Aanderson44

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">did robert mcnanara have somthing to do with the edsel faliure? if he did why would hge want it to fail? </div></div> I don't for a minute believe that Robert McNamara "wanted" the Edsel to fail, no more than anyone else within Fomoco. What began as a project to create a "Totally new kind of motorcar" (or words to that effect), in the Edsel in fact resulted in just another car, based on existing Ford-Mercury components, with of course its own unique sheet metal, but underneath, when you study the '58 Edsel Citation, you see an awful lot of Mercury, the Pacer and Corsair being completely Ford based. What was projected to be something like a 500,000 unit production run in 1958 turned out to be less than half that, of course abetted by the deepest recession in the auto industry since 1938. A lot was attributed to being the cause of the "failure" of the Edsel: Styling, gadgets, price-points. Of the styling, well it was no more or less "kitchy" than Mercury, certainly in many ways much more pleasing to look at than the'58 Olds, and not nearly the chrome acreage of the '58 Buick. Gadgetry? About the only unique gadget of the Edsel was the "Teletouch" automatic transmission selector setup--other than that the car was pretty conventional. Price point? Ahh, there was the rub! Edsel was slotted in to fill the supposed price gap between the Ford Fairlane 500 and the lower priced Mercury models--but that was a fairly small gap indeed, particularly to try and fill with a car having no long brand recognition. For a few dollars more than a top-line Ford, you find the Edsel Corsair, for a few dollars more than the Edsel Citation, a Mercury--there was just not a sufficient difference to make a win-win decision on the part of the car buyer. It appears that the decision point was simply the expected annual cost of restyling an Edsel year to year--a process that back in those days could cost many millions of dollars to accomplish, and for a car that established very early on that it had no ready-made market niche. Enter McNamara. Robert McNamara would have been but a footnote in automotive history had it not been for his accepting President-elect Kennedy's invitation to become US Secretary of Defense, on which watch he watched the Vietnam War grow, expand and stagnate, to the point that he is the object of considerable scorn among those who were drafted to fight it. I suspect that the sincere vituperation against McNamara in the decades since spilled over into the stories of his being a top manager at Ford Motor Company. I think the real truth is a bit different, though. McNamara was one of a group of US military officers recruited by Henry Ford II to come into the company, set things straight (Ford was, by all accounts, the sick man of the auto industry in the immediate postwar years--the tattered heritage of HF-I. In 1958 or thereabouts, McNamara rose to the position of General Manager of Ford Motor Company, charged with, among other things, maintaining and improving the profitability of a company newly joined to the ranks of publicly traded corporations (Ford was a closed corporation from its founding in 1903 until 1955, when some 40% or so of the stock was offered for public sale). Competent management has much to do with cost controls, and this seems to have been McNamara's forte', not that there is anything inherently wrong with that. So, he inherits two divisions of Ford that were questionable at the minimum, Edsel which was almost immediately in trouble, and Lincoln, who had never made a dime for Ford since being bought up in 1921. So, what to do? Well, for starters, either make a profitable enterprise out of Edsel, by either finding a slot in the lineup that made real sense, or blend it into either Ford or Mercury assemblies--which is what happened for 1959 (although the '59 Edsel was in styling by late 1956, given the normal 3-year lead time from sketchpads to sheet metal), and to a radical extent for 1960, with Edsel becoming a slightly gooked up Ford. There really wasn't much else that could have been done, it appears from all that has been written about Edsel's rise and fall. In short, the Edsel was Fomoco's DeSoto, really little more than a repacking of other cars, albeit to a greater extent than Chrysler ever did with DeSoto. As for Lincoln--Mcnamara dared to recognize that not only had Lincoln always run a distant second, first to Packard in the 20's and 30's, but also to Cadillac by the 40's and into the then present time of 1958. McNamara was willing to go one more engineering/styling effort with Lincoln, IF it could be shown that the design teams could come up with a Lincoln that would not only catch the eye of the buyer, but also could be produced profitably--a strong challenge, but one that resulted in the timeless 1961 Lincoln, and ensured the viability of the marque from then on, both in sales and profitability. For all the castigation McNamara gets over being the "hatchetman" at the chopping block beheading the Edsel, many forget (if they ever really knew!) that it was Robert McNamara who helped push through the Falcon--which when released became the best-selling completely new Ford product since the introduction of Model A in December 1927--and it was the Falcon platform that spawned an even more spectacular, trend-setting success, when in April 1964, Falcon begot the Mustang--albeit not McNamara's baby--let's just think of Mustang as being his automotive grandchild. McNamara is thought of in many ways, often disparaging, but in the case of the Edsel, disparagement of Robert S. McNamara is, in my opinion, not at all warranted. Someone would eventually have pulled that plug, it fell to him to jerk it out of the wall socket. