of these models at the tender age of 4, by a cousin of Dad's, who owned several small town Ford stores in western Indiana & eastern Illinois--sure had fun with it! A short-lived company, Master Caster, also produced promotional models in this fashion for a few years as well, early postwar Ford and Chevrolet models. About 1950, Bank Thrift Company, who made all manner of supplies for banking, began producing a line of pretty well done scale models of new cars, to be imprinted for banks and other thrift institutions, with the legend "Save for your new ______ at ____ National Bank" imprinted on the roof. Banthrico's were also slush cast, most from the same sourced scrap aluminum alloy as AMT and Master Caster, with stamped steel chassis, a coin slot and a locking plate on the bottom. In addition to Fords and Chevies, Banthrico did Plymouths, Dodges, DeSoto's, Chryslers, Pontiacs, Oldsmobiles, Buicks, Cadillacs, Nash's (including the early Ramblers), even Packards and Studebakers. They are highly collectible today. It's hard for most anyone under say, 50 years old, to remember that the "mega dealerships" we see today didn't really begin to come about until the late 50's. So, those early promotional models played a huge part in helping to sell the product. I have my own promotional model story to tell: It was the first Saturday in June, 1954. I'd just finished the 4th grade, coming up on my 10th birthday. I used to be the kid at our house who always got up with the chickens, to have breakfast with our dad, making that hour or so, our special time together. Dad mentioned that morning, over cereal or whatever, that he was going to go shopping for a new car for his business work (Dad was an executive with Lafayette Production Credit Association--so he spent days and days, up and down the county roads, talking with farmer-members, checking on crops and livestock. Would I like to go along? Now, you didn't have to ask me that question twice! After making the rounds of the Ford, Chevrolet, Studebaker and such dealers, we wound up in the showroom of Charles Snyder Chrysler-Plymouth in Lafayette. On the showroom floor was a shiny new Plymouth Suburban station wagon. After I had checked the car out thoroughly, inside, outside, upside and underneath, we wound up in a deal booth, while the sales manager checked over Dad's '52 Plymouth 4dr sedan. It became apparent that Dad and the salesman were about $50 apart (on the trade), not a lot of money today, but on a deal over a new car at about $2200, the trade being worth perhaps %500, a significant amount of money. You know the routine--sales manager comes in, tries to counter any objections, finance guy comes in to see if payments were going to be a problem (Nope, Dad was prepared to write a check right there), and finally, Mr. Snyder, the dealer slips in. He looked over the papers, talked to Dad a bit, and then, seeing me squirming excitedly on my chair, announced that he'd be right back. Within 5 minutes, he returned, with a small cardboard box in his hand. Getting Dad's permission, he handed me that box--which upon being opened by an excited kid, revealed........a Product Miniatures 1954 Plymouth Suburban promotional model, in red, just like the one out on the polished linoleum. In the fall of 1991, when Dad was struggling with his final illness (Dad died a week before his 88th birthday), while I was visiting with him, he suddenly blurted out: "You still got that damned $50 toy car????" Yes, Dad couldn't hold out anymore, after Mr. Snyder made my day, that morning--we came home in a shiny new station wagon, and the rest, as they say, is history. Art Anderson
  14. I'm thinking that this car is simply someone's street "special", built in the 30's--not all that uncommon, even in the Depression era. The engine might well be original to the car, but that Stovebolt is no performance engine at all--certainly not with battery-coil-generator igntion and electrical system, and definitely not with an asthmatic 1bbl carburetor. Still, it's a neat little car! Art Anderson
  15. <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Promo model history goes well back into the 19th century when miniatures were carried by a wide variety of traveling salesmen. However, for cars, one of my favorite pieces of history for promos dates to 1921. Marmon had limited display for the auto show in New York. Factory shop apprentices were instructed to build 1/4 scale models, two for each of the eight body styles offered for the 1921 Model 34B, plus at least two 1/4 scale engines. These models were well received by the public. Several still exist in the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History and I have one of the engines. </div></div> Ron, True enough, but I believe I would separate "salesman's samples" from the concept of the promotional piece, as the former weren't generally offered for sale, or given away for the purposes of promoting the sales of the actual products. For example, a very good model-building and collecting friend of mine in Northern California has a most historical scale model, made for promoting the company's forthcoming car--it is THE actual 1/8th scale 1948 Tucker model, as seen in the famous portrait of Preston Tucker holding the car in his arms. What is interesting as well, is that the Tucker Archives at the Gilmore Classic Car Museum has one of the hand-made hubcaps from this model, and the model itself is missing exactly that hubcap. Perhaps, one of these days, both model and hubcap will be reunited, as my friend is getting very well up in years. Perhaps the most famous, and most poignant of all promotional model cars were the cast and polished 1036 Cord 810 sedans, presented to buyers of the first of these cars, to remind them that their car, albeit delayed in release, was indeed coming. Other interesting promotional, but not produced for public sale, model cars include the 2 or 3 1955 Lincoln Futura dream car models, done in 1/10 scale by Ford's styling studios, for showing around the country, in places where the actual car wasn't shown--at least one of these exists today, in private hands. And of course, each February, in Florida, perhaps the most sought after "promo" of all, the crowning part of the Harley Earl Trophy, presented to the winner of the Daytona 500, is a scale rendering of GM's Firebird I turbine dream car. Of course, in all this discussion, I haven't mentioned, other than the SMP 1911 Chevrolet Prototype, the numerous promotional model car kits that have been produced: Models such as the AMT Ford Levacar, all the various model kits of Indianapolis 500 Pace Cars and such. Additionally, in 1964-66, Ford Motor Company ordered specially boxed model kits from AMT, their '32 Ford Victoria (first released as a Ford promo kit, BTW), the '32 Ford Roadster & Coupe, and the '25 Model T Coupe. These were available only through your local Ford dealer, and then only if you had received the offer by mail, as sent to registered Ford owners (I got one of these for each of my 3 Model A's and my '27 T Coupe!). More recently, in late 2003, I got the call, while working at Playing Mantis, doing product development for Johnny Lightning 1/64 scale diecast miniatures, to honcho the development of a miniature of the then forthcoming Chevrolet HHR--which we debuted as a run of some 30,000 pcs in time for the announcement of the production car at the 2004 LA International Auto Show in 2004. It was rather exciting to be in on the ground floor on a totally new car, working from GM Styling computer files, while coaching the mockup makers at our factory in China, to get it right, so that GM could sign off on it for production. But, those days are now past, for me. Art Anderson
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