Franklin series 145 and 147 Prices

[Walt G]

I have a significant amount of Franklin period information and original material  that I never shared with the club when I was a member and a regular contributor to Air Cooled News. Can not recall if I ever used this, but thought it may be of interest. Interesting to note the cars with wire wheels were more costly . Spare tires and tubes on all models are extra charge. in 1930 you could have bought a very nice house for the cost of a Franklin chassis.

Edited February 4 by Walt G (see edit history)

[alsancle]

Interesting.  Production models were not inexpensive.   Custom models were very expensive.   Reminds me of my Royale,  where the production bodies were 2500 dollars and the custom Dietrich bodies were 6k.

 

Also, I notice that the wire spokes were an extra 70 bucks. 

[John Bloom]

They have some really nice custom body offerings of those models. Here is a 147 body by Dietrich at Tom Hubbards museum in Tucson. 5,000 dollars  for this custom bodied example. I’ve seen this car many times and it is just really a clean attractive Franklin. 
 

 

 

 

[Walt G]

The Pirate coupe was actually a convertible coupe . I think information like this from factory publications that went to dealerships gives a great perspective of the cars .

this was early in 1930 so the great depression had not sunk in yet . All thought it was a small blip in the economic structure that would recover soon. A year from when this notice was published the reality of what had happened set in . Production was cut , sales sagged etc. for everyone and everything.

Now most collectors do not consider what you see here or I what I just mentioned.  1929 was a great year for car sales, in fact probably the best year in history up until that time.

Another part of this same report by the factory mentions the accessories that were available for sale . There was an extensive well produced accessory catalog produced by Franklin and a special Dealer's bulletin done as well for the 1930-31 models. I hope to reproduce this and have copies available  - I did this years ago ( probably 30+ years ago) and by now with the level that one could have copies made then all those pages are most likely faded and unreadable.

[PFitz]

Interesting that it lists the Pirate Phaeton as being standard with wood wheels, yet the five known survivors are all wire wheels.  I still have a library copier copy of the 31 accessory catalogue but being a copy, of a copy, of a copy, the pictures are rather fuzzy.

Edited February 4 by PFitz (see edit history)

[PFitz]

2 hours ago, John Bloom said:

They have some really nice custom body offerings of those models. Here is a 147 body by Dietrich at Tom Hubbards museum in Tucson. 5,000 dollars  for this custom bodied example. I’ve seen this car many times and it is just really a clean attractive Franklin. 
 

 

 

 

The '30 Pirate Phaeton to the right of that '30 Deauville is also an export right-hand drive that Tom Hubbard found in England, brought back and restored. 

[John Bloom]

20 minutes ago, PFitz said:

The '30 Pirate Phaeton to the right of that '30 Deauville is also an export right-hand drive that Tom Hubbard found in England, brought back and restored. 

It too is fabulous.  
 

[PFitz]

Yes, fabulous. Always loved that, Midnight Green, which Tom said he matched to what color the car had when he found it. 

 

But somehow it ended up with '29 head lights and a '31 hood ornament. What Walt called the "Deco Duck" ornament.😁

 

Paul

[Steve Braverman]

The 145 sedan was the least expensive model. Even the coupe cost more. I find that interesting as you got so much more car with a sedan.

[f147pu]

The 145 sedan was attractively priced as a loss leader???

 

[PFitz]

21 hours ago, Steve Braverman said:

The 145 sedan was the least expensive model. Even the coupe cost more. I find that interesting as you got so much more car with a sedan.

Maybe the sedans could be sold for less because the may have cost the factory less with the greater demand thus production volume for sedan bodies ? There is a big cost to set up a production line for a specific body design. The unit costs go down with that set-up costs spread over greater numbers. 

 

Paul

[147 Franklin Airman]

I wonder if those grill slats would have been black from factory or has someone removed the chrome and painted them?

[PFitz]

6 hours ago, 147 Franklin Airman said:

I wonder if those grill slats would have been black from factory or has someone removed the chrome and painted them?

Martin, hi.

 

The hood front "slats" were painted black for 1930. Brushed chrome starting in '31.

 

Mid '30 production the factory put out a service bulletin about also painting the grill shell's center bar black.  The contrasting center bar chromed is unique to Franklin and not all 30 owners like the look of it all black.

 

Paul 

Edited March 9 by PFitz (see edit history)

[Steve Braverman]

13 hours ago, PFitz said:

Martin, hi.

 

The hood front "slats" were painted black for 1930. Brushed chrome starting in '31.

 

Mid '30 production the factory put out a service bulletin about also painting the grill shell's center bar black.  The contrasting center bar chromed is unique to Franklin and not all 30 owners like the look of it all black.

 

Paul 

I thought they were painted fender color? The drawing is missing.

[PFitz]

2 hours ago, Steve Braverman said:

I thought they were painted fender color? The drawing is missing.

Yes, the shutter assembly drawings for 30 and 31 seem to be missing. But there are enough surviving orginal cars and some factory literature to go by. 

 

For Series 14 the hood front shutters are painted black as standard. Yes, some cars had black fenders, but black fenders or not, the shutters were black. Some shutters are painted body color or fender, like yours and the Marion Davies 30 Pursuit that are known to be restored, but that color many not be as it was when the car left the factory ????? Verifying that would take researching back to before they were restored. 

 

Remember that the hood front was to have the cars look like the cars with water cooled engines. There is a service bulletin later on in '30 about the factory starting to paint the center bar black also, and it goes into detail how to do it to earlier '30s..  You see that on some original  '30s.

 

Paul 

[Walt G]

the shutters were painted black as stated and so was the center bar of the shell from the factory. Keep in mind that these assemblies ( shell, shutters) were put together in batches by workers - not each one on its own for every car made. The black was the general color that the factory wanted so all were done that way. There was an assembly line! had to be. The interior of the factory was designed to accommodate PRODUCTION. ( not a guess on my part I toured the factory several times when it was still standing from the basement to the top floor ) If there was a request to have the shutters the body/hood color this was done, but a lot of the time at the local dealership because the customer when seeing the car may have requested that. All this was discussed when I used to host the former employees gathering/talk at the trek in the 1970s helping Chape Condit at first and then he encouraged me to basically organize it each year as he advanced in years) . That question was asked then and is still being asked.

[Steve Braverman]

Mine need to be painted anyway. Black is easy.

[PFitz]

Found it !  The service bulletin about painting the Series 14 hood front center bar is #566 - March 22, 1930.

 

Does not say when the change took place, such as the usual after a car number. It just says, ".....highly desirable that this work be done on cars now in owner's and dealer's hands. It also shows an illustration of how the center bar should be painted to show off the bullet point ends of the bar.

 

I prefer the center bar left chromed to contrast with the black shutters rather than the hood front looking like a big black hole. 

 

Paul

Edited March 10 by PFitz (see edit history)