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Didn't Smokey Yunick destroke a SBC to 209 cubic inch in the 1960's to qualify for Indy? </div></div> Nope. For starters, 209cid would not have matched any USAC Championship (Indy) engine formula of those days, and secondly, while Yunick was the undisputed master of the small-block Chevy in racing (not drag racing, however), he never set up one for Indianapolis or USAC Championship trail, rather he used Offenhauser 4's and transitioned to 4-cam Fords. In those years, the maximum engine displacement for Indianapolis was 256cid, and 161cid for supercharged engines, regardless of whether stock-block or pure racing OHC engines. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Art, the rails you describe above <span style="font-style: italic">are</span> part of the body, they can't be separated, of course, unless you use a torch. Unibody cars don't have any body mounts and you won't find any on a Met.......... </div></div> Ok, I understand! Of course, for the purposes of such a small scale diecast model, we weren't able to do any sort of massive detailing on the diecast chassis, as the entire car is slightly over 1" long, the bulk of the space on the chassis plate needed for engraved logo's and imprinted legal information (acknowledging licensing, etc. I guess what threw me here is that most true unibody cars have just subframe sections welded to the body shell, up front to provide engine-bearing and suspension strength and rigidity, in the rear to provide solid, stable leaf or coil spring mountings (the latter with one of the various forms of locating links for the rear axle). Now for one more question: Are those frame rails more or less what was used underneath the comparable Austin, or were they engineered in Kenosha, specifically for the Met? Much of the popular literature, including the Krause Publications book on the Met (reprints of contemporary enthusiast magazine (both Brit and American magazines) have references to the Met having been an Austin chassis/driveline clothed in American Motors styled sheet metal? Art

<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"> AMC didn't build the Metropolitan, but rather Austin did, in England, on the chassis of the Austin Princess. Art </div></div> Although all the parts and components were supplied by Austin, Fisher & Ludlow, Ltd., a body manufacturer also of Birmingham, was picked to supply the unitized bodies. This was not built on a Austin Princess chassis.......... Read The Metropolitan Story by Patrick R. Foster.........it explains the birth of the Metropolitan........... </div></div> That said, How does one explain the presence of frame rails underneath the floorboards of a Metropolitan? I did some extensive research, including study and a full series of overall and detail pics of a 1961 Met owned out of suburban Detroit for the purpose of executing the design of the Johnny Lightning '54-'62 Metropolitan (1:64 scale diecast miniature)--perhaps you have seen it? Generally speaking, a unitized body doesn't have a full chassis frame underneath, only subframes front and rear for attaching suspension and carrying the engine. Art

<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"> AMC didn't build the Metropolitan, but rather Austin did, in England, on the chassis of the Austin Princess. AMC's contribution to the car was the styling, and of course marketing and sales. Art </div></div> Austin Motor Company built the Nash Metropolitan under strict specifications. Nash's engineers who worked closely with George Mason were most likely responsible for this failure. </div></div> How does one consider the Met to have been a failure? It was actually a pretty good little car, trouble is, the US market wasn't into tiny little commuter/urban cars in the days when longer, lower, wider, more powerful cars meant status to nearly everyone. I do not see it as a failure at all, but at least a limited success. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">What were some of the earlier (pre Nader ) engineering failures that may or may not have lead to recalls of a car such as the copper cooled 1923 Chevrolet http://www.mindspring.com/~corvair/cococo4.html. </div></div> Well, There's always the 1942 Lincoln Liquimatic transmission. All but a handful answered Lincoln's recall notice, having their Liquimatics changed out for 3-spd boxes. Early 1928 Model A Fords came equipped with a multiple disc clutch, which type certainly had performed well in larger, heavier cars, but were a disastrous failure in a mass-produced light car such as the A. No recall was issued by Ford, but a service bulletin was put out to dealers authorizing them to replace the multiple disc unit with single plate clutches as customers brought them in for clutch repairs, at no cost to the customer. As a general rule though, factory recall notices were almost nonexistant in the years prior to the 1970's--mostly because the products produced worked rather well, particularly in the standards of years gone by. Many failures that were once commonplace would be reason aplenty to spark a recall today, but not yesterday. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The steel cylinder sleeves used in the early Mercury (and maybe Ford as well) wore out quickly; almost as fast as the aluminum cylinder walls on the Chevrolet Vega. The Mercury engines were ready for pressing out the sleeves and installing new pistons and rings at fairly low mileage. </div></div> Charles, A correction: Prewar Mercury engines used a cylinder bore to make them 239cid, while Ford remained at 221cid. It was the Ford engine in those years that used a pressed-in sleeve, not the Mercury. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Hollow front spindles on Metropolitans caused some to break off at the inner bearing. I had one break years ago sending the car and my son on it's side. The Met I own now has solid spindles that my father made. This was a very poor design and should have been caught!!! I'm not sure if other early AMC's had this problem. </div></div> AMC didn't build the Metropolitan, but rather Austin did, in England, on the chassis of the Austin Princess. AMC's contribution to the car was the styling, and of course marketing and sales. Art

I believe that is an aftermarket (from the likes of Warshawski/JC Whitney) from the early 50's, pretty much apes the 49-50 Olds Rocket Ship hood ornament. Art

What you see as a B-post really isn't. Buick, like everyone else back then, framed hardtop window glass in a chrome surround, which rolled up and down with the glass. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">My wife and I are having a huge disagreement. I have an 83 F-100, all orginal and in great shape. The problem is, it's orange and white. My wife hates "Orange" and wants me to do a modification, drop in big block, paint it black, rims and all. I personally think it has more character in its original form. It will make 25 in 08. Will it have any more value in it's original form than as just another modified pick up? Is there any real value in an original early 80's Ford truck? I appreciate the opinions of folks here. Thanks in advance. </div></div> I doubt that keeping this era of pickup completely stock, as in a resoration will mean much more in the way of money upon selling, than if it were mildly but well modified. Art

If those are gennie Ford or Ford-approved accessories, they likely are from circa 1965-69 or so, given their very angular, almost space-age styling--this would be perfectly in keeping with the squarish, angular 65-66 Galaxie and LTD body styling of those two years. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Growing up here in Southern Illnois (born 1948) I have seen all my life, up through the 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's and today, a good deal more of those late 40's - early 50's Chevrolet pickups on the street than I have of the Ford pickup trucks from the same era. Do you reckon this is because there were just a lot more Chevys sold initially? Or was the Chevy a hardier vehicle? </div></div> Chevrolet outproduced Ford in the pickup arena something like 3:2 through the years represented by the AD Chevy pickup. Both were sturdy as hell, particularly as Ford offered a virtually bullet-proof flathead 6 in their trucks 1942-51, and an equally good 6 in the I-block OHV engine in 52. Art

IIRC, There were several Packards in the original black & white "Untouchables" film, scenes from which became stock footage used in the 1960's TV series of the same name. At least one Packard, probably from 31-32, was destroyed in making the film , a closed body car, which at the time was still considered parts-car material for restoration of open cars. Packards also appear in "The Great Gatsby" I believe, and I want to remember (it seems to me) that several Disney films of the late-50's through the 60's, including "Follow Me Boys" featured elderly people of means driving, or being driven in Packards. Of course, by the 50's, a lot depended on what was available in the inventories of the LA area movie car prop rental firms and on studio back lots. Art

It's a 1930-mid 1931, but in looking at it further, it could very well be a stock A or AA truck cab--with perhaps the fabric roof insert replaced with sheet metal perhaps (late 31 AA truck cabs had an all steel top, but with drain molding all the way around, in the same manner as the 32-34 BB truck cabs. Art

For starters, I don't think you have a factory-built pickup cab there. Why? Because, IIRC, 30-31 Model A pickup closed cab back panels are one-piece, not 3-piece in the manner of a sedan. Second, it appears that the windshield is slanted, something which Ford did not do on a truck cab until 1935, all truck cabs prior to then had vertical windshields. Pics from any other angles? Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> The story I have read on this claimed that the Russians captured a single B-29 and copied it to make their first heavy bomber--right down to an aluminum repair patch on the skin of the original plane. Q:"Vot iz Zis?" A:"Who knows, Ivan? Put it on." </div></div> The Soviet's did intern 3 B-29's which had to seek emergency landing at Vladivostok during the USAAF bombing campaign over Japan, during the time when the Soviets and Japanese honored a mutual non-agression pact between them (The Soviet Union re-entered the war against Japan in early August 1945. The B-29 crews were interned, housed, but not imprisoned by the Soviet Union under the rules of neutrality. However, stray aircraft weren't covered by any such treaty agreements, so the Soviets were free to dispose of those aircaft as they saw fit. The Tupolev Design Bureau was given the task of disassembling them, and then duplicating them, which they did masterfully, down almost to the last rivet. The resulting TU-4 bomber (Superfortress in Russian costume), and down to their various features and equipment. TU-4 was operational by 1948, appearing in the skies above the May 1 Soviet Labor Day Parade that year. To bring all this back on point, Tupolev did a much better job cloning the B-29 (seeing as how they had 3 of them to play with) than ZIS did of a Packard. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Well there is a reason the Ziz cars looked a lot Packards. The Soviets purchased the body tooling from Packard. </div></div> As others have stated, "Urban Legend". I suspect that this oft=repeated canard comes straight out of the "Red Scare" years of the late 40's, followed by Sen. McCarthy's reign of terror. Any direct, side-by-side comparison of the immediate postwar ZIS and it's supposed Packard counterpart, shows far too many major dimensional, shape and contour differences for the ZIS to have been a perfect, off-the-original-dies copy. The one ZIS I've seen up close (and I've seen it twice), that being the one alleged to have been presented by Stalin to Chairman Mao upon Mao's accession to ultimate power in China, then given to the Chinese People's Army commander in Korea (supposedly Mao was embarrassed to be seen in such an automobile?), showed me far too much in the way of "cobbled" sheet metal, panels that seriously didn't fit, and an overall crudeness of fabrication and assembly, for a car supposedly made from very precise stampings from very precise dies. The differences in dimensions really can't be explained away by the thinking of some that those came about due to conversion from inches to metrics--as that conversion is so easily made, 25.4mm=1 inch. Now, it is more probable, it seems to me, that the Soviets, having their own purchasing commission within their diplomatic posts here, for them to have simply purchased a car, shipped it home, either around 1940, or immediately following VE Day, and gone from there, simply studying it, then drawing up their own. I think the same is almost certainly true of the later ZIL and Chaika limousines (keeping in mind that the Soviet Union had an interim car between the supposed Sr. Packard clone ZIS and the late-50's ZIL which really doesn't closely resemble any particular car from any other country directly), given that both of those later, more visible limousines are physically much larger in all dimensions than a 55-56 Packard. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Packard8 - You wrote: <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">One thing that?s always puzzled me is how Studebaker was able to design and manufacture a first class V8 4 years before Packard.</div></div> I never studied the matter fully, but read more than one reference that Studebaker's V8 bore more than a passing similarity to Cadillac's V8. I've also heard of more than one Stude being refitted with a Caddy V8. Though that Stude motor debuted as more powerful (per cubic inch) than other V8 of the day, I've heard it lagged behind others over the course of the 1950s - until displacment reached 259cid and they began toying around with superchargers, culminating in Granatelli's work with the R-series motors for the Avanti. Now, I'm not saying Stude cloned their V8, but was "highly inspired" by the Cadillac V8 - more of a follower than a leader. </div></div> I suspect Studebaker pulled off their V8 when they did, more or less because of Studebaker's willingness to advance their product line as for any other motivation--they clearly saw a crying need to leave the 30's behind. Also, it should not have been "rocket science" by 1948-49 to begin developing a new V8 engine--after all, Studebaker's V8 conquered no new territory, covered no really new ground. For decades, by that time, the Society of Automotive Engineers had been meeting more than annually, and as professionals in their area of expertise were (and still are) wont, they shared ideas, even their results (that's called "presenting (research) papers"). That said, designing a new engine, with overhead valves, with completely conventional features just is not an exotic affair. As a case in point, drawn from motor racing, the most famous, and longest-running series of pure racing engines ever developed, with its beginnings in 1919 and continuing to 1977, the Miller/Offenhauser/Meyer-Drake/Drake-Goosen-Sparks inline 8 and 4-cylinder racing engines owed their designs, each of them, to ONE man, who did the engineering (with the input of Arthur Sparks (of Forged-True Piston fame)through all those years. Leo Goosen did the calculations, determined bore & stroke, figured out the requisite dimensions and worked the stress tables, then executed the drawings, to be built and machined by a very small group of craftsmen--so for a company such as Studebaker (or even subsequently, Packard) to have laid up a brand new, existing-technology V8 engine would not have been as huge an investment as it might seem sometimes. The only critical issues would have been the avoidance of patent infringements, such as those potentially might have been. Of course, there are major differences in how a thoroughbred racing engine might be laid out and manufactured compared to one that must be mass-produced at an acceptable price, but I think the illustration I've given isn't all that invalid. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Anderson 44: The reason that CM dropped the LaSalle in 1940 is that the LaSalle was a BIG SALES FLOP from the day it was introduced. The Packard 120 from it's introduction in 1935 through 1939 out sold the LaSalle two to one. During this same period of time the Packard 12 luxuary models outsold the Caddy V12 and V16 models, Some times during the period of the 30's this was as high a two to one. It seems that if you look at the sales figures for Caddy and Packard during the 30's, that people prefered the socalled generic look of the Packards, over the designs of the Great Farce Harley Earl. If you check the sales figures Packard most always outsold Caddy. You GM guys just hate to admit that Packard was on top of its game in the 30's, and Caddy no matter how hard they tried was second best. </div></div> Packard53, Sorry, but you have me pegged completely wrong here. I hold no case for any marque, never have, and never will. I will admit, however, to not having been much enamored with General Motors over the years, with the exception being two cars I've owned purely because I liked them, individually--those being a '58 Chevy sedan delivery, which I restored in the years 1993-97, and a '59 Chevy Biscayne 4dr sedan which I preserved as an all-original car from the time I bought it in 1993 until I sold it in June of this year. Outside of the 27 T, 2 Model A Fords, and one '32 Ford I owned in the 1960's, I've not owned a Ford as a modern daily driver. I do admit to having owned just one Cadillac, an '86 Sedan DeVille which I acquired a year ago, from the original owner, with less than 50K on the clock--creampuff of a car, and I do drive it daily (although my annual mileage is generally in the sub-10,000 mile range. Most of my driver's seat time has been in Chrysler products, but finally swore off Mopars due to the constant headaches with the last one I owned. As for antique, classic or collectible cars, I carry no dislike for any marque, I appreciate them all, including Packards. As a youngster growing up in the years 1944-1960, I, pretty much like most of my age, had limited regard for postwar Packards, along with many of the cars of other independents, but that was due as much to "peer pressure" as anything else, as most of us probably tended to echo our parents' preferences, or we saw something of the styling of the makes produced by Ford and GM we liked a lot more--with kids, style is as much as anything else. AND, as kids in the 50's, we WERE enamored with V8's, turned off (largely in as a group!) by inline engines of any sort, 6 or 8, it didn't matter much which. Much of our discussion here, including our individual analysis of "what went right", and "what went wrong", with or for Packard (and this can be said of just about any carmaker (or for that matter, the manufacturers of just about any bygone products and even long-gone companies who left our midst 50 or more years ago, must, of necessity come from our readings, anecdotes we have heard in latter years, simply because to have been even a young adult in the 1930's or even in the immediate postwar years would necessarily make us in our 80's or 90's today. Almost certainly, there are very few people alive today (if at all) who were in positions to know first-hand, of any of the discussions, conferences and such out of which product decisions were made 55-75 years ago, and even memoirs and other written records can be quite sketchy, and often carry the personal bias of the writers. However, some things of those bygone decades do stand out, pretty strongly. Packard management did what they had to do during the 1930's, just as did each and every management team in every industry in the United States, in order to survive what was (and hopefully will remain!) the most serious, almost savage, economic climate ever seen in this country. Certainly the Cemetery of Automobile Marques and Companies is well-dotted with the headstones of brands and companies who did not survive the 30's. Compared to the older headstones, one does see the "date of death" on the Packard marker as 1958, so for much of those years, Packard and its management did manage to keep on living. In 1932, at the very depths of the Great Depression, each and every automaker put their best foot forward--1932 is regarded by many, within the old car hobby, designers, artists and stylists as well, as having been the one year when virtually no American automaker offered a bad-looking car. They pulled out all the stops, figuratively if not literally, and as such produced some of the finest cars of their genre, late-20's designs, but on the cusp of something new. Yet, from that year, the automobile went through perhaps its greatest period of evolution, and that was rapid, both in engineering, and in appearance. Virtually no car produced in 1941-42 bore any serious resemblance to the cars of 1932 save for a few styling cues, even transmissions, suspension systems, wheels, tires, brakes or interior appointments. My view of the 1930's is pretty much that from the car buyer's point of view, it was a time of cautious shopping. People tended, with such a major purchase, beyond the obvious money factors, to go for cars that they trusted, either from brand loyalty (of that, perhaps Packard and Ford may well be the prime examples), or the strength of the manufacturer (certainly Packard, along with GM and Ford carried the external aura of strength perhaps more than any other companies in the business then), and I am pretty certain that reliability and durability were also strong considerations. However, styling DID rise to the forefront as a selling point, if not as part of a salesman's pitch, certainly psychologically. And styling came to the fore, not only in cars, but home appliances, furniture, clothing, even in public transportation (Airplanes were hot, streamlining railroad passenger trains was hot, for example). Manufacturers realized that true recovery and