Dr. Karl E. Peace, a biostatistician, author, and philanthropist who has worked in public health for decades, has donated his 32-car collection to benefit Georgia Southern University. One of Dr. Peace’s previous contributions, an endowment in honor of his late wife, Dr. Jiann-Ping Hsu, allowed the university to establish a college of public health in her name.

Hagerty Marketplace is hosting the auction of The Dr. Karl Peace & Georgia Southern University Collection, the majority of which are Studebakers.

We can’t remember the last time we saw so many of South Bend’s finest under one roof. While there are a couple of post-Studebaker Avantis, a Chevy, a Buick, a Mercury, and a couple of Fords among the collection up for sale, let’s take a look at some of our favorite Studebakers that we’ll be paying particularly close attention to as the auctions come to a close starting on June 11.

1953 Studebaker Champion Regal Starliner

The 1953 model year marked the first year of the low, sleek Starliner coupes, penned by Robert Bourke at Studebaker’s design studio, which was headed by the legendary Raymond Loewy. Studebaker coupes of this era are a favorite among land speed racers because they perform much better than their peers, and it’s easy to see why: Their streamlined shapes were unlike anything else on the road. Later Studebaker Hawk variations expanded on the theme with fins and extra trim—we’ll be highlighting some of those as well—but the original Starliner is one of the best iterations and proves that sometimes less is more.

1957 Studebaker Golden Hawk

Studebaker’s most powerful and prestigious model at the time, the Golden Hawk debuted in 1956 with 352 cubic inches of Packard V-8 power, showing the fruits of the brand’s merger with Packard two years prior. For 1957, a Studebaker 289 replaced the larger Packard mill, but the output was the same 275 horsepower as before thanks to a centrifugal supercharger. These luxurious winged coupes are a rare treat, and because a 1956 model participated in the famed Mille Miglia, this one in particular could also be eligible for entry, adding another reason why a collector might see this Golden Hawk as the prize of Dr. Peace’s collection.

1960 Studebaker Champ Pickup

Studebaker didn’t have the deep pockets of its Big Three rivals, so it had to get creative in the late ‘50s when the brand needed to replace its aging pickup truck line that had been in service since 1949. Using the same chassis and stepside bed as its previous light-duty pickup, Studebaker cobbled a truck cab together by shortening a Lark sedan. We’ve gotta say, for something built on a shoestring budget, the styling works pretty well. 1960 marked the final year of a 170 inline-six as a flathead; it got an overhead-valve cylinder head in 1961. These pickups are a rare sight and would likely gather quite a crowd at any car show. Combine that with its fantastic gold paint and this one was an easy pick for our list.

1962 Studebaker Gran Turismo Hawk

The Gran Gurismo Hawk represented the final evolution of the sleek Starliner coupe into a more formal and stately touring car. The prominent grille might be a bit brash, but the new greenhouse gave the Gran Tursimo Hawk an all-new profile that matched its more upscale ambition. Inside, a plush interior kept up the theme. This one is powered by a 289 V-8 and a three-speed manual. Membership to the Brown Car Appreciation Society is complimentary.

1964 Studebaker Avanti

Plenty of Studebaker’s designs were vastly different from anything else on the market, yet we can’t help but think that the Avanti was perhaps the most ambitious effort the brand ever made. Its sleek fiberglass body is unmistakable. Studebaker-produced Avanti models were powered by 289-cubic-inch Studebaker V-8s, some with optional Paxton superchargers like the Golden Hawk. This one is naturally aspirated and backed by a four-speed manual transmission. Finished in blue over a blue and white interior, this example looks fantastic in photos, although a few mechanical and cosmetic issues need sorting out. It’s still a well-preserved example of a sporty personal luxury car bursting with style.

1964 Studebaker Daytona Convertible

Like the Champ pickup we mentioned previously, the Daytona used a lot of the mechanical underpinnings of its predecessor. In this case, that was the compact Lark, the same car that served as the basis of the Champ. Renowned designer Brooks Stevens was responsible for completely redesigning the Daytona to compete with rivals like the Dodge Dart, Chevy Nova, and Ford Falcon. We’d say he succeeded, as the lines look clean and sharp, even today. Just 416 Daytona convertibles were built in South Bend before production moved to Ontario, so this represents one of the last U.S.-built Studebakers in the company’s history.

There are plenty of other Studebakers in the Dr. Karl Peace & Georgia Southern University collection—plus the odd Chevy, Ford, and Buick. If you’ve got room in your collection for a bit of American car history outside of the Big Three, then you might consider one of South Bend’s stylish alternatives and help Georgia Southern University in the process.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.

The post 6 Stylish Studebakers up for Grabs appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Simply sitting behind the wheel of my newly repurchased ’64 GT Hawk, it turns out, wasn’t going to make it roadworthy. In order to properly rekindle my fondest high school memories, I’d have to break out the elbow grease. So what had been done to it in the last 20-odd years since I last owned it? Very little, it seems. The pesky exhaust leaks at the manifold had been rectified, and an electric fuel pump and generic voltmeter were installed. Other than that it was preserved in full, a rolling monument to my dumb teenage self. Follow along as I remedy my own juvenile hackery. (Hawkery, maybe? I dunno.)

The first task at hand: mount up a set of late-’60s Crestline Mark II wheels, already shod in new tires. These were last installed on an old Concord, then an AMX. I figured they’d add a nice, period-correct hot rod vibe to the Stude. Indeed, they looked good mounted. Then I arrived at the car’s front right corner, noticing where a massive chunk had been bitten out of the front drum—large enough for one to catch a glimpse of the brake shoe on each rotation. I recalled the precise moment that the Hawk collapsed upon losing a wheel, sending an array of sparks from the scraping metal that is, I imagine, still sprinkled across the right northbound lane of US-1 near Sanford, North Carolina. Due to my previous missteps, I’ll be finding a new brake drum or better yet, discs. At least for now, I broke two hub pullers, threw on some rear shoes, bled everything (with help), and adjusted the spur wheels to their satisfactory, unassisted standard of performance.

Once tired of addressing problems that made my car neither faster nor louder, I moved on to the fuel system. Yikes. In my defense, I had no part in this horrific fuel pump installation. Breaking out my terminal kit, ratcheting crimpers, and heat gun, I reworked the wiring into something more presentable. The Edelbrock carb still wasn’t having it: the accelerator pump circuit seemed entirely non-functional, and the mixture and idle screws were in complete disagreement.

I suspect the younger Matt Anderson, unfamiliar with the arcane mysteries of the vacuum gauge, is to blame here. Knowing better now, I pulled apart the carb into its smallest pieces, cleaned its nooks and crannies, and reassembled it with components from a fresh kit. Using the assortment of tools now at my adult disposal, I dialed in the carburetor to my satisfaction.

In the spirit of rectifying past sins, I turned my attention to the hose clamps on the rotten fuel lines, as well as the doubled-up fuel filters that looked like they came off a radiator hose. Without admitting to being directly responsible, I can say it possesses my former hallmarks: foraged parts and obvious impatience. Needless to say, I went ahead with all-new hoses, clamps, and a singular filter. I made sure to pump the fouled gasoline into lawnmower cans for my Wheel Horse to consume.

Alas, I knew in my heart that I wouldn’t be able to avoid the wiring department for long. None of the turn signals worked, nor did the brake lights, horn, or reverse lights. (Memories of sailing through state inspections on cool-factor alone came back to me.)

I got started on the most safety-critical functions. For starts, the brake light switch had only one wire on it, and my strategy of propping up my iPhone to shoot video from a fence post indicated that only the left lamp was functioning. While I was replacing the bulb (to no avail), I noticed that the reverse light bulbs had been removed. In their place were permanently illuminated reverse lamps. Then it dawned on me: When I swapped the Powershift auto to Borg-Warner overdrive in the heat of summer in 2002, I had committed crimes of the reverse-light-switch variety and bailed myself out by removing the bulbs. Stupid kids. Someone after me must have come up with the “fix.”

After lots of probing with a multimeter and alligator leads, I determined that the real problem with the brake light was the turn signal switch! Off came the steering wheel, exposing an indicator and canceling mechanism that appeared to be installed either by a thumbless animal or, more likely, by me after school. With a heat gun and pliers, I managed to straighten out the whole mess, bringing the signal switch contacts into their correct positions and the blinkers and brake lights into working order. At the same time, I noted that the wheel had been torqued down on top of the horn wire, which seemed to explain the non-functional horn.

Oh, how naïve to think that a self-generated wiring problem was going to be that simple!

Upon testing the horn, I found it to be non-functional. Replacing the horn and fixing the steering wheel wiring did nothing. I traced the hots and grounds back to their origins, which wasn’t easy given my past wiring misadventures that involved changing the wire color no fewer than three times. More 11th-grade than automotive-grade work. The ground to the relay, which should be switched by the switch at the wheel, was permanently grounded to the bolt holding the voltage regulator down. My mistake. So, with the circuit doubly earthed, why didn’t the horn blow all the time? Beats me.

In laying recumbent beneath the dash, I also sussed out why the speedometer wasn’t working and why the mileage looked eerily … familiar. I do vaguely remember getting annoyed at the rodent-esque racket it was making, which led to disconnecting it at a rest stop on the way to Wrightsville Beach. I decided to just leave it for now.

With my past transgressions acknowledged and somewhat addressed, why not drive it to work tomorrow? The next morning, I made sure my wife was available to rescue me just in case. She agreed but saw fit to remind me that I am, mentally, still a high schooler. 

Loaded up with my lunch, laptop, access badge, and tools, I hit the road. My first hint that things might not be right? Total lack of power immediately upon exiting the driveway. As we’ve established, I’m still the same idiot from 2004, so I continued along anyway. Maybe it was just cold, I rationalized. It didn’t take long—about 0.75 miles—before the universe caught up to my false confidence. The Hawk sputtered to a halt in the parking lot of a fried fish joint. I popped the hood to begin diagnostics, at which point the radiator core urinated on my khakis and dumped a quart of coolant on the ground. I picked up the phone and dialed.

“Hi love … whatcha doin’?” 

I made sure to ask my wife to please grab a gas can, just in case. As you may remember, all of my jerry vessels were recently filled with stale sludge. Five gallons of it didn’t help. I gave up after it blew backward through the fuel filter and limped the car home to my foundry storage, with my wife following in her 4Runner. I grabbed another car and went to work, sad.

Following my day at the office, Dana and I took a stab at bringing the Hawk the half-mile home. The failure had all the telltales of a fuel sludge problem—likely due to the elimination of fuel filter #2 and its rejected particles sitting on top of fuel filter #1—so I pulled the needle valve filter assembly on the side of the road. “Ok, turn the ignition on,” I asked my wife. Exceeding the call of duty, she fired the 289 right up. With fuel gushing everywhere at a steady idle, I did the most productive thing I could think of; with needle valve and filter assembly in my left hand and my thumb over the 5/16-inch garden hose on the right, I pressure-washed the cruddy parts clean and jammed the fuel hose down the carb while I reinstalled the filter assembly. Dangerous, yes, but I did have a fire extinguisher and precious few cranking amps left. 

It was enough to get the car home. Now, with the Stude in my driveway and the radiator off for a re-core, I felt an odd sort of nostalgia amid the thrill of a real breakdown on the way to somewhere important. It really does bring back memories!

The post Hawking for My High School Studebaker: Part 3 appeared first on Hagerty Media.

We blame the weather. While the staff of this website calls many places in the United States (and overseas) home, the lion’s share of our editors are located somewhere in the Midwest. And right now, dear reader, the Midwest weather is volatile as hell.

Naturally, we turned to internal discussions about cars to cope with a week where temperatures fluctuated by as much as 50 degrees and weather patterns swung from rain to sun to snow and back again.

This time around, we got to talking about the ’60s, one of our hobby’s indisputable golden eras. That led to discussions about front-end design, and how radically different it was from automaker to automaker. In short order, many of us began campaigning for certain cars with front ends that stuck in our hearts and minds, for one reason or another.

Compiled here is a list of eight such cars. Beneath each nominee is a brief summary of why it warrants appreciation, made by each car’s loudest proponent in the (chat)room.

Rules? Delightfully few. The car had to be built at some point in the ’60s, and beyond that, it was up to each of us to make the case. Naturally, such a loose mission brief will have let many great cars slip through the cracks. Got one that should have made this list? Let fly in the comments below!

1968 Chevrolet El Camino

If your first thought was that the face of the ’68 ElCo is virtually the same as that of the Chevelle, allow our own Cameron Neveu to offer the most compelling—if a bit unorthodox—case for picking the former:

“Why the El Camino over the identical appearing 1968 Chevelle? Well, the ElCo front end looks even sweeter knowing you’ve got a bed out back.”

An open and shut case, in our eyes. The 1968 model’s four round headlights make it extra distinct, and while the performance fan in us enjoys the SS badge between those four eyes, there’s something about the long, horizontal Chevy emblem that we can’t resist.

1968 Citroën DS

The DS pops up in all sorts of design lists, and for good reason. Those swooping body lines were quite brave for the era, and who could forget the high-tech hydraulic suspension that gave the car a magic carpet-like ride, helping to accentuate the design details that seemed to float over the blacktop? But the nose is worth celebrating on its own. As U.K. correspondent Nik Berg reminded us, if you sound out the DS title with a thick enough French accent, you’ll hear “Deésse,” which just happens to be French for “goddess.”

The big, wide headlights at either corner, contrasted with the waterfall of the hood in the middle, the exceedingly convex chrome bumper, and the lack of a grille make this front end as striking as they come.

1965 Buick Riviera

If the front end of a car were to be described as “very Teddy Roosevelt-esque,” could you picture it? In a single sentence, Eddy Eckart swayed the jury in his favor: “Simple, and formal in a means business kind of way, all without being too assertive.”

Gaze upon the forward cant of those headlamps; marvel at the buttresses flanking the massive hood. “The Riviera looks like a concept car that actually made it to production,” added Brandan Gillogly. There’s a reason this car is a popular choice for custom builders and restomod specialists, and it has everything to do with how the Riv’ manages to speak softly, while … well, you know the rest.

