'37 Grille center stainless moulding

[37S2de]

I was talking to another member today about the center stainless strip in the '37 grille.  These are somewhat hard to come by in good condition.  My memory (faulty though it may be) tells me that someone, somewhere, in the past,  found a VW body side moulding that was very close in size and shape to that center piece and could be modified to fit the '37 grille.  I don't remember if that was on a forum, or in "The Antique Studebaker Review" or in "Turning Wheels".

 

Does anyone here remember the reference, or, even better, the VW model that that stainless strip came from?

 

Thanks. Tom

[37S2de]

I found the reference I was looking for, and it turns out that my memory was indeed faulty.

 

In the January - February  1996 issue of The Antique Studebaker Review,   the late Gene Searcy  wrote an article describing the restoration of his '37 President rumble seat coupe.  This car is now in the Armacost Collection. Gene wrote that a stainless steel molding from the quarter panel of a 1966 Buick Special was almost an exact duplicate of the center grille molding on '37s.  I'd be willing to out on a limb and say that if a person did some research and came up with a Buick part number for whichever molding it is, that they would have a better chance of finding the Buick part than an original '37 Studebaker molding.

 

The VW reference came later in the same article.  Gene wrote that aluminum  moldings on Beetles were the same shape as the stainless running board moldings found on State Presidents.  He bent these to shape and fabricated new ends.

 

Tom