growth was going to come from that which was "new", that spoke of the future, not the past. An awful lot gets said about Harley Earl at GM, both positive and negative. By all accounts, he was an arrogant, often nasty bastard. Yet on the other hand, Earl did, perhaps as much as anyone, bring about a fundamental change in the way products are designed for appearance. He wasn't much of a board-designer past his very early years at GM, but he was a trememdous force in being able to make styling the important part of the design of cars as any other area within GM. Almost every other carmaker had to make do with either very small design staffs (Ford for example, pretty much depended on Bob Gregorie to interpret Edsel Ford's conceptions, but Ford had fewer stylists company-wide than GM had in any division, as an example). The small size of many companies, relative to Ford or GM gave those companies rather little room to wiggle, let along make a mistake. With the smaller independents, such a little thing as a grille that turned customers off could be the kiss of ultimate death. But, the overwhelming need for any company trying to get past the Depression was the task of "growing the brand", in what was, by all acounts, a limited market, limited in the sense that new car sales never reached, let alone, surpassed the record year of 1929 (in fact, 1929's sales figures were not surpassed until 1955). While Chevrolet of course, grew their brand in the 30's, they did so at the expense of Ford. Other major makes did so at the expense of independents. Packard was able, it would seem, to have done so by managing to pick up sales from this as well, with the 120/110, and that was a very good move on their part. However, is not the real thrust of this thread here the "effect" that the two less expensive, and somewhat smaller cars had on the Packard name, in retrospect? I think so. I have to wonder, as I am pretty sure others do as well, had Packard been able to focus marketplace attention on say, "One Ten" (or any catchy name) by Packard, with that car having it's own distinctive appearance, yet retaining some Packard identity, the long-term effect might have been different. Even Rolls-Royce was pretty much able to give Bentley, in certainly the postwar era, an image, even though anyone with a grain of sense could look at a 50's Bentley, and see a Silver Cloud with a different grille shell. Had the Clipper been known as "Clipper, a fine car from Packard" rather than (at least in popular conversation if nothing else) a Packard Clipper, perhaps the larger Packards might have seen marketability after WW-II, but of course, who really knows what went on behind the eyeballs of management that wasn't recorded on paper? But, please do not characterize me as just an interloping "GM Guy", because that I am not. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Another major factor that killed Packard in the South and Southwest was the Lack of a Pickup. GM, Ford and Dodge had Good Pickups. And a very large part of the people in those areas Needed and Wanted a Pickup. <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> The people I knew, when growing up, couldn't have survived without a Pickup. If they could afford a third vehicle, they may have got a car, but a pickup and a tractor always came first, in importance. They needed the tractor to pull the pickup out of the Mud. <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> </div></div> I somehow rather doubt that adding a pickup truck to the product mix would have done much. After all, Hudson had one, a very nice, and very wide-bodied pickup, and it really didn't see much rural sales (or for that matter, much in the way of sales volume at all). In most of rural America, Cadillacs weren't often seen either--but Buick sure was--in much of the midwest, for example, a sign of "making it" in small towns and even on the farm was a Buick, not Cadillac or Packard. Cadillac didn't reach into very many small towns or even every moderate-sized city either, but they of course, did have more dealerships than Packard. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">ok. i have read every post in this thread (several times) and i believe that NOONE (author, critic, historian or any anyone else including myself) will try to argue that the 110,115 quality was the least bit lacking. i.e. the 110-115 quality was just fine relative to any measure wheather percieved or otherwise. I contend at this point we can put the quality issue to rest as being a NONissue. "I think Langworth's premise is properly summed up this way: that once Packard management accepted the concept of an automotive product that went for a price point, rather than the very best they could do, they ceased to be who they had been. His point seems to be that the production of the 110 was responsible for the postwar perception by the public and the management philosophy." This is just a diplomatic way saying that the 110-115 allowed an average John Q. Pubic to afford a Packard product. THE question remains: did the 110-115 retain enuf styling so as to be NOT distinguisable from the 160-180 models IN THE EYES OF THE PUBLIC??? If the answer is yes then certainly that would corrupt the rich mans view and discourage him from buying another Sr. Again, Packard operated under the banner of PRESTIGE and LUXURY and catered to the high rollers!!! Is that a false statement??? </div></div> Agreed that "quality" (as defined by fit, finish, durability and reliability) surely wasn't the issue, IMHO. However, and I think this is important: The 120 and