1966 Alfa Romeo Giulia Duetto Spider

If the Riviera is an American sledgehammer, Stefan Lombard nominated a delicate Italian pickaxe to contrast it. While it’s hard to find a bad angle of the Giulia Duetto Spider, the car’s clean, simple face manages to avoid the “mouth-agape fish” look that so many small cars of the time suffered from.

He also noted that while many cars look great from a front 3/4 angle, it can be harder to make the head-on view sing. In the Duetto’s case, Lombard had this to say: “The sloping nose and covered headlights lead into that delicate V grille, which flows back beneath the car. I love it.” Hard to argue with that!

1969 Chevrolet Corvette

The chrome front bumper the third-gen Corvette stuck around through 1972, but since the design debuted in 1968, it counts. Resident Corvette fanatic Grace Houghton opted to shout out the 1969 model, and we didn’t need any additional convincing. Two beautifully high fenders dip down to a broad chrome bar that spans the width of the car’s face. Below the bumper, two rectangular inlets, each housing a round turn signal bulb. The look, as Houghton so eloquently put it, “manages to look muscular and delicate at the same time … So Mako Shark, and so good.”

Bonus points if we’re looking at a ’69 L88, with its massive hood bulge shrouding a 427 big-block.

1969 Ford Mustang Mach 1

Though it’s easy to blur the lines, it bears repeating that “muscle cars” and “pony cars” were not always the same things. When it debuted in April of 1964, the Mustang was a relatively docile thing. The front end might be famous now, but that has more to do with what the Mustang has become in automotive culture than it does with how it looks on its own.

That look began to change almost immediately, as our resident Ford guru Sajeev Mehta reminded us. By 1969, the Mustang’s face had gone from cheerful companion to something far more sinister. As Mehta put it: “The 1969 Mustang took the hum-drum front end of the 1965 model and made it deeper, more aggressive, and far more angry. It became half muscle car and half pony car.”

1963 Studebaker Avanti

Though I’ll admit it’s not my favorite front end from the 1960s, there’s something distinctive and instantly recognizable about the Studebaker Avanti that warrants respect. Those perfectly round headlights seem like they should flank a broad grille, but instead, it’s just solid bodywork. That decision highlights the offset futuristic-script “Avanti” emblem that proudly proclaims the model’s identity. The fenders end in sharp corners, framing the simplicity of the grille-less countenance. You can’t help but appreciate designer Raymond Loewy’s flair for the dramatic.

“Counter-point, there should be a grille between this headlights and this nominee is actually bad.” – Stefan Lombard

Well, that’s just like, your opinion, man.

1968 Dodge Charger R/T

Fret not, Mopar fans, our site’s executive editor has you covered. Eric Weiner was swift and decisive with his nominee, the ’68 Charger. That broad, mail-slot rectangle of a grille is immediately recognizable. Hidden headlights add a menacing tone to the front end, and this is one of the few cars that makes a large front overhang look attractive.

This rectangular motif also carries over onto the new Dodge Charger. Anytime a front end’s design elements can look attractive in two distinctly different eras, you know you’ve got a winner in your hands.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters. 

The post 8 1960s Classics With Faces We Can’t Help but Love appeared first on Hagerty Media.

It’s fairly well known among aficionados of automotive trivia that Studebaker was the official American distributor for Mercedes-Benz cars in the 1950s. Less well known is the fact that the independent automaker based in South Bend, Indiana, had an earlier relationship with another German automaker, Porsche. Ironically, at the same time that the automotive operations of the Studebaker Corporation were deteriorating financially, Studebaker’s tie-up with Porsche helped it get established as a serious automaker.

Long before the Panamera, Cayenne, or Macan changed Porsche’s image from that of a maker of high-performance two-door sports cars to a manufacturer of luxury executive and family cars, Porsche developed a four-door sedan for Studebaker.

The history of the Porsche company dates to the engineering consultancy founded by Prof. Dr. Ing. h.c. Ferdinand Porsche in 1931 with his son-in-law Anton Piëch and Adolf Rosenberger, a businessman and gentleman racer who had succeeded both as a privateer and as a factory driver for Mercedes-Benz. While the engineering firm was started by Dr. Porsche, the first Porsche cars were developed by his son Ferry in 1947 while the elder Porsche was still in prison for his contribution to the Nazi war effort and the use of slave labor in his Stuttgart facility.

Ferdinand Porsche died at the age of 75 in early 1951, soon after his family secured his release from prison by paying French authorities a fine that was essentially a ransom. Late that year Ferry Porsche came to the United States to meet with Porsche’s North American importer and distributor, Max Hoffman. He asked Ferry if he was interested in doing contract engineering for American firms. Porsche jumped at the opportunity to provide additional revenue for his fledgling company, so Hoffman put Ferry in touch with a friend, Richard Hutchinson, Studebaker’s vice president for exports.

By the early 1950s, Detroit’s Big Three automakers were using their great resources and economies of scale to put serious pressure on independents like Studebaker. Hoffman, who by then was also importing and distributing Volkswagens, suggested that Studebaker should sell something small and inexpensive, like the Beetle, as no American car company was then serving that market. Hutchinson didn’t need much convincing; he had earlier negotiated with the British occupation authorities, who had started the postwar VW company out of the ruins of the Wolfsburg KdF plant, to ship him one of the first Beetles in the United States.

(Impressed by the Type I, Hutchinson had actually negotiated a contract to be the American distributor for VW, but Harold Vance, the president of Studebaker, killed the project.)

Still, Hoffman and Hutchinson arranged for a team from Porsche to meet with Studebaker executives in the spring of 1952. Ferry Porsche was accompanied to South Bend by designers Karl Rabe and Erwin Komenda as well as chassis engineer Leopold Schmid.

They brought with them a standard 356 coupe out of Hoffman’s inventory and an experimental four-seater designated Type 530, essentially a 356 that was stretched enough to make room for a rear seat, with longer doors for rear seat access and a slightly raised roofline for headroom in back.

According to Hoffman, the initial testing of the 530 at Studebaker’s proving grounds did not go well. With Ferry Porsche in the passenger seat and Vance and Hutchinson in the back, Hoffman steered the prototype around the track. He was not impressed. “It was a terrible car,” he told automotive historian Karl Ludvigsen. Still, the Studebaker execs were impressed enough to continue the meetings, with the company’s VP of engineering, Stanwood Sparrow, and chief engineer, Harold Churchill, joining in.

Instead of having Porsche develop an American people’s car (something Henry Ford had originally accomplished with the Model T), Studebaker ended up contracting with Porsche to develop a conventional front-engine car similar to the existing ’52 Studebaker Champion sedan, only with more power and less weight. It was also designed to take advantage of modern manufacturing methods.

Despite Hutchinson and Hoffman’s enthusiasm for the idea, it’s not surprising that the Studebaker managers in general were not very interested in a small, air-cooled, rear-engine American people’s car. None other than Henry Ford II turned down the opportunity to acquire the entire Volkswagen company, when presented with that offer gratis by the British in 1948.

The design brief that Studebaker gave Porsche specified a six-cylinder, air-cooled engine, a three-speed transmission, and a maximum achievable speed of 85 mph.

Ferdinand Porsche had Austrian ethnicity and was Czech by birth, not German. Ferry Porsche built the first production Porsche cars in a sawmill in Gmünd, Austria. Later, Reutter Karosserie in Zuffenhausen, near Stuttgart, Germany where the Porsche engineering firm was located, took over body assembly. When Ferry Porsche and his crew returned to Zuffenhausen from America, they were still working in wooden sheds. The Porsche company built its first proper assembly plant across the road from Reutter in 1952. The money from Studebaker made the move to that factory possible.

The six-cylinder engine that Porsche came up with was rather novel. It was a V-6 design, a configuration which was not very common in the early 1950s. The only V-6 in production at the time was a relatively small 2.0-liter engine by Lancia. Larger displacement V-6 engines aren’t smooth because of inherently unbalanced secondary rotational couples. Today that problem is addressed by counter-rotating balancing shafts.

To address primary balancing issues, most V-6 engines are 60-degree designs. (The GM 3800 was a 90-degree design made by hacking off two cylinders from a V-8, but it ran like a 60-degree six due to trick, offset crankshaft journals.) Instead, Porsche went with a 120-degree design because the crankshaft would have only three throws, with two connecting rods on each journal, compared to the six journals needed for a 60-degree motor. It was cheaper and simpler to manufacture and the relatively compact and lightweight crankshaft meant the unbalanced forces were reduced. According to Karl Ludvigsen, it may have been the first 120-degree V-6 ever made.

The engine was further novel in that it had hybrid cooling. The cylinder heads were air-cooled, while the cylinders were water-cooled with a small radiator placed inside the ductwork for the head. The use of liquid cooling for the cylinders also provided a reliable source of heat for the passenger cabin.

Ferry Porsche and Karl Rabe returned to South Bend in the early fall of 1952, with drawings and 1:5 scale models. Studebaker approved the overall design but apparently had misgivings about the hybrid cooled engine. Studebaker commissioned Porsche to also develop fully air- and liquid-cooled versions of the V-6.

Another contract was drawn up for Porsche to build a prototype and several extra engines for testing, and Porsche gave the project the internal designation of Type 542.

In early 1953, Porsche moved into its new factory, where development of the 542 proceeded, with fabrication of the body and engines taking place in the fall of that year.

The result was a four-door sedan, with pontoon fenders, that was slightly wider and a bit shorter in length (111-inch wheelbase vs. 115) than the 1952 Champion. The design brief from South Bend specified the use of many production Studebaker parts including wheels, drum brakes, the Commander model’s transmission (a three-speed manual with overdrive), door handles, steering wheel, and a Saginaw steering box.

Those specifications were relatively easy to accommodate but another Studebaker requirement posed a greater challenge. Porsche was developing a unibody architecture but Studebaker’s assembly plants in Indiana and California were set up to build body-on-frame (BOF) vehicles. BOF car bodies typically end at the firewall, with a separate front “clip” mounted separately to the frame. A body made with unibody construction is necessarily longer than the main part of a BOF body. To accommodate such a body, not only would the assembly plants need to be reconfigured, but Studebaker would have issues shipping the bodies by rail to California. To save space, bodies were placed vertically on special railcars, but the longer unibodies would not fit in the mountain tunnels on the way to the Golden State.

The finished 542’s “unibody” was actually made in two parts, with a separate front end with its own boxed structures, essentially two unibodies bolted together. Two different front structures were designed to accommodate a radiator for the water-cooled version, and air ducts for the air-cooled edition. Reutter was responsible for fabricating the 542’s body.

Like other Studebakers, the front suspension used coil springs and tube shocks but instead of conventional A-arms as used in American cars, the 542 used dual trailing arms like you would find on a VW Beetle. Unlike other Studebakers, the 542 had independent rear suspension, not for better performance, but because fixing the differential in place allowed for a lower driveshaft and a flatter interior floor. The semi-diagonal trailing arm rear suspension presaged its use years later by Porsche and BMW.

Regarding the engines, Ferry Porsche would have rather used aluminum but Studebaker was used to casting and machining iron and steel, so the air-cooled version—designated 542L, for luft, German for air—had both iron heads and individually finned, cast-iron cylinders. The heads and cylinders were fastened to the crankcase with long bolts, a setup familiar to anyone who has rebuilt an air-cooled VW or Porsche engine. Porsche made the crankcases for both engines as short as possible, to save some weight with the ferrous parts.

Both the 542L and the 542W (W for wasser, water) were overhead valve designs with wedge combustion chambers, and had the same oversquare dimensions with 3054cc (186-cubic-inch) displacements. Both motors used aluminum pistons.

It’s clear that Porsche was using the 542 project to expand and develop its own technical abilities. While the 542W got a conventional forged steel crankshaft, the 542L had a cast one made from nodular spheroidal-graphite iron—again, a technology that would be embraced by the industry later.

Ignition systems from both Autolite and Delco-Remy were tried. Fuel was supplied by a single Stromberg carburetor through a six-armed intake manifold that stretched across the wide 120-degree vee, although at least one prototype engine had dual carbs.

The 542L used an axial-flow fan, instead of the squirrel-cage fans on air-cooled VWs and Porsches. Concentric with the cooling fan and driven by the same belt was the engine’s generator and an oil cooler, a critical component for air-cooled engines, was integrated into the air flow. To keep things compact, all the ancillaries of the 542W were mounted inside the vee. Because of the need to drive the cooling fan, the 542L had slightly less power: 98 bhp (96.7 hp) at 3700 rpm, compared to the 542W’s 106 (104.5) @ 3500 rpm.

In early 1953, Raymond Loewy, Studebaker’s outside design consultant, and Robert Bourke, who was working in South Bend for the Loewy studio, traveled to Stuttgart to see how things were going with the body. Since the finished prototype doesn’t look out of place with Studebaker’s lineup at the time, it’s clear that Loewy and Bourke had some input. While styling was not actually part of Porsche’s commission, the finished product also shows some Porsche DNA. It was nothing revolutionary, after all Studebaker was a rather staid company, but the result can well be described as handsome.

Studebaker management got its first look at the finished 542 in March, 1954 on the occasion of the Geneva auto show. While the 542 was not displayed at the show, Harold Churchill, by then VP of engineering in South Bend, and Klaus von Rucker, a German-born engineer who was second in command at Studebaker’s R&D department, were at the show. Ferry Porsche drove them back to Stuttgart in the 542.

After further shakedown tests in the Swiss mountains, the 542, with dark metallic blue paint and saddle brown upholstery, was shipped to Indiana along with the extra engines in the autumn of 1954. In an article for Special Interest Autos, Karl Ludvigsen says that the car was tested with both engines. Since only a single prototype is mentioned, presumably the engine swap was done in South Bend, likely facilitated by the bolt-on front ends. Likewise, both engines were fully dynamometer-tested.

Though the 542 missed the target weight by over 500 pounds, Studebaker personnel were still impressed with the prototype. Harold Churchill considered the Type 542 to have been “an excellent job.” Ed Reynolds, who was on the staff of Studebaker’s proving grounds, called the 542 “a solid little thing.”

Why, then, did the Type 542 never see production? The simplest explanation is a lack of money. “By the time it arrived, the interest in it had departed,” Reynolds said. That departing interest was likely due to Studebaker’s pressing financial concerns. Less than a month after the 542 arrived for testing, Studebaker’s financially struggling automotive operations were merged with Packard to form the ill-fated Studebaker-Packard Corporation.

What about the 542L and 542W engines? Studebaker could have used a modern six-cylinder engine, and didn’t introduce its own overhead valve inline six until 1961. Like the 542 project as a whole, a lack of finances probably killed the Porsche-designed bent six. Churchill said, “The problem was the capital to tool it.” To put the engine into production would likely have cost $15 million to $20 million in 1954.

To get an idea of how precarious Studebaker’s finances were, that figure works out to about $200 million in 2024 dollars. That seems like a lot of money but it is a fraction of the cost of putting a brand-new engine into production these days, which is close to a billion dollars or so.

Studebaker did have a respite from following at least some of Max Hoffman’s original advice. In 1959, the company introduced its first compact car, the Lark. The Lark sold over a quarter million units in its first two years, reviving the company, at least until the Big Three automakers introduced their own compact cars. Lark sales halved in 1962 and Studebaker ended production at South Bend just before Christmas in 1963. Studebaker car production would end for good when its plant in Hamilton, Ontario, shut down in 1966, though a few knock-down kits may have been assembled after that by Studebaker’s importer in Israel.

The prototype 542 no longer exists except in photographs. At least one 542L engine still exists in Porsche’s corporate collection and has been on display in the company’s museum in Stuttgart.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.

The post Porsche’s First Four-Door Was a Studebaker appeared first on Hagerty Media.

If you’ve been reading this column regularly, you know that I recently struck a deal to buy my old high school ride, a 1964 Studebaker Gran Turismo Hawk. After 19 years away, mere hours stood between me and the car. When Sunday morning finally came, my wife and I hit the road for Johnston County, North Carolina. With some cash and a U-Haul on hand, I set out certain that this whole transaction would be a breeze. After all, the ad said it ran great!

As we approached the seller’s provided address, the Google Maps lady said “You have arrived!” a bit prematurely. Or so it seemed, anyway; there was no house in sight. Just a tight, sandy trail. So, down I went, not entirely sure I was in the right place.

The trail ended at a dam holding back a two-acre pond. Past that was a pasture at which, according to my correspondence with the seller, the Studebaker should have been parked. It was not there. I did spot a narrow two-track path, which I followed until I spotted an old man in overalls. The remainder of the path led down a steep berm. The whole situation had an uncertain vibe. Overalls Man waved at me.

“You might want to stay here,” I told my wife, as I started off towards the gesticulating figure. The rain was starting to pick up. I started thinking of all the things I didn’t bring, a tow strap and dry clothes chief among them.

I followed the ol’ fella through the gate, across the stream. Up the hill and sharply to the right, to the left, between two fenceposts. Up another hill, past a woodpile, a brush pile, to the left of a garden, to the left 90 degrees, between a house and a dog pen, and, finally, to the backside of the Hawk.

Through that whole maze, we passed not one convenient place to turn around; I shuddered at the thought of backing the trailer through the gate, across the stream, up the … well, you get the idea. The only thing left to do was get the Studebaker running, so I walked back to the car to get my jump battery. (That much I did bring.)

Upon laying eyes on the Hawk for the first time in nearly two decades, it looked nearly identical to when I had last seen it. Only one thing caught my eye: a patch of Bondo in front of the left rear wheel. The rest? Straight out of the Leesville High School parking lot. Was my counterfeit off-campus lunch pass still in the glovebox?

Further nostalgizing would have to wait. I had to get the thing running well enough to back it between the house and the dog pen, and then forward out into the pasture.

I popped the hood, noticing that someone had wired a wooden pull handle to the massive piece of metal’s safety catch. A nice touch—I have no idea how many times I cut the backside of my hand trying to address the breakdown du jour.

I began by positioning my massive motorhome battery (the one my wife convinced me to buy on the way to Albania) over the battery tray, valve cover, and starter solenoid. Overalls Man sprayed starter fluid in the carb and around the air filter (I don’t usually do that) and the mighty four-barrel 289 lit off. And then, with a backfire, it lit up. The flames were surprisingly high, given the volume of ether soaking the paper filter element. (Usually, “down East,” my cohort and I would worry about starting a forest fire via scorched pine needles, but everything on this property was saturated in water from recent rain.) I did the only thing I know to do in such situations: floor it and keep cranking!

Overalls Man, unaware and thus surprised by my method of making cars run while on fire, let out a yelp and fell backward into a bush. In retrospect, I should have warned him, but I was a little busy. Eventually, the fire went out, squashed with a combination of vacuum and smacks from a wet rag.

With one hurdle crossed, I turned my head over my shoulder to inspect my trailer’s reverse route.

At the time I sold my Hawk, I was just entering my 200-level engineering classes. Almost twenty years later, I was facing a graduate-level trailer backing exam. “This will go fine as long as you don’t watch me,” I told the man as I walked all the way back to my 4Runner.

For this final exam, I used every tool at my disposal. I rolled down the back glass of the 4Runner, lowered the side windows, pointed the mirrors down, and made sure my backup camera was turned on. 4WD locked in Low, plus differential lock. Amid a montage of hand movements and neck straining, along with a lot of false moves, the trailer made its way… up the hill and sharply to the right, to the left, between two fenceposts. Up another hill, past a woodpile, a brush pile, to the left of a garden, to the left 90 degrees, between a house and a dog pen … and, finally, landed at the Hawk’s rear end.

Using the aforementioned (massive) battery, plus my strong desire to immediately leave this place and never return, I backed the Stude onto the trailer using its built-in winch, i.e. the starter motor. This is abusive behavior, yes, but it was pouring rain and I was getting mildly annoyed at the stench of stale gas; shockingly, the 289-cubic-inch V-8 didn’t “run great,” as the ad stated. Given that the trailer was loaded with a backward-facing car with a 700-pound engine sitting beyond the trailer’s rear axles, we planned for this to be a short trip to the nearest parking lot. There, we’d flip the Hawk around and head on our way home. Don’t fail me now, Hobby 600 battery!

We were a few, terrifying miles down the road when we spotted a Lowe’s off the highway. On the exit ramp to the store’s large parking lot, there was a Mazda Tribute completely engulfed in flames. The driver was nonchalantly chatting on the phone while walking toward Smithfield’s BBQ (worth a stop even if your car’s not ablaze!) while the fire department approached the scene. “Well,” I figured, “if my car happens to self-immolate due to fouled gasoline bathing an overheated starter, at least I won’t have to worry about response time.”

We navigated around the flaming Mazda and parked in the Lowe’s lot, directly downwind of the Tribute/Smithfield-flavored smoke.

Just for giggles, I tried firing up the Hawk. The electric fuel pump ran spastically and never stopped. I tried once, to no avail, and realized that I had neglectd to bring a fire extinguisher of my own. Leaning, once again, on my miraculous Balkan camper battery, I motored the Hawk down the trailer ramps and then back up again, this time with the heavy side forward. I was just half an hour from my parents’ house, so I popped over there to share my spoils, eat some snacks, and pick up a set of Crestline Mark II mag wheels that I knew I had been saving. After stuffing my face with cheese and crackers and doing a quick wheel mock-up with the old man, we were back home Statesville in no time.

Well, now what? I have the car back, and that’s what matters. Nothing could really prepare me for what it felt like to sit in the driver’s seat after all this time. I haven’t yet found the words for it, except to say that something in my bizarre universe feels more right than it did yesterday.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.

The post Hawking for My High School Studebaker: Part 2 appeared first on Hagerty Media.

I keep a very detailed spreadsheet of all the cars I’ve owned. Every time I drag something home, I relish the “check-in” process—my ritual of recording the year, make, model, purchase price, cylinder count, and whether it drives. These go into a Microsoft Power BI data visualization model that offers a prediction of what I might buy next. Last time I checked, it forecasted a brown 1987 Volkswagen Quantum for the sum of $2300. While a Choco-Quantum indeed sounds appealing, in a sick sort of way, the model could not predict that I’d reunite with the 1964 Studebaker Gran Turismo Hawk that I drove through high school. I sold that car in order to fund a semester abroad in Australia. When it popped back up on Facebook Marketplace, my brain registered pure joy right before what PowerBI would consider a whopper of a #DIV/0! error.

As soon as I saw the single-picture ad, the panic attack commenced. Regular readers of this column will recall that my hands have been rather full as of late, namely that I am focused on turning an old foundry into a place for car storage. But buying back your old high school ride is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. The signficance of the moment hit me hard, so I did something that I rarely do: thought about it for a few days. (When I was 15 years old, all I could think about was how rad this car was.)

About four days later, I realized what needed to be done. On my way to work, I called the Studebaker’s owner. I explained how I had purchased the very same car as a roller when I was 15 years old, got it on the road, and then drove it through high school and part of college.

“What makes you so sure it’s yours?” he asked. “Well…”, I said…

1. The matte black finish, tweaked fender, and perfectly straight hood

When I bought the car for $2500, half of which was under a $5/hr work agreement, the hood was loosely attached and Bondo stalagmites hung from the underside of its bulge. It was also bent at the corners from what I diagnosed as a harrowing latch failure on the highway. When I had the hood off to remove the stuck 259 V-8, its abhorrent condition became apparent. I had a friend drive me out to Goldsboro, North Carolina, where we fished a dusty, matte black NOS hood out of a scorching attic. The old, bent hood was relegated to sled duty the two times it snowed that winter. (We were kids, after all.) The following half-dozen summers we used it as a campfire pit by the lake.

So yes, I know that matte NOS hood.

2. The creased front left fender

I would like to preface the text below with the following disclaimer: I did stupid things, because I was stupid, and it was stupid to do them.

I periodically competed in autocross events in my track-prepped Corolla, which was fun. For whatever reason, I decided it would be a good idea to compete in the Studebaker. Maybe I had become outclassed in the Toyota due to modifications, or maybe the thing was just broken. In any case, a few friends and I drove the Studebaker down to Laurinburg to compete with Tarheel Sports Car Club. With masking tape on the doors indicating our competition number, 85FSP, and a set of wheels from my dad’s Mustang, we set off.

The wheels didn’t fit right at all, not even with the 3/4-inch spacers. Each of the five lugs was barely biting on the stud, and checking their constantly lessening torque required the wheel to come off. So, we diligently retorqued the outer lugs after each run. The inners? Not a chance.

After a handful of rounds—all ending in poor times and cone picker-upperers later asking me about a certain buzzsaw-like noise they heard when I turned left (I didn’t know either)—it was time to head back to Raleigh. Whether it was the monotony of loblolly pine-lined US-1, the drone of the exhaust, the long day in the sun, wisps of carbon monoxide seeping into the cabin, or some combination of the aforementioned, my friend Kellen started nodding off in the passenger seat. The only thing keeping me awake was my car’s ever-worsening front-end shimmy.

Just as I was checking to make sure my copilot was breathing, the shimmy went away accompanied by a punting sound. I looked to the left, where a familiar-looking 17-inch wheel and spacer was rolling past us on the shoulder. Despite recognizing it as mine, I was dumb or panicked enough to hit the brakes, disrupting my Studebaker’s Citroën-esque balancing act and shoving the front left brake drum and bottom of the fender to the pavement in a shower of sparks.

There we were, stopped in the middle of US-1. My free wheel narrowly missed a van before taking out a picket fence. Friends convoying with us assisted in moving the Studabaker out of the road while I chased the wheel, its nuts fortunately still along for the ride between the rim and spacer.

So yes, I know that fender crease.

3. The 2-1/4″ Silvertone exhaust

The 2-1/4-inch Silvertone exhaust I chose to replace my Hawk’s heavily rusted 2-inch dual setup was not cheap, valued at 105 hours of labor at my modest $5/hr wage. Or 37 mowed lawns. (This was before my windfall $7/hr detailing at Saturn of Raleigh.) Ordering this set by phone from Stephen Allen’s, LLC, was my 15-year-old equivalent of buying a single-family home.

To minimize cost, I dug around my parents’ crawlspace and found a pair of Flowmaster 50-series mufflers that my father had rejected for being too quiet. He’d hacked off the mating interfaces with a Sawzall, so they weren’t exactly clean. I had no welding gear, either—that wouldn’t come into my life for another eight months, around the time I got my license.

Alas, I assembled this high-quality stainless steel exhaust with ill-fitting mufflers and hung it all solely with clamps and straps that required constant fettling to keep from asphyxiating my passengers.

So yes, I know that exhaust.

4. The floor shift Borg-Warner Overdrive

When I was legally licensed to drive and could hit the road with the Hawk, it was equipped with the Studebaker Powershift automatic. The transmission shared a lot with the Ford FMX. At the time, the Powershift offered a high degree of manual control for a slushbox, but it was nevertheless heavy and slow.

I don’t remember if a failure or what prompted the changeover to a proper manual transmission, but I managed to pull the complete Borg-Warner three-speed overdrive setup out of a parts car. This particular donor was a desert tan ’62 GT Hawk that had practically rusted in half. In order to facilitate easier removal of the transmission with minimal exposure to snakes and wasps, I hooked the International 856 tractor to the rear of the car and pulled it several inches further away from the front. The floors simply fell away, yielding full access to the bell housing and linkage bolts.

Swapping in the manual ‘box was a bit more delicate. I positioned the car on cinder blocks at a cow lot. There were three Nubian goats running around at that time, and their dung balls mixed with ATF to create a horrifying slurry.