the 110 were then, and are today, clearly identifiable as Packards, and were badged and advertised as such. Of course, that certainly helped launch and sell the smaller, less expensive cars, and they surely did keep Packard going in tough times. However, at what price? it seems to me, from all that I've read about these cars, indeed other marques and their attempts at either upscale or downscale variants of their products, faced the issue that Packard did: Just how to go about introducing a somewhat lesser version of the high-priced car, giving it enough brand identity to be able to capitalize on the Senior car while not cheapening the image of the top of the line? Or conversely, how to "create" a Senior car out of the brand of a lower priced vehicle, without its seeming like the same lower priced car with X-number more screws? Both are difficult, and not many have succeeded over the years. Perhaps the two most visible efforts in the time frame 1924-the late 30's were the Essex-Terraplane from Hudson and the LaSalle from Cadillac (sorry to use the "C-word" here!). Both of these smaller, less expensive cars fared pretty well, while not seriously affecting their senior cousins over the economic storm of the Depression, mostly (IMHO) in that the Essex (and later the Terraplane) just didn't SCREAM Hudson, and likewise, while LaSalles certainly had much the look of a Cadillac, the badging, the advertising clearly was LaSalle, not Cadillac. But, everything about the styling of a 120, or a 110, clearly shouted PACKARD as you saw it coming down the road (as did all the advertising), as anyone who knew what a car was back then surely recognized a Packard radiator or grille shape instantly--such was Packard's identity. And I believe, therein lay a problem: Packard's clientele was heavily populated by the patrician, brahman society, the noble old-money wealthy, perhaps more so than any other marque. I suspect there may have been some "disgust" among those of of that strata of society that somehow, all of a sudden, "lesser", more "plebian" folks could now be driving what heretofore they may well have seen as "their" make of car. Additionally, by being badged the same as the super-luxury car, but at a much lower price, those who were "on their way" up (and there were people who were economically upwardly mobile throughout the Depression years), who seeing that they could have a bit of the "action" with a prestige brand, and even perhaps having the wherewithall to afford a more expensive Packard, opted for the lower priced cars, getting a bit of the prestige of a Packard "on the cheap" if you will. With that, at the top end of the economic scale of potential Packard buyers (particularly those who were already Packard owners), very well there was a bit of backlash, while at the lower end of the scale of prospects for a first-time buy at a Packard dealership, there wasn't as much incentive to move a notch or two up the ladder. (in other words, why spend significantly more for the prestige of the brand?) With this idea in mind, did the 120 and 110 truly do much for Packard other than provide badly needed sales and profits; did they truly "grow the marque" at all levels? Even Cadillac had to face that question with the last series of LaSalle, after analyzing sales in 38-40, they wisely decided to kill of the LaSalle, move those prospects directly to the Cadillac side of the showroom. Likewise at Hudson, it would appear, as the Essex-cum-Terraplane likewise got blended into the Hudson lineup by the end of the 30's. Had Packard been able to give the junior cars some strong brand identity of their own, while retaining some evidence of their Packard heritage, still building them as they did, with every attention to build quality, I suspect they could have made it work much better, and come the postwar era, not have had some of the image I heard of constantly as a kid growing up, that the lesser Packards cheapened the image of the company in the 30's, and that I did hear, from my father, other relatives, in fact almost anyone with whom I'd talk about those older cars. As for really distinctive styling, I think that was a problem with the Junior Packards, certainly by the late 30's. Again, look at the face of a 120 or a 110, they certainly had the genetics of their big brothers. But, when viewed from the side, or the rear--they really do look very much like a mid-range GM car, more so than any other marque of the era. That had to hurt some, as it gave what might have been a distinctive car, very much a generic look. But of course, that's looking back at a time when I wasn't yet thought of, based on all the books and pictures I've seen, reinforced by what I heard being said in the 1950's. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">"However, I completely reject his argument that the Packard 6 shouldn't have been built." In 50 words or less, what are Langworths REASONS for his claim???? </div></div> I think Langworth was pretty much echoing a commonly held sentiment that I was hearing way back in the 1950's. Art

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">55 Connie: EXCELLENT POST you know your history well. ANDERSON 44: When I made my remarks about Packard trying to be a defanse contractor, I knew what I was talking about. If you read and study the history of Packard as I have, then I think you might come to the conclusion that I have. Packard by trying to play both sides of the coin was their fatal mistake. The money spent of defense contracts and and havinng to take profits from the auto side, to help prop up the defense side, took away money that should have been used for proper RD for the auto side of the business. </div></div> Which is pretty much what I said after eating some crow, I believe. It would seem to have made very little sense to go out on a limb to develop and produce a pair of jet engines in response to a DOD Request For Proposal, in those days, when things were already beginning to look less than rosy. But of course, retrospect is always pretty good vision. Art