Amid the hot summer of 2002, I installed that transmission and three-pedals on my back. I decided to keep the floor shift rather than steal the column shift stuff from the parts car. That meant adapting a vintage JC Whitney kit that would break when driven aggressively, and I suffered some severe forearm burns on the Silvertone exhaust as I fiddled underneath the car, trying to find any gear to get home.

So yes, I know that transmission. I have the scars to remind me.

*

Needless to say, I convinced the seller that this was indeed my old Hawk. We made a deal.

Next weekend, my wife, Romanian street dog, and I are going to head “Down East” with a trailer. This time, when it’s back home, I won’t have to bother updating my spreadsheet.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.

The post Hawking for My High School ’64 Studebaker: Part 1 appeared first on Hagerty Media.

We associate the name Studebaker with cars and trucks, but the company was in the transportation business a half-century before the first primitive motor vehicles were developed. You see, Studebaker was literally in the carriage trade, perhaps the most prestigious brand of horse drawn conveyances in America, and was founded in the 1840s.

Studebaker supplied carriages to at least four U.S. presidents, including the Barouche that Abraham Lincoln rode in to Ford’s Theater on the night of his assassination. Long before the invention of television and radio, the Studebaker company understood how to generate publicity. After Studebaker transitioned to making automobiles in the early 1900s (it was one of the few companies that made both gasoline and electric powered cars in the early automotive era), people got their news and publicity about consumer items from newspapers, magazines, and movie theater newsreels. One way to get the attention of wire services, newspaper chains, and newsreel studios was literally to go big. Making the biggest or tallest of something was sure to get attention.

Studebaker was headquartered in South Bend, Indiana, and in 1926 it built what many consider to be the first dedicated automotive proving grounds in America, about eight miles west of town in New Carlisle. In promotional materials, the 840 acre facility was billed as the “Million Dollar Outdoor Testing Laboratory.” According to an inflation calculator, that works out to about $17.2 million in today’s money, which sounds like a relative bargain. The newest automotive proving grounds in the United States is the American Center for Mobility autonomous and electric vehicle testing facility on the site of the former Willow Run complex in Ypsilanti, Michigan; it was budgeted at $80 million in 2017.

A first-rate facility, the site was ringed with brick pillars topped with limestone plinths and cast replicas of the spoked-wheel Studebaker logo. Studebaker also built a “clubhouse” adjacent to the proving grounds to provide housing for proving ground employees during inclement weather back when an eight-mile drive could be treacherous in the winter.

In 1931, Studebaker managers decided to build a 2.5-to-1 scale replica of their its President Four Season Roadster and put it on display at the proving grounds, billing it as the “biggest car in the world.” It was 41 feet long, 13.5 feet tall, 15 feet wide, and had a wheelbase of 325 inches. Its estimated weight was 11,000 pounds. The steering wheel had a diameter of 44 inches, the headlights were 33.5 inches tall, and the “wire spoke” wheels were 6- foot-8 in diameter and weighed more than a quarter ton each. Electrical conduit was used to fabricate the wire spokes. Firestone supplied the 10-foot tall rubber tires, with proportionately large Firestone logos, of course.

Paul Auman, who was in charge of Studebaker’s experimental body shop, was given the task of building the giant replica in the spring of 1930, so that it would be ready when the actual car was introduced. It took Auman and his team of 60 employees over three months to fabricate the body, mostly out of white pine, after which it was trucked to the proving grounds and assembled.

The massive two-tone green model car was the subject of a nine-minute promotional film shot by prominent director Alf Goulding, who also used the footage in his feature film, Wild Flowers. More people probably saw the promotional short than Goulding’s feature motion picture, as the nationwide RKO theater chain displayed the short about the giant car in its theaters from coast to coast. In addition to attracting attention like the December 1930 issue of Popular Mechanics, whose headline read, “Studebaker Builds World’s Largest Auto,” the big President became a bit of a tourist attraction.

Perhaps it drew too much attention. By the mid-1930s, souvenir hunters, vandals, and the elements had taken their toll on the giant President. It had served its purpose, and the model it was based upon was no longer current. In another big publicity stunt, with firemen from the South Bend Fire Department on hand (just in case), on May 17, 1936, the replica was doused with oil and Paul Hoffman, former president of Studebaker, and Jesse Meyer, the company’s corporate secretary, set a torch to it. Within 30 minutes it was gone. Prior to the conflagration, two of the tires and hubcaps were removed. The two wheel covers are currently on loan to the Studebaker National Museum in South Bend. In the years since Studebaker folded, most of the cast Studebaker logos on the columns surrounding the proving grounds appear to have been scavenged or stolen, though you can still see one at the Studebaker National Museum in South Bend.

The next big car that Studebaker made, for the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair, was almost twice as long. Just a few days after the fair launched, the first drive-in movie theater in America opened in New Jersey. You could watch a movie sitting inside your car. At the Studebaker pavilion in Chicago you could also sit in a car to watch a movie, but the car was a giant 1934 Studebaker Land Cruiser, inside of which was constructed a complete motion picture theater with seating for 80 patrons.

To publicize the mammoth motorcar, Studebaker published publicity photos of a large cleaning crew of attractive women standing atop the titanic car, scrubbing it down in shorts and halter tops. The Land Cruiser was 80 feet long and 39 feet tall, with 12 foot wheels. Visitors were given free diecast scale models of the big Studebaker, and you can usually find one or two for sale on the auction sites.

Finally, have you ever heard of the Studebaker Trees? Today you can make a few clicks on a mapping application and see satellite images of the large Studebaker sign that was formed from living trees, but back in the 1930s, few people traveled on airplanes, let alone had access to satellite imagery. (It was two decades before the space race began with Soviet Russia’s launch of the Sputnik satellite.) Most of the period photos were specifically taken by aerial photographers hired by news agencies or Studebaker itself. So what was the point if most people couldn’t see it for themselves? As mentioned above, back then big was, well, a very big thing.

The idea for the tree sign is attributed to two Studebaker engineers, Michael de Blumenthal and Mel S. Niemier, who proposed the idea to Studebaker president Al Erskine as a publicity stunt. Supposedly, it was also a tribute to the growing aviation industry, so that pilots and what few people who traveled by air over northern Indiana could identify the “Million Dollar Outdoor Testing Laboratory” as they passed over it. Another factor may have been the ability of Studebaker Corporation to benefit from tax benefits given for reforestation efforts, and free labor provided by the Civilian Conservation Corps, a Depression-era relief program to employ young men.

In 1936, plans were drawn and engineer Niemier, and his 10-year-old son layed out the sign’s proposed outline with stakes. Two years later, in 1938, Studebaker bought 16,000 six-inch seedlings from the Indiana Department of Conservation, Division of Forestry. About half were used in the planting of the sign and the other half on site land not used for testing vehicles. It took CCC workers almost two months to plant the seedlings, using white pines for the outlines and red pines for the letters’ interiors. Studebaker maintained the living sign until it went out of business in 1966. The Bendix Corporation bought the proving grounds and donated 175 acres of land to St. Joseph County, Indiana, including the Studebaker Trees and the adjacent Studebaker Clubhouse. The donation was to be used to create Bendix Woods County Park. The county built roads and hiking trails through the site as well as picnic areas and shelters. In 1985, the site was placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Subsequently, Bendix sold the proving grounds to Bosch, which in turn sold it to Navistar, which currently operates it as the Navistar Proving Grounds.

Even the most ancient and magnificent of trees, like the giant Sequoia Redwoods of California, have a finite lifespan, and 75 years is a fairly long time for white and red pine trees to live. Trees can be felled by storms—a large storm in 2004 took down a significant number of the original evergreens. Others died from disease and simple old age. Also, over the years, scrub, brush, and deciduous trees starting filling in as undergrowth, diminishing nutrients available for the pines. As the 75th anniversary of the Studebaker Trees approached, fewer than 2000 of the original 8000 trees remained.

In 2011–12, a census of the trees was performed and a management plan was formulated. A challenge grant from a charitable foundation provided funding to begin the removal of dead and deciduous trees as well as invasive species. Sponsors could “buy” a letter for $2000. After funds were raised, vines climbing on the trees were trimmed and treated with herbicides to reduce stress on the pines. Deciduous and diseased trees were removed.

Once all the unwanted vegetation was cleared, the site was prepared for new plantings, beginning with the letter “U” in autumn 2014. Instead of six-inch seedlings, two-to-three-foot saplings of White Pine, Eastern Hemlock, Norway Spruce, and White Spruce were used to fill out the sign. It was decided to go with multiple species to reduce the risk of wide-scale damage by species-specific disease or pests that can wipe out monocultures. Also, the new trees were planted farther apart than those planted by the CCC 85 years ago. Those trees were planted too close together to develop the root systems they should have had.

The Studebaker Trees are in good health these days, and whether or not you’re a Studebaker enthusiast, they’re certainly worth a visit if you’re in the area. Bring some food and enjoy a picnic inside the sign.

Northern Indiana and western Michigan have an abundance of sites of interest to car enthusiasts beside the Studebaker Trees and the Studebaker museum in South Bend. The Gilmore Museum north of Kalamazoo and the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Museum in the original ACD building in Auburn, Indiana, are both within a couple hours drive from South Bend. And if you have time, there’s the RV Museum and Hall of Fame in Elkhart, as well as the National Truck Museum, also in Auburn.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.

The post Studebaker Lived Large: Two Giant Cars and a Living Sign You Can Still See From Space appeared first on Hagerty Media.

If your answer to the question “What’s a bear’s natural habitat?” is anything but “a Studebaker,” it’s time to grab some popcorn and watch (or re-watch) Jim Henson’s The Muppet Movie. Thirty-five years after Fozzie Bear and Kermit the Frog road-tripped to Hollywood in a 1951 Studebaker Commander, the colorful movie car has embarked on an even longer journey, an 18-month road to restoration.

One of two ’51 Studebakers used in the 1979 comedy musical and now owned by the Studebaker National Museum in South Bend, Indiana, the one-time movie prop is headed to Razorfly Studios in Sylva, North Carolina, for a full makeover. The transformation of the now-dilapidated car is expected to be finished by summer 2025.

The news has drawn plenty of media attention and rekindled happy memories for fans of all ages. That comes as no surprise to Studebaker National Museum Archivist Andrew Beckman, who says the car and Henson’s characters make great co-stars.

“The style and whimsy of the Muppets dovetails nicely with the Studebaker’s far-out styling,” Beckman says. “The film’s producers were intent on finding a Studebaker to serve as Kermit and Fozzie’s ride, as they felt it was a good fit.”

Beckman was a child when the movie came out, and he didn’t have to twist his dad’s arm to take him to see it. In fact, his father owned a handful of Studebakers at the time, and he was the one who suggested going to watch The Muppet Movie. It’s no wonder why Fozzie’s ’51 Commander has been special to Beckman ever since.

“The car is more of a character in the film, similar to the Love Bug or Chitty Chitty Bang Bang,” he says. “The film came out when the Muppets were at the height of their popularity, on TV every week, and Kermit was on Sesame Street. The movie was designed for all ages and was a huge success.”

The story follows Fozzie and his sidekick Kermit as they drive cross country to make it big in show business. Along the way they meet dozens of other Muppet characters and an endless stream of real-life stars, including Steve Martin, Richard Pryor, Bob Hope, Edgar Bergen, Milton Berle, Mel Brooks, Telly Savalas, Orson Welles, James Coburn, Dom DeLuise, Elliott Gould, Madeline Kahn, and Carol Kane.

Chased by villainous Doc Hopper, played by Charles Durning, Fozzie and Kermit run into the fictional rock band Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. Offering to help the weary travelers, the band members decide to disguise the car, but the psychedelic paint job they choose is hardly subtle.

When the group is finished, Fozzie is impressed. Kermit? Not so much.

“I don’t know how to thank you guys,” Fozzie says.

Kermit quickly adds, “I don’t know why to thank you guys.”

Since computer-generated imagery was not yet available to Henson and other filmmakers in the late 1970s, two Muppet cars were used during production, one for long shots and the other—the museum’s Studebaker—for closer shots showing Fozzie and Kermit driving. To pull that off, puppeteers were required. They hid below the dashboard, so they couldn’t be seen, but that also meant they couldn’t operate the car. Henson installed a camera in the nose of the Commander, allowing the actual driver to drive from inside the trunk using a television monitor.

According to The Muppet Show Fan Club newsletter, “The first time they tried ‘driving,’ the television monitor went on the blink, and the driver had to be talked through the scene by an assistant director on a walkie-talkie. ‘A little to the right, now, to the left … hold it …’”

After filming was complete, the close-up car was parked on a studio backlot. Left to the elements, its paint—actually poster paint, which the crew preferred for its resistance to glare—quickly faded. In 2004, after the car was acquired by the Studebaker Drivers Club’s Orange Empire Chapter in California, it was gifted to the Studebaker Museum. Beckman says the Commander was in “pretty rough shape” when it arrived; its engine had seized up, and it was in desperate need of major rehab. But that would cost money—a lot of it—an estimated $175,000 for a full restoration. That would include returning the actual steering wheel and controls to their original position so that the car can be driven as intended.

The Studebaker National Museum cleaned up Fozzie’s car and put it on display, as is, along with a donation box to get the rehab work done. Only about $9000 was raised over the years, so two years ago the museum decided to start a crowd-sourcing campaign. Including the money raised from a GoFundMe page, the museum has secured approximately $60,000 in funding, enough to get things started.

RazorFly Studios, an Academy Award-winning prop house and custom-car builder, has agreed to partner on the project. Again, there wasn’t any arm-twisting involved. As Eric Hokanson, a restorer with Razorfly, told the South Bend Tribune, “I grew up with the Muppets. I said, ‘Really, we get to work on a Muppet car? Cool!’”

That famous ’51 Commander is about to get cooler.

“This project is so special to museum staff, the community, and Muppet fans around the world,” says Studebaker National Museum Curator Kyle Sater. “We are one step closer to returning a bear to his natural habitat—a Studebaker.”

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.

The post At Last, the Car from <em>The Muppet Movie</em> Will Get a Restoration appeared first on Hagerty Media.

For a group that likes to call themselves car people, automotive enthusiasts have an odd affection for cars that look like trucks: The Chevrolet El Camino, the Ford Ranchero, and the Subaru Brat.

Whatever you call these oddities—car-truck, truck-car, cowboy Cadillac, ute—it’s tempting to say that they trace their lineage back to Henry Ford and the 1917 Model TT truck. Though early Ford cars and trucks are obviously related, the TT was a purpose-built utility vehicle with a more substantial frame and drivetrain. Typically, car-based trucks have gone in the other direction, borrowing their mechanicals from automobiles, not trucks, and tilting the utility/luxury balance more towards the latter.

So, if not the Model TT, which vehicle is the true founder of the car-truck line?

Since I haven’t done a Marianas Trench–level dive into the subject, I can’t say with 100 percent certainty that it was independent automakers Studebaker and Hudson that first introduced actual car-based pickup trucks to the American market. However, I believe that the 1937–39 Studebaker Coupe Express and the 1941–47 Hudson Cab Pick-up (including the 3/4 ton “Big Boy” models) are among the very first American vehicles that combined pickups’ cargo beds with the styling, sheetmetal, and mechanical componentry of those brands’ passenger cars.

Introduced for the 1937 model year, the Coupe Express was based on the Studebaker Dictator. In case you’re wondering why Studebaker would choose a model name associated with despots, the Dictator nameplate was introduced in 1927, before Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, and Stalin had solidified the word’s modern connotations. If the branding scheme is now awkward, it was at least coherent: Dictator was the entry-level Studebaker, below the midrange Commander and flagship President.

Power was supplied by Studebaker’s larger, 218-cubic-inch (3.6 liter) L-head inline six-cylinder producing 86 horsepower, driving through a three-speed manual transmission, with an optional Borg-Warner overdrive available. Typical passenger-car options like radios, heaters, and turn signals were available. You could even choose from two different styles of steel wheels. (Yes, young Padawan, things like heaters and turn signals were not always standard equipment, let alone air conditioning. Before the 1976 Honda Accord, cars were very much priced à la carte.) About 3000 units of the introductory Coupe Express were sold. Advertising touted the “passenger-car comfort and style … combined with useful business body types.”

For the 1938 model year, the cab of the Coupe Express was updated to reflect styling changes on the passenger cars. In this case, styling alterations made the vehicle more practical: They allowed for a slightly longer cargo bed, which featured a sharp-looking, backwards-sloped tailgate. Despite the styling changes, sales dropped by almost two-thirds to around 1200 trucks. Again, the 1939 models were restyled to reflect Studebaker’s cars, but sales of the utes dropped even more, to just about 1000 units. The Coupe Express was discontinued to be replaced in 1941 by a 1/2 ton model of Studebaker’s more conventional M-Series pickup in 1941.

Hudson, on the other hand, never developed a dedicated truck line. You could well argue that all of Hudson’s pickup trucks, in fact all of its light commercial vehicles, were car-based. This wasn’t a bad thing, since Hudson’s automobiles were regarded as robustly overbuilt; perhaps they were suited well for the task of being car-truck hybrids.

In 1929 Hudson’s Dover truck brand started selling a line of commercial vehicles based on the parent company’s Essex automobiles, equipped with pickup beds, side-express bodies, or custom bodies made by the Hercules company in Kentucky. The United States Postal Service was a major customer, buying 500 of the car-based trucks, presumably for mail delivery. One of those postal utes, shown below, long resided at the Hostetler Hudson Museum in Shipshewana, Indiana, which closed in 2018.

Hudson also sold those same vehicles under the Essex brand, with slight changes. In 1932, a new line of pickups and sedan deliveries were offered, based on the Terraplane. With the Great Depression going on, sales were modest and peaked at about 8000 units in 1937.

That year, Hudson’s lineup of what it called Commercial Cars was expanded to also include a cab and chassis model, a sedan delivery, a station wagon, plus a “Utility Coupe,” which had a small pickup box that pulled out like a drawer from the trunk, and a “Utility Coach,” a two-door sedan with removable seats and panels to cover the rear quarter windows.

For the 1939 model year, the lineup was expanded yet further, offering three different wheelbases and multiple trim levels, all of them with car styling. That year the heavy-duty 3/4 ton Big Boy trucks were introduced. In 1940, when Hudson cars got new front-end styling and A-arm front suspensions with coil springs, the trucks shared those modern developments.

The Hudson trucks introduced in 1941 were probably the most car-like. Hemmings describes them as “low, long and dripping with chrome,” looking “like something dreamed up by a customizer… rather than the product of a mainstream American automaker.” Contemporary advertising focused on “new beauty and style,” plus “passenger car roominess and comfort.”

The fact that the ’41 Super-Six is considered by Hudson enthusiasts to be one of the marque’s most attractive products didn’t hurt. The half-ton Cab Pickup and the three-quarter-ton Big Boy models were based on 116- and 128-inch wheelbase versions of the Super-Six Commodore. Though those were midrange cars, they had substantial frames with 7 3/8″-inch tall rails and four lateral crossmembers augmented by a stiff X-member. The independent A-arm, coil-sprung front end was billed as “Auto-Poise Front Wheel Control,” the rear end had leaf springs with a track arm, and all four corners were dampened with modern hydraulic tube-type shock absorbers. The trucks did feature stiffer springs than the passenger cars and the Big Boy’s brakes 11-inch drums came from the parts shelf for the Hudson Eight.

The Hudson pickup may have been based on a sedan, but even the shorter-wheelbase model had a full-steel pickup bed measuring more than 48 inches between the inner fender walls and 93 inches front to back: With the tailgate down, you could carry a full sheet of plywood. On the inside, the dashboard offered the sedan’s clock, “Weather-Master” heater, Zenith radio, and deluxe steering wheel with a chrome horn ring as optional features. Super Six mechanicals were included as well, with Hudson’s 212-cubic-inch inline six driving through a column-shifted three-speed transmission that, like the Studebaker’s, was also available with an overdrive.

The war-shortened 1942 model year introduced Super Six sedan features such as slicker, restyled fenders and a flared lower body to hide the running boards. As with most cars in the immediate postwar period, the 1946 models were much like the prewar cars except for a new grille. The pickups, although they were some of the first postwar vehicles that Hudson made, still retained the earlier body style with exposed running boards—possibly due to their lower volume compared to the cars.

When Hudson introduced its innovative “Step-down” 1948 models, the firm stopped making pickup trucks as they were not compatible with the new model’s semi-unibody construction. While one prototype was reportedly developed, Hudson would never make another production pickup truck, car-based or otherwise, again. The company would merge with Nash to form American Motors in 1954.

Can we say with absolute certainty that Studebaker and Hudson made America’s first car-based pickups? No, but one thing’s for sure: Chevrolet and Ford were fashionably late to the party.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.

The post Did Ute Know? The first car-based pickup was not a Chevy appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Some time in March 1963, my parents rented a spring break “vacation apartment” in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I was 9 years old, and my hobby was building car models—AMT models, specifically. Despite my enthusiasm for the endeavor, I wasn’t very talented in the execution. Actually, I was terrible, and if half a tube of glue was called for, you could expect me to use at least two tubes.

We got to Fort Lauderdale for a beach vacation, and it rained. And rained. And rained, which left us close to nothing to do. In those pre-Yelp, pre-Airbnb days, Dad had simply asked the rental agent how close the place was to the water, to which the agent replied, “Just two blocks!” Of course, Dad meant the ocean, not the drainage canal nearby.

With little to do, it was quickly turning into a cheerless vacation. Then my dad rescued it by taking me to a hobby shop. It was there I found the model that would change my life and set me on a path toward enlightenment and endless pride. I really do mean that, but said path was not without some head-scratching, some embarrassment, and a lifetime of explanations.

I bought AMT’s 1:25-scale plastic Studebaker Avanti. More of a spaceship than a car to this 9-year-old, the real Avanti had a futuristic design with an (almost) grille-less front end, snappy 2+2 seating, and a large greenhouse with a back window easily the size of a Triumph TR2. It was made of exotic fiberglass, and it was very fast. The model was the full manifestation of a car from the future, delivered into my hands that day. Within hours, the Avanti and I had a full working relationship, boy and inanimate object, a car that looked to me like a magic portal to the future. My future. And now, almost 60 years on, it truly was that portal.

The 9-year-old me struggled in school, and friends were tough to come by, but I quickly learned that I could take my love of cars everywhere. I could read about them, I could occasionally ride in them, I could endlessly dream about them, and, if I could live through those seemingly 100 years between ages 9 and 16, I might actually be able to drive them. Cars didn’t judge, cars didn’t criticize, cars didn’t tell me what was wrong with me.

The Avanti and I, we bonded. Not just because it, like me, was a bit of an oddball, but because it is so misunderstood. I get that some people think it’s ugly. I understand when people say it was a failure because it didn’t save a 100-year-old company that had been on its death bed even before an ill-advised 1954 merger with Packard. That stuff didn’t matter to me back then, and it matters even less today.

Right around the same time I got my driver’s license, I managed to get my very own Avanti. It was sitting at Sun Motors on Fairfax Drive in Arlington, Virginia. Avanti Gold, a supercharged 1963 four-speed R-2 model with a fawn and elk interior. My boss, a hardened old soul five years my senior, did the negotiations for me, all of which involved enough convoluted horse trading worthy of a Silk Road merchant four centuries prior.

I have since owned well over 100 of them, which makes me just expert enough to run you through the car’s first four generations.

The Studebaker Years, 1963–64

The 1963 Avanti had a 289-cubic-inch Studebaker V-8 as standard and was available in non-supercharged (R-1) and Supercharged models (R-2). The base, and rarely seen, transmission was a three-speed manual; a four-speed manual and a BorgWarner automatic were options. Air conditioning was not available on R-2s, as the Paxton supercharger left no room underhood for an A/C compressor.

All Studebaker Avantis were equipped with Dunlop disc brakes up front and conventional drum brakes in the rear. Options included power steering, power windows, an AM or AM/FM radio (both were rebranded Delco units), tinted glass, left and/or right “Stratovue” exterior mirrors, and a host of other convenience items. All 1963 interiors were two-tone vinyl, with fawn (a light tan) on top and colors such black, turquoise, orange, elk (darker brown), or red below. The carpets were tuxedo “salt and pepper” style (not GM sourced, but similar to those in the C1 Corvette).

In 1964, a few features were added. The front end received square headlight glass lenses, replacing the previous round lenses. Inside, a tilt steering wheel became an option. The two-tone vinyl interior was changed out for a single color, and the tan painted dashboard and console pieces were replaced with woodgrain vinyl applique. The tan steering wheel also became a brown woodgrain. The bucket seats, lightly disguised copies of Alfa Romeo buckets, got thicker seat backs in last few hundred cars.

An R-3 engine was also added, but only for the last nine cars off the assembly line, in December 1963. The R-3 was bored out slightly, and the Carter AFB carburetor was enclosed in an airbox for better performance. A rumored twin-carbureted R-4 never made it to production.

Getting further into the weeds, running changes on the production line actually gave us some “1963½” models, which featured a 1964-style interior with 1963-style round headlights. Perhaps even more obscure are the cars that were sent to Nevada for something called the “Las Vegas Driveaway.” Those cars, slated to have vinyl applique on the dash and console, instead featured black paint. The rumor is that heat + early vinyl = excessive peeling, so the move was made to avoid angry customers.

Such is the nature of small-volume production, few Avantis from this era are exact duplicates. With six exterior colors offered (including different formulas for red between 1963 and ’64), and nearly endless option combinations, the cars were all semi-personalized. The total number of Studebaker Avanti cars built is generally agreed to be 4643. How many remain is unclear, but my best guess is “somewhat fewer than 3000—perhaps 2600?” Though they are not completely immune to rust, the fiberglass bodies have helped with attrition rates, and the Avanti was always regarded as a “special” car, even when new.

The RQA Avanti II Years, 1965–69

When Studebaker closed its factory in South Bend, Indiana, in December 1963, the Avanti was one of the casualties. Enter two South Bend car dealers, Leo Newman and Nate Altman. The duo bought production rights and much of the parts supply for the Avanti and moved manufacturing to one of the former Studebaker South Bend interior finish buildings. A matter of months later, the Avanti II emerged.

Gone was the distinctive rake to the front end, thanks to a slightly taller new General Motors powerplant. These are known as the RQA cars because of the prefix to their serial numbers, as in RQA-0XX. They were essentially 1964 Avantis, now totally handbuilt, with a Chevrolet 327 V-8 for power. I’m a big fan of the earliest Avanti IIs. Make mine an air-conditioned four-speed with the available 350 horses, please.

The Avanti II quickly became a highly personalized car, as you could order an unlimited combination of paint colors and interior fabric choices. A Grecian Bronze exterior with a marbled blue vinyl interior? Not a problem. Would you like red carpets with that? Despite some outliers, most Avanti IIs were tastefully done, and those that survive tend to be bargains. It really is a lot of car for the money.

The RQB Avanti II Years, 1970–82

The later RQB cars (again, because of their s/n prefix) are easy to spot thanks to their high-back bucket seats with built-in headrests. As time went by, not surprisingly, the Avanti became more luxurious and lost some of its performance edge. The 327 V-8 was replaced by a 350-cubic-inch GM unit, with a 400 also available in some years.

Increasingly, leather replaced vinyl in the seats, door panels, and trim. The AM/FM radio sprouted a cassette deck or 8-track player. Sunroofs became the norm. The carpeting, once like every other 1960s car, grew a deeper pile, and in some cases, turned shag. After Nate Altman’s death, his brother Arnold took on much of the day-to-day activity of running a small automobile company in the 1970s. The challenges of being America’s fifth or sixth largest (remember Checker and Excalibur?) automobile company were close to legendary. Payroll had to be made, government regulations had to be addressed, and a once-seemingly endless but now dwindling supply of parts had to be procured—at ever increasingly expensive costs. Avanti needed its next savior.