55Connie, Excellently written, IMHO. For my disagreement with Langworth's closing contentions about the 110 (and I sensed a bit of an allusion to the 120 as well in his final comments), I still consider Richard Langworth as perhaps the best of the writers that Collectible Automobile has, for he is not only knowlegeable about the era he writes, but gives every evidence of researching his material pretty carefully (unlike some of the newer writers for "that other newsstand collector car magazine"). Packard management did what they saw as necessary in the 30's, to simply continue in business. And often that meant, back then as today, "thinking outside the box", which I think is exactly what went on in the creation of two junior lines of cars. And, from all appearances, it worked. Mindless conservatism, in the presidential penthouse, or in the boardroom seldom works for long in the business world--it really never did, doesn't now, and likely won't work for long at anytime in the future either. The business world is far, far too dynamic (meaning ever-changing) for any rigid adherence to a particular product, a particular design, or the same old, same old way of doing things, product selection, or producing products. While stock price probably wasn't quite the motivator in the early postwar years that it is today (and frankly, too much emphasis on stock price has made many a horrid mess in our modern business/industrial world today!), certainly it appears that paying out nice dividends, as if Packard stock were a "stock for widows & orphans" seems to have been a strong motivation--otherwise, why did not Packard management seriously look beyond the now, look out over the rest of the automotive field, seriously test the trends that were in the offing (most of which did come true, to the dismay on East Grand Avenue)? Therein lies the question, and the answers as well. Packard wasn't singularly alone in their postwar conservative approach. The World's largest retailer, in 1945 was none other than Montgomery Ward. The record of Ward's, and their almost curmudgeonly chairman, Sewell Avery, is quite clear. Avery was firmly convinced that the Depression would return with a vengeance once the troops came home, that he'd need bank vaults full of cash to weather the storm he was certain would happen by 1946-47. So, absolutely no upgrading, no remodeling, no going out to find new product lines, and certainly no new stores would be built. By the time Avery left, Montgomery Ward had been passed by Sears Roebuck & Company like a hot car passes a struggling truck, and Sears didn't even bother to look back. Montgomery Ward lost their initiative, their innovation, their image as being a going, dynamic retailer, never to fully regain it, and slowly began retrenching, leaving what had been tremendous markets for them by the late 1950's. Even with 2 or 3 turnaround attempts in the 60's and 70's, it was too little, too late, and they pretty much melted away, certainly as a full-line retail store chain. Had Packard's management and directors been able to see "beyond the now", been truly aware of what was happening with the industry leaders, I think things would have turned out rather differently. I wonder what the effect on Packard might have been, also, had the 120-sized car been continued in those immediate postwar years. I also wonder, had Packard's management done what others were doing during the war years, once the immediate crisis of gearing up, ramping up wartime defense production had passed, that being doing some engineering and design work on cars truly aimed at "taking the company to the next level". I suspect that had they done some of those things, they'd at least have been a very valuable, desireable company for any merger or buyout, for a number of potential suitors, be they inside or outside the automobile industry. And, I do suspect that they'd not have been motivated to take the jet engine gamble that they did. I have to admit that in my earlier post on this subject area, I was writing "off the top of my head" without really digging up much to support it. I did do some serious searching right afterward, and realize now that some of the things I wrote weren't factually true. However, those jet engines do show up in US Air Force databases, as maintained by the Air Force Museum, the J41 and J49, both of which are noted as "disposable" engines, and both listed as cancelled. By "disposable" I take that to mean engines destined for one-way use, such as a guided missile. In the early days of missile development, when airbreathing guided missiles were a serious thing, and of all those designed, most wound up being ultmately rejected for production. As such, for what was a relatively small entrant into the jet engine business, it seems to be that those two engines were a very risky crap-shoot for Packard, and one they very well could have left to the likes of GE, Allison, Curtiss-Wright and Pratt & Whitney. But that's getting away from the thrust of what you were saying, unless those dollars could have been invested in a body assembly operation before that came to be a crisis. Art