The Steve Blake Years, 1983–85

Washington D.C. real estate developer Steve Blake had been in purchase talks with Leo Newman and Arnold Altman for some time. On October 1, 1982, the transfer of ownership became final.

The first “Blake Avantis” were 1983 models. Steve was a personal friend, and his outgoing nature and vociferous personality made him a true one-of-a-kind. His Avanti vision, never fully executed, was to make an American version of the Porsche 911—an ever-evolving, ever-improving performance and luxury brand.

The costly blade-style chrome bumpers were replaced for 1984 with Kevlar-reinforced fiberglass units, and the change was dramatic. Blake hired chassis engineers, started a racing program, fitted the cars with 305-cubic-inch L69 Camaro V-8s, and used public relations and a touch of advertising in an effort to make the Avanti look and drive fresh in the 1980s. A convertible version was launched for model year 1985, and three production cars were actually built. Despite increasing sales, and plagued by paint problems, Avanti closed its doors for the first, but not the last, time in early 1986.

Although the original Avanti lived on in many forms and with an increasingly interesting list of owners, the original chassis—a Studebaker unit that traced its roots to the 1950s—was in production from 1963 to 1985. Love it or hate it, the Avanti was an American icon of the late mid-century.

What they’re worth now

Early Avantis, particularly the ultra-rare ’64 R-3, remain the most coveted of the marque. The Studebaker R-1 and R-2 are both worth more than double the Avanti II models, which represent excellent entry points into the Avanti world. That said, we are seeing renewed interest in early Avanti II cars, as well as Blake 1983–85 cars. Interest in all Avanti generations skews heavily toward baby boomers, though our quote data shows Gen X drawn to the early cars, while later cars have garnered a significant amount of attention with Gen Z.

The Avanti’s trajectory is strikingly similar to that of the Cord 810/812: the last dying effort of a dying Indiana car manufacturer, available in naturally aspirated or supercharged form, sporty and fast, with styling that was initially polarizing but no longer looks out of place.

I still have fond memories of that rainy Fort Lauderdale vacation half a century ago, and I’ve never spent too much time wondering how my life would be different if I had picked up a Mercedes 300SL roadster model instead of the Avanti. We were pals, the Avanti and me, and we still are.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters. 

Via Insider

The post The long, remarkable life of the Studebaker Avanti appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Jeff writes:

I have a ’63 Studebaker Avanti which will start up, run for five seconds, and then shut down. I have changed filter and use gas preservative. Car will continue to start up and shut down, many times. Fuel pump is working (has an electric as well as a mechanical pump). Any thoughts? My mechanic has replaced the condenser several times recently, not sure why; would this do that? Or is the float not opening up the needle valve? Thanks for any suggestions.

Sajeev answers:

Great question! By any chance do you have a fuel-pressure gauge on the fuel line, or one that you can connect to monitor the pressure as the motor stalls out? We need something like this to 100 percent rule-out a weak/failing fuel pump (or pumps). Or perhaps there is too much fuel pressure and the carburetor is flooding itself … but odds are that would be very noticeable.

Anyway, once the fuel pressure is confirmed to be within spec (usually 5 to 10 psi), we can consider an issue with ignition. Tell me what you think.

Jeff replies:

I am not a car mechanic, so don’t really have ability to do that. However, it seems to me that the chances of two fuel pumps failing at the same time would be like winning the Powerball. I can hear the electric one. I don’t think it is flooding out, no strong gas smell.

Sajeev concludes:

Perhaps my initial request to check for fuel pressure isn’t necessary, but that’s usually where I start. Voltage drop(s) can take both pumps out, but maybe the stalling Studebaker needs another opinion.

You can take apart the carb, give it a good clean, or a full rebuild. Or, don’t touch the carb yet and check for vacuum leaks (via smoke testing) or check the resistance of parts of the ignition system. Odds are it isn’t a vacuum leak, because it runs for a few seconds. The ignition could be an issue, especially if it’s been upgraded with non-standard parts that are either used (i.e., worn out when removed from the junkyard) or of poor aftermarket quality.

But, again, ruling out fuel pressure makes it easier to determine if whether you’re facing a fuel, spark or vacuum leak. And a drop in fuel pressure really feels like the first place to look.

What say you, Hagerty Community? Is fuel pressure the first thing you’d look for?

Have a question you’d like answered on Piston Slap? Send your queries to pistonslap@hagerty.com—give us as much detail as possible so we can help! Keep in mind this is a weekly column, so if you need an expedited answer, please tell me in your email.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.

The post Piston Slap: Stalling Stude’ requires second opinion? appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Matthew Anderson is a North Carolina native, professional engineer, and devoted crapcan connoisseur. He owns a Holden, a Citroën, a Hobby 600 camper, a Moskvich, a Studebaker, an Isuzu, and he thinks that’s it. We don’t ask him too many follow-up questions. –EW

If you’ve been following my international exploits, you know that I’ve now settled into a new house in North Carolina. My BMW wagon, my Lada, and much more had to be left behind in Germany. My key ring is thus rather empty. Perhaps you see where this is going.

In the interest of time, I am going to avoid extensive tangents that each deserve their own story. Just let yourself be swept up in the whirlwind of my usual vehicular misadventure.

Okay. So. I grew up in the Carolinas and still have family in the region, plus a few cars sprinkled around. To give you a sense of the landscape, I’d sown a number of seeds to lay dormant during my years away. Now that I’m back, it’s watering time.

Home base—for me, my wife, cat, Romanian street dog, Moskvich, and camper van—is a former Depression-era subsistence farm (more on that later) in rural Piedmont, North Carolina. The sole key on my ring upon move-in was for a special vehicle: my dad’s 1964 Ford F-250, which he bought new and has never sold (full story on that later). We call it “Fordy.”

Fordy is everyone in the Anderson family’s emergency transportation. And my path crosses the threshold of “emergency” more often than most, so Fordy and I have been through a lot together. Once, for several months in college, it was my companion while both my Corolla and Studebaker were blown up (again, I’ll explain later). Another time, early in my Michigan years working at my first engineering job, the truck’s engine mildly blew up while towing a Javelin. (Patience, we’ll get there.) Fordy survived. I gave the truck a robust, comprehensive semicentennial service and clean-up in 2014, after which my dad promptly tossed a heavy load into the bed and dented it. The truck was suddenly my daily driver  again, helping me commute 38 miles round-trip each day and clean out two small barns in my spare time.

My parents drove roughly 120 miles to help with unpacking boxes and moving into the North Carolina house. They left the truck and its idiosyncrasies with me. Fordy, as usual, was great around the property and handled dump runs like a champ. Commuting was rougher. Maybe I got used to luxury motoring in Germany with the BMW wagon, but this rig much prefers following a threshing machine than a line of traffic. It had its own needs, to boot: a dead generator requiring overnight charging of the battery, three coolant leaks, a misfire, high idle, and an exhaust leak. After three commutes, I threw up my hands and retired it to pasture duty. I vowed to find something else while I sorted it out.

With the used car market having lost its mind since I lived in America, I started scraping the bottom of the friendship barrel instead of losing my shirt on something built in the last 10 years. Growing up in North Carolina myself, I have a broad selection of horrible enabler buddies with equally horrible cars.

From this muddy trough sprung “Fuggles,” a beat-to-hell 1992 Dodge pickup with a rattle-can paint job and five-speed gearbox. I drove Fuggles on a loan-only basis for a week or so before giving it back to my friend, who spent the next morning dealing with a failed crank sensor. The car gods, thankfully, spared me for a brief moment but only barely, so I would not let my guard down.

Another one of Jon’s cars came next: a rusty, acrid-smelling 1989 Isuzu Trooper that had been sitting outside of a mountain cabin for a year. Though it too had needs, $1000 was all it took to win the title. Happily, it drove comfortably for long distances in a mostly straight line. Of course, it also lost oil, needed tires, and often burped up several ounces of coolant without warning.

Mechanical maladies were tolerable, but nothing could prepare me for the wave of hot, mouse-spiked ammonia gas that oozed from the defrost trapdoor on the first cold morning. My brain struggled to process this as vaporized rodent urine burned my eyes. I spent the first weekend power washing the tobacco spittle and vermin remnants out of the carpet, while trying to find the offending nest under the dash. (I did it with my mouth shut, because I know better.) Upon reinstalling the carpet and bumping the HVAC tube under the glovebox, a tiny, still-live baby mouse tumbled out onto the floor.

With a 9:00 a.m. exhaust shop appointment scheduled for the following morning, the race was on to eradicate the habitat prior to judgement day. And judged I was; the keys were ultimately returned to me that evening along with unvarnished side-eye. I hopped in and immediately noticed another mouse on the passenger floor, this time deceased. After paying respects and removing it from the vehicle, I left for the airport on business. An hour of hard driving later, the Trooper’s oil lamp started illuminating anywhere under 1500 rpm and the engine puked a healthy volume of ethylene glycol right onto the concrete at the airline parking deck valet line. I handed in my keys and tried to act natural.

As the Airbus A320 jet carried me high above the bad decisions littering the ground around Charlotte, I realized I had a couple days to make a conservative car plan. I didn’t, of course, instead using the time to dream about the dozen or so Renaults I had gone to inspect at a lot earlier in the week (I’d love to elaborate but let’s keep it movin’!).

Once back in town, I headed to work and finally caught a break. I’ve dubbed her Grace, a 2003 Ford Taurus SES found parked in front of a church with a For Sale sign. I called the number, and because I had faith this would be the case, it was indeed the minister’s car. The mild-mannered man sauntered out of the mezzanine, we did a hot lap of the neighborhood, and the 97,000 mile, 24-valve leather sofa was mine.

Finally, the Hobby 600 camper arrived to offer a bit of reprieve. Though still wearing German plates, it was and still is my best option for getting to work when my wife wants to drive the Taurus: something with brakes that doesn’t smell like a litterbox lined with deer corn. With the Trooper now laid up in the barn, it was Fordy’s time to shine. Fresh from a tune-up, new intake manifold gaskets, and an alternator conversion, the truck was called into action for the upcoming weekend’s State Fair demolition derby championship. (You KNOW I have stories from my glory days in this arena!)

I’d kill two birds with one stone on this trip, taking my wife and nephew to a cultural staple of my childhood while also consolidating another vehicle left in hibernation while I lived in Germany.

The morning before the derby, my dad and I went out to visit my ’61 Studebaker Lark Cruiser, along with its parts car, living at the BMW/Studebaker garage at which worked while in high school. (What? How? Why? More to come!) Also on site was next pearl on my crapcan necklace: a 1988 Holden VL Commodore. The final year of the last “old-body” Commodore, this ex-detective-duty VL came equipped with a silky smooth straight-six from the Nissan Skyline, five-speed manual gearbox, and zero options. No doubt, it is the best car I’ve ever purchased in Australia from someone in prison. (If I go into how I got this thing, it will derail us forevermore.) After investing an hour in some basic prep work on the Stude—scrubbing sap, swapping plugs, and freeing up the stuck motor—it was time to load the Holden and take it home.

My father had sent me a couple distressing videos of him cranking on the Holden key with no motion, but I figured it was best to assess the car in person. And yeah, sure enough, the ignition lock barrel was frozen up tight. But why? He drove this thing off the trailer and around the farm just 12 months prior. Just as I was about to do demo-derby type things to the lock cylinder to ensure a timely arrival at the State Fair, old friend and farm/garage owner, Truett, hinted to me that my father “said he put the keys in the ash tray. This car seems to have three ash trays.”

Interesting. I ran around and checked the rear doors, leading me to a second key, atop of a layer of ’90s cigarette ash and rust. Of course! The first set must be from my other VL Commodore, the parts car, which had been stolen and used in a Melbourne crime spree. (I recommend a pitcher of margaritas for when this story unfolds.) 

With the correct key, the car fired right up and drove onto the trailer. We loaded up a Wheel Horse and buffet table as well, which meant no room this time to bring the International 504 tractor. Or the Citroën Ami.

What is wrong with me?

The post Against All Oddities: Germinate, my lovelies! appeared first on Hagerty Media.

If first impressions mean everything, and second and third impressions accurately confirm as much, then by now you know VanDerBrink Auctions’ place in the automotive community. No trailer queens here, just dozens upon dozens of vehicles, mostly project cars or parts cars that have been left to the mercy of the elements. And the Minnesota-based auction company is at it again—times two.

VanDerBrink will auction more than 250 cars and trucks on Saturday, October 15 when it disperses the Randy Milan Collection in Fort Collins, Colorado. Less than one week later, VanDerBrink will conclude an online-only auction of 80 cars from the Gary Kuchar “Car Crazy” Collection in Custer, South Dakota. Bidding ends on October 21.

Both collections have similar roots: Their owners once had big dreams, but they no longer have the time to make their treasures roadworthy, so they’re selling them to other mechanically inclined hopefuls.

Colorado’s Milan, like his father before him, has collected vehicles for more than five decades, never letting go of anything. Until now. Milan, who owned a towing company, has a special fondness for iconic Chevrolets, especially 1959 and ’60 Impalas, and there are nearly 100 ’59 and ’60 Chevrolets of all models. His collection also includes vehicles from Cadillac, Ford, Mercury, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, and Buick, as well as a vintage midget sprint car and a 1955 Chevrolet stock car.

Similarly, but on a smaller scale, South Dakota’s Kuchar tells Fox News that he’s been collecting and working on cars for most of his 84 years. A native of Nebraska, Kuchar headed to California after graduating high school and became a body man building custom cars. He continued looking for cars after he returned to Nebraska to take over the family farm when his father retired. “I especially like orphan cars from out-of-business companies,” he says. “Studebaker, Kaiser, things that are different.”

Kuchar moved to the Black Hills of South Dakota in 1992 and brought along some of his cars, parking them in a nearby gorge. (That’s gorge, not garage, although Kuchar protected his more valuable automobiles in carports). He also continued to buy more and more cars. “Quite a few of them have been fixed,” Kuchar says, “but I’ve fallen behind on the others.” So it’s time to sell some.

With the help of Hagerty Senior Auction Editor Andrew Newton, we’ve selected a dozen interesting prospects that Newton says are “interesting and solid enough to restore—and you can’t say that about everything (in VanDerBrink’s lineup).”

The Milan Collection

1963 Studebaker GT Hawk

Hagerty #3 (Good) condition value: $10,800

This red Studebaker GT Hawk not only runs and drives, it’s arguably the best-looking car in the Fort Collins group. Powered by a 289-cubic-inch V-8 with automatic transmission, it has power steering and brakes. The interior features white bucket seats with red carpet, AM radio, clock, and dealer-added A/C, and the odometer reads 79,366 miles.

1958 Chevrolet (Bel Air) Impala Sport Coupe

Hagerty #4 (Fair) value: $28,300

With visible rust, particularly in the rear, and missing most of its exterior chrome and back seat, this 1958 Chevrolet Impala Sport Coupe might not get a second look from the uninitiated. Those in the know, however, will consider it viable since 1958 was the first year of the Impala, which was longer, lower, and wider than its predecessors. With its bold styling, including quad headlights and iconic rear end, the one-year-only 1958 body style paid GM dividends for years.

1958 Chevrolet (Bel Air) Impala Convertible

Hagerty #4 value: $56,300

In worst shape than the Impala above, this 1958 Impala convertible is worth a roll of the dice for the same reasons previously mentioned—and then some. The Impala convertible was the most expensive car in the ’58 Chevrolet model line and is highly sought after today. Bringing this one back will take a lot of time, effort, and money, but the satisfaction of saving it would be priceless.

Dodge Power Wagon 300 Tow Truck

Hagerty value: N/A

VanDerBrink doesn’t tell us the model year of this Dodge Power Wagon 300, and we can’t figure it out from the VIN because we can’t make out all the numbers and letters, but hey, doesn’t that just add to the fun? By comparing photos of this one to other Dodge trucks, we’re going to say it’s likely a 1971 model powered by a 318-cu-in V-8. And check out that heavy duty bumper up front. If you’re looking for a tow truck, this may be the answer, but you’ll have to do a bit of maintenance work inside and out to get it in working order. Nobody wants to call a tow truck to tow their tow truck.

1955 Chevrolet Vintage Race Car

Hagerty value: N/A

First, the bad news: this ’55 Chevy race car doesn’t run, and even if it did it doesn’t have a steering wheel. The good news is, it looks very solid (right down to the roll bars), so if you can get the 383 Stroker V-8 purring (and score a suitable steering wheel), it sure would be blast to return it to the track.

The Kuchar Collection

1934 DeSoto Air Flow 4-door Sedan

Hagerty value: N/A

Although the bare-bones auction description refers to this car as a “DeSoto Air Flow,” it’s actually a Chrysler Airflow, and it was a game changer. Ahead of its time in both engineering and design, it was also a sales flop, despite accolades from the media and Walter P. Chrysler himself, who said, “We had the horse and buggy. We had the automobile. Now we have the first real motor car in history.” This first-year 1934 model, an older restoration that is powered by a six-cylinder flathead engine, ran when it was parked five years ago. The odometer shows 29,525 miles, but VanDerBrink suggests the real number may be 129,525. Regardless, it’s an iconic automobile that should garner interest.

1971 AMC Javelin AMX

Hagerty #3 value: $24,200

Another older restoration that resided under a carport, this metallic green two-door fastback is the rarest of ’71 Javelins—an AMX with a 330-horsepower, 401-cu-in engine (with Edelbrock four-barrel carb), of which only 745 were made. It features a fiberglass hood, disc brakes, locker rear end, bucket seats, tachometer, clock, AM radio, and manual windows and locks. The muscle car also wears racing slicks in the rear, since it was used as a drag car in Salt Lake City before it was purchased and restored in South Dakota. The odometer shows 15,716 miles. We’re guessing at least two bidders will battle for this one.

Crazy 1930s Ford Rat Rod Truck

Hagerty value: N/A

Here’s something you don’t see every day. In fact, you’ve likely never seen one—Gary Kuchar designed and built it himself. Constructed mostly of Ford components, the rat rod truck has an elongated frame with three 225-cu-in six-cylinder engines and automatic transmission. The Frankenstein truck has the cab of a 1925 Ford pickup, the front end of a Dodge D-50 truck, a 9-inch Ford rear end, a gas tank from a tractor, and Ford spoked rims that were welded together to create 17-inch rims.

Here’s the thing, though: Kuchar never ran it or took it on the road, so who knows what you might be getting yourself into. One thing is for sure, if you’re the highest bidder and you succeed in getting it running, be prepared to answer a lot of questions at your next cars and coffee get-together.

1981 DeLorean DMC-12 Coupe

Hagerty #3 value: $46,600

You’ll also get plenty of attention in this car, not because no one has ever seen one before but because most people have (thanks, Back to the Future). The iconic stainless-steel creation of John Z. DeLorean, the DMC-12 has gullwing doors, turbine rims, and black/gray leather bucket seats, it is powered by a fuel-injected 161-cu-in V-6, and it shows only 21,564 miles. The car doesn’t run, but it did when it was parked—plus it has been sheltered. It might be worth taking a flyer on, even if it doesn’t fly like Doc Brown’s DeLorean did.

1961 Plymouth Fury Convertible

Hagerty #3 value: $31,100

The Fury’s design was radically overhauled for 1961, with all vertical styling cues dropped in favor of a flat look, with revised headlight eyebrows. This yellow convertible (with white top) is powered by a 318-cu-in V-8 that generated 230 hp when new and is mated to a push-button transmission. Among the car’s features are black carpet with a white vinyl split bench seat, power steering and brakes, and dual mirrors. The Fury, which was purchased in California and driven to South Dakota, ran when parked. VanDerBrink warns that it was overheating when Kuchar stopped driving it, so it may need a head or an overhaul, but once the Fury is up and running again, the new owner likely won’t miss an opportunity to add to its 45,345 miles.

1968 Jaguar XKE 2+2

Hagerty #4 value: $32,100 (minus 10 percent for automatic transmission)

Restoring this ’68 Jaguar Series 1.5 E-Type 2+2 is such a tall order that VanDerBrink suggests that it could also be deemed a parts car. Showing 92,801 miles, its 4.2-liter OHC six-cylinder engine (with dual Zenith carbs) no longer runs, and there’s plenty of additional work to do, both mechanical and cosmetic. Is it worth the challenge? Consider that Jaguar built approximately 5621 Series 1.5 E-Types from August 1967–July 1968, and only 1577 of them were 2+2 coupes. A fraction of those were built with a Borg-Warner three-speed automatic transmission, like this one. So that makes it rare … but does it make it desirable? That’s for you to decide, but Jag owners generally want to row the gears.

1957 Chrysler New Yorker

Hagerty #4 value: $19,700

This New Yorker is something of a train wreck, but there’s one good reason to consider buying it: The 392-cu-in HEMI V-8 under the hood. Not surprisingly, considering all the pine needles in the engine compartment, it doesn’t run. It also has some rust on the bottom, and the windshield is broken out. Get ready to roll up your sleeves, and just keep imagining what it might look like someday.

The post 12 hidden gems unearthed amid car hordes in Colorado and South Dakota appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Ever since I first attended an SDC meet in 1996 (thanks to great parents who indulged my love of cars), I have loved Studebaker. But even I have to admit that, in the end, Studebaker execs did themselves in. The company very nearly went under in the 1930s, but thanks to the new management team of Harold Vance and Paul Hoffman—and in no small part, healthy refinancing and restructuring—Studebaker survived the Depression. By late 1933, against all odds, the corporation was back in the black. Unfortunately, those same guys started making the decisions that led to the last South Bend Studebaker cars leaving the soon-to-be-shuttered factory in December 1963, only a few short months into the 1964 model year.

But first, a little history, if you’ll indulge me. Studebaker got off to a great start in the postwar era with its startlingly modern, all-new 1947 line.

With further advances, such as a V-8 engine and automatic transmission—both designed in-house, a major achievement for an independent—Studebaker had healthy sales through 1952, when it celebrated its centennial.

Unfortunately, trouble was right around the corner. Record sales in 1947–52 helped the automaker tool up for a major redesign and fresh lineup, but it had to be a hit.

The all-new 1953 models—both the beautiful coupes …

… and the comparably stubby sedans—sold less well than hoped. Studebaker needed a lot more sales than it got to stay in the black.

Trouble was, everyone and their brother wanted the sleek, sexy Loewy coupes. Studebaker had not anticipated the demand, because traditionally, its bread and butter were two- and four-door sedans, not coupes. So  demand for sedans was well below expectations and much higher than anticipated for the coupes. It didn’t help that the pillarless coupes had some flexing issues that led to doors sometimes not wanting to open. Or close. A solution was found relatively quickly, but I imagine new ’53 coupe owners may have been soured on the experience with early-build versions.

That’s not to say that Studebaker stopped making neat cars after the 1953 models didn’t live up to the company’s (and in some cases, customers’) expectations.

Studebaker’s classic Loewy coupes, handsome E Series (later Transtar) pickups, hot-rod Golden Hawk, innovative Wagonaire, and many other models were attractive and interesting, but sales continued their downward trajectory. Meanwhile over at GM, Ford, and Chrysler, new designs, new gadgets, and even more deluxe models were making the warmed-over ’53 bodies look also-ran by comparison.

The Studebaker story is oft told. So I won’t go too deeply into it. It’s hard for me to do a post on a Studebaker and not start with the history of the company and all the stuff that happened. It wasn’t a happy ending, but it sure was interesting. I think a movie about the last decade or so of Studebaker would be pretty interesting. All the twists and turns! Sherwood Egbert, the Lark, the Avanti, Andy Granatelli, the move to Canada, etc.

Now, where was I? Oh yes, one big problem was that Studebaker didn’t control its costs. Whatever the workers wanted, they got, and with nary a cross word from management.

That led to astronomical production costs compared with the Big Three, and Studebaker’s rapidly aging facilities complicated matters further. The success of the ’59 Lark provided a brief reprieve, but when the Falcon, Corvair, and Valiant debuted, it was back to the same-old, same-old in a very short period of time.

And thus do we come to the 1964 Studebakers. Brooks Stevens, the renowned Milwaukee-based industrial designer, was a godsend to small companies like Studebaker. He had quite a knack for taking a shoestring budget and delivering a major refresh that looked great. What would be his last assignment for Studebaker was the 1964 model refresh. There’s a 1959 Lark under there, but it isn’t immediately obvious.

Stevens first worked his magic in 1962, with the Mercedes-like ’62 Larks. They looked to be all-new, thanks to clever styling, but were the same old Lark. Sales increased over 1961. That same year, with perhaps his best design ever, the Gran Turismo Hawk appeared, looking surprisingly modern with its shorn fins and Thunderbird-style roofline. The transformation from the finned 1956–61 Hawk was remarkable.

Studebaker had spent most of the early ’60s clinging to relevance. Had it not been for Sherwood Egbert, Studebaker may have had even less time left than it ultimately received. But Egbert, going against orders to shut down Studebaker, instead tried his best to keep it going, hiring Stevens to come up with new styling, introducing the Avanti, and setting records at the Bonneville Salt Flats with Andy Granatelli-prepped R1- and R2-powered Hawks and Avantis.

Egbert did all he could to keep Studebaker afloat, but unfortunately his effort didn’t translate into any meaningful sales increase. Illness forced his retirement from Studebaker in November 1963; almost immediately, the Studebaker board approved shutting down South Bend in favor of limited production at its Canadian facility. The last Indiana-built car came off the line December 20, 1963. At the same time, production of all light- and heavy-duty truck lines, the Avanti, and the GT Hawk ended for good.

But not before the last “new” Studebakers came out in the fall of 1963. While technically still Larks, the name was not seen on the car. Instead, the names of different trim lines—Challenger, Commander, Daytona, and Cruiser—were emphasized. Studebaker may not have had much time left, but it still had quite a good-looking car, as well as attractive, colorful interiors.

The instrument panel was particularly sharp. In contrast to so many other domestic cars, the Stude had full instrumentation. And the optional tachometer was placed right there on the dash with the other gauges, unlike the difficult-to-read, center-console-mounted tachs in some GM and Ford products. Despite all of Studebaker’s troubles, it still offered many thoughtful, intelligent design features.

In addition to more modern, squared-off sheet metal, there was power if you wanted it. The aforementioned R1–R4 power options resulted in a sedate little Studebaker that could potentially suck the doors off unsuspecting Sport Furys, Impala SSs, and Fairlane 500s.

You could even get disc brakes, but you’d have to hurry, as only South Bend-built Studebakers got the R-spec equipment. The denuded Canadian-built 1964 lineup would be limited to bread-and-butter family cars, not hot rod Avantis, Larks, or GT Hawks. And no convertibles!

Yes, the beautiful Daytona convertible, with its fresh sheetmetal and most-excellent interior, would disappear with the closing of the South Bend factory in December ’63.

All Canadian Studes would have a fixed metal roof—unless you sprung for a Wagonaire with the retractable roof.

With the ’64 redesign, Studebaker deemphasized the Lark nameplate, and so all non-Hawk Studebakers were emblazoned with their trim levels: Daytona, Commander, Cruiser, etc. The Daytona convertible retailed for $2797 (about $26,722 today).

According to my Standard Catalog of American Cars 1946–75, only 647 Daytona convertibles were built between the introduction of the 1964 models and the closure of South Bend in December 1963. The final Indiana car built was a two-door Daytona V-8 hardtop. Like the convertible, there would be no pillarless two-doors once production moved to Hamilton, Ontario.

And it was sporting some serious firepower under the hood—yep, an R1.

And it had a red interior. The car survives in showroom condition at the Studebaker National Museum in South Bend. If you visit, tell Andrew Beckman that I sent you.

My friend Jim Cavanaugh and I got to see Beckman’s personal Studebaker back in 2015. We also got to view a bit of the museum archives, which was very cool. I highly recommend that if you’re a gearhead who happens to find yourself in central Indiana, you’ve got to visit the facility.

Oh, and Mr. Beckman’s Daytona sounded very healthy indeed when he pulled up out front to meet us.

But if you wanted luxury and not necessarily a hot rod, you needed look no further than the Cruiser. As in the past, the Cruiser nameplate designated the finest Studebaker you could get. While previous versions of the Cruiser had merited a longer wheelbase than lesser Studes, the 1964 model had the same 113-inch wheelbase and 194-inch overall length as the other ’64 four-door sedans. Price: $2595 ($24,792). Only 5023 were built.

The attractive, new-for-1964 “Lazy S” hood ornament was indeed appropriate for the luxurious Cruiser; it also graced all other Larks except the entry-level Challenger model. In fact, this picture is of the 1964 Daytona convertible, spotted in the summer of 2018 at an SDC zone meet in Iowa City, Iowa.

It’s just a happy coincidence that both cars are painted in Laguna Blue, an original Studebaker color. It’s very sharp, whether on the Cruiser sedan or the Daytona convertible. But who doesn’t love a convertible?

Cruiser features included a standard Thunderbolt 289-cu-in V-8 (although some export Cruisers were built with the six), plush cloth interior, wall-to-wall carpeting, and extra chrome trim inside and out. Available only as a four-door sedan, the $2595 Cruiser ran about $650 above the cheapest Lark, the $1935 six-cylinder Challenger two- door sedan.

As with our featured Cruiser sedan, most 1964s got a clock instead of a tachometer. I think this may be one of the most attractive instrument panels of the ’60s—all business, but with just enough chrome trim to let you know you’re in something a cut above.

Even our sporty, topless Daytona feature car, resplendent in Laguna Blue with matching blue bucket seat interior and floor-shift automatic transmission, had the clock instead of the tach. Well, Studebaker buyers were a somewhat more practical bunch.

It was a good try; but with South Bend shut down, already gun-shy Studebaker buyers became even more skittish. In 1965, operating out of a Canadian facility originally intended for Dominion-only sales, Studebakers were technically imports in 1965–66.

Ultimately, the diversification-driven Studebaker board got its way, and in 1966 the car division was shut down in favor of STP car care products, Gravely tractors, and Trans International Airlines. But handsome cars like these true-blue 1964 examples remind us of what was once the oldest auto manufacturer in America. Even to the end, their cars were interesting.

One final note: Most of the Studebakers in this column were seen at a Studebaker Drivers Club meet on August 11, 2018. The Cruiser was spied at the Planes, Trains, and Automobiles show in historic Geneseo, Illinois, in September 2012. Special thanks to my uncle, Dave Klockau, for texting me and letting me know about the terrific Studebaker club show! Being in the Quad Cities, I never would have known otherwise. It was a great show. There was also a gorgeous 1958 Packard Hawk that I still need to write about one of these days!

The post 1964 Studebaker Cruiser and Daytona: Brooks Stevens’s Last Pass For South Bend appeared first on Hagerty Media.

If the Aston Martin DB5 is to James Bond what the Yugo is to Rodney Dangerfield, then what’s the Studebaker Lark?

Judging by the company’s sponsorship of a popular 1960s family TV comedy, it’s Mister Ed, as in the talking horse. Regardless, Studebaker was a genuine player in its time, and the 1959–66 Lark embraced innovations that continue today—all on an impressive budget.

“Studebaker developed the original 1959 Lark from its older Champion and Commander models, and much of these earlier designs lingers [sic] on in the Daytona,” wrote Car Life about the new Lark Daytona convertible in its April 1962 issue. That meant trouble from the get-go, considering the rapid progress of the Big Three. “To begin with, the car is quite heavy for its size,” the test revealed. “The Lark is the only compact with a separate body and frame. Add to this the bulk of a V-8 engine … (and) in tight turns, the front end plowed badly.”

The magazine credited its test Lark, which featured the 259-cubic-inch, 180-hp standard V-8, with energetic performance. “Fortunately, our Daytona was powered to overcome its bulk and proved quite brisk through its automatic gears,” the review added. Other ’62 powertrains included a 112-hp Skybolt Six, a larger 289-cubic-inch Thunderbolt V-8, four-barrel carburetion, four-on-the-floor, and dual exhausts. Take that, Olds 4-4-2!

In hindsight, this Studebaker was actually oh-so-close to greatness. The holdup? Frankly, it lacked curb appeal. When the Lark debuted for 1959, the South Bend, Indiana, company focused on providing “style, economy, and performance,” while painting brochures with superlatives like, “The most exciting compact in America today.” But as the 1950s ended, interest in frumpy designs like the Lark’s was fast waning among buyers, prompting Studebaker to retain designer Brooks Stevens to align the Lark with the times. A Hail Mary at best, his facelift included a more emphatic, Mercedes-Benz–style grille and quad headlights, a flatter hood, swoopy body-side character lines, longer quarter panels with Thunderbird-esque taillights, and a modernized interior. Doubling down, Studebaker called the updated Lark Daytona convertible and hardtop “America’s new action car.”

For 1962–63, Studebaker spun eight different models off the Lark platform, including a two-door sedan; hardtop and Daytona hardtop; a convertible and Daytona convertible (109-inch wheelbase); a four-door sedan and well-appointed Cruiser; and a station wagon (113-inch wheelbase). Startling features included a Skytop sunroof, front Power-Grip disc brakes (a first for American cars), a Supercharged Jet-Thrust V-8 with up to 290 horsepower (more than a 1962 AC Cobra 260), a limited-slip differential, and the ambitious Daytona Wagonaire. This evolution of the previous wagon featured a sliding rear roof panel, dramatically increasing storage capacity and allowing “open-air” motoring or glamping under the stars.

Further refreshed 1963 Larks offered thinner roof pillars and a new windshield for an airier appearance, plus more interior updates. Even so, with its dowdy silhouette (“Doors that pass the hat test,” crowed a period TV spot), the bread-and-butter Lark sedan still looked like the love child of a Checker Marathon and a Borgward Isabella—in short, it was a car struggling to climb out of the 1950s.

Despite its bravest attempts, Studebaker’s finances were in tumult, and the company succumbed in 1966. Yet in retrospect, the 1963 Daytona models with the 289 V-8 and the four-speed gearbox surely attract modern collectors, as does the Wagonaire with its fantastic sliding roof. Catch one if you can.

1962 Studebaker Lark Daytona

The post The Studebaker Lark is a budget-friendly slice of the ’60s appeared first on Hagerty Media.

For many car enthusiasts, horsepower, elapsed times, and racing lines are of little importance. There are plenty of car owners that just enjoy keeping an automobile on the road and spreading the love of driving, as well as the vehicle’s history, to those that may appreciate it. We sifted through the Hagerty Marketplace listings to find some strange and rarely seen vehicles that we think would be a huge hit at any cars and coffee into which they might rumble, putter, or whirr.

1950 Crosley Hot Shot

Asking price: $8500

If you’ve only got a corner of your garage free, this pint-sized roadster might still fit. The car has an 85-inch wheelbase and weighs just 1100 pounds; if there’s not enough floor space, it can simply be picked up and hung on a coat rack. That svelte curb weight should make its 26.5-hp engine feel somewhat close to adequate, even if it won’t be winning any drag races.

This would be the perfect car for a Jeep flat-fender fan—or anyone else who has an aversion to doors—and it does seem well-suited for short trips or car shows. It would make grocery runs a whole lot more fun provided you don’t need to stock up at a Costco or Sam’s Club.

1964 Studebaker Avanti

Asking price: $32,500

There are few on the Hagerty media staff that were around when the Avanti was introduced, and even fewer who would admit it, but we’d like to have witnessed the reaction of the general public when such a revolutionary car was unveiled. The styling, credited to Raymond Loewy, is unique and eye-catching to this day. Add that to the fact that it could be optioned, as this example is, with a centrifugal supercharger for its 289 V-8 and the Avanti must have seemed like a true marvel. This coupe would certainly turn heads, and if you don’t mind explaining what it is and that no, this 289 V-8 is not a Ford product, it may be the collectible for you.

1968 Saab Sonnet II

Asking price: $10,500

Another engine you’d have to constantly explain is the Ford V-4 that’s mounted in the front of this swoopy Saab coupe. Today, the most common sighting of “V4” is a mistake made in a Craigslist ad describing an inline-four, but this 1498cc Ford Taunus engine is actually the rare vee-four configuration, an upgrade to the previous Sonnet three-cylinder engine that was almost half the size but partly made up for the low cylinder count by being a two-stroke mill. These fiberglass sports cars still look great and their lightweight construction is a proper fit for their 73-hp output. Think of it as a Swedish Lotus.

1957 Nash Metropolitan

Asking price: $13,000

One of the United States’ first captive imports—a rebadged version of a vehicle sold in a foreign market—the Nash Metropolitan was way ahead of its time. It traded on compact maneuverability and fuel economy when big fins and massive chrome juggernauts were the stock-in-trade of the U.S. auto industry. This one features an original interior and a refreshed exterior. The previous owner used it as a commuter, so it could be a reliable run-about. Or, if you are looking for a project, we’ve seen radical pro street builds and wild road race cars built from these minuscule mid-century machines. Your call.

1929 Ford Model A speedster

Asking price: $29,900

This beautiful creation stopped us mid-scroll. A new build, its wooden boat tail and hoodless design leave no doubt that it’s a racer. Its Model B four-cylinder engine wears a Riley two-port overhead-valve conversion that makes this lightweight racer far more powerful than the original flathead-powered model. Its 100 horsepower might not seem like much, but compare that figure to the factory rating of a lot of the other vehicles we’ve mentioned here and remind yourself that this car is nearly 100 years old. This one seems perfect for The Race of Gentlemen: Just imagine it kicking up sand on a beach, going head-to-head with a stripped-down hot rod of the same era. If you’re wondering how to protect an investment like this from both rust and termites, just know that Hagerty started as a boat insurance company, so this is something we could handle.

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it.

The post 5 oddballs that will spark conversation anywhere appeared first on Hagerty Media.

John writes:

I have a 6-volt positive ground system in my car—can I jumpstart it with one of those capacitor bank jumpstarters? I’ve used it very successfully on a 12-volt system. The jumpstarter gets its juice from any amount of voltage left in the “dead” battery. Plug it into the battery, wait a few minutes for it to charge, and then start the vehicle—This is neither a charger nor battery jumper.

And while I’ve got you, do you have any idea where I can get an old-style but updated radio to fit my ’49 Studebaker Champion?

Sajeev answers: 

That’s an interesting question! Before we proceed, here’s a video of how these supercapacitor jumpstarting tools work to ensure everyone’s on the same page.

I couldn’t find a good answer, so I checked the owner’s manual for one such jumpstarter. Not surprisingly, they specifically mention it must not be used on 6-volt or 24-volt batteries.

Maybe this is only to minimize legal/warranty concerns on their end, but you’re taking on a lot of risk by not heeding their warnings. As you might already know, the supercapacitors in these gadgets are dangerous when used outside of their parameters, so I’d avoid this at all costs. Instead, get a fresh battery and keep it topped up with a quality 6-volt trickle charger as mentioned here.

Regarding the audio system, you’ll likely need to convert to 12-volt to get a modern version of a retro stereo installed in your Studebaker’s dashboard. But I wouldn’t even bother with the factory stereo—or the hole in which it resides. Instead, run something like this audio alternative that runs on your 6-volt system, interfaces with your phone, and spits out amplified audio for either two or four speakers.

For your application, I am tempted to run the 2-channel setup, replacing the Studebaker’s front speaker and adding another one discreetly in the rear parcel shelf or the C-pillar. (My 1965 Ford Galaxie had a factory-installed speaker at the C-pillar; it was kinda awesome.)

The speakers will be cheap on eBay or Amazon, as you don’t need a fancy, brand-name driver to make a big improvement over the stock Studebaker setup. But that might be too intrusive, so perhaps sticking with the 2-channel amplifier with two speakers mounted in/under the dashboard might be best.

There are several ways to slice this particular loaf of bread. What say you, Hagerty Community?

Have a question you’d like answered on Piston Slap? Send your queries to pistonslap@hagerty.com, give us as much detail as possible so we can help! Keep in mind this is a weekly column, so if you need an expedited answer, please tell me in your email.

The post Piston Slap: Shocking revelations for a 6-volt Studebaker? appeared first on Hagerty Media.

You don’t have to be from the Sooner State to appreciate this strange Studebaker up for auction in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. We came across this black and white beauty thanks to a post on Barnfinds.com. While it’s not quite a dusty and forgotten car, it is unlike anything we’ve ever seen and certainly worth a look. Titled as a ’57, auction platform All Collector Cars recognizes that it’s likely an old clerical mistake, as the styling and trim of this car more accurately identify it as a ’58 Studebaker Champion.

There’s little in the online listing to verify this car’s service life other than its functioning lights and siren, but we must admit that the black and white two-tone fits it quite nicely. The Highway Patrol decals on the doors don’t look out of place, either. On the other hand, most, but not all vintage Highway Patrol vehicles we’ve been able to identify use white doors on a black car; this looks more like a factory two-tone worn by normal, run-of-the-mill Champions. A Studebaker Champion would also make an interesting choice for a highway-going police interceptor, as the 185-cubic-inch flathead six-cylinder produced a paltry 101 hp—not exactly intimidating figures, even for the era. This one is connected to a three-speed transmission and the listing notes that it runs and drives just fine and shows 106,639 miles on the clock.

The fins on the Champion’s quarter panels are not overbearing to the eye, especially compared to some of the full-size Mopars of the era. Compared to the understated ’57 model year Champion it replaced, however, they are downright ostentatious. The same can be said about the front end, which is chock full of chrome and new-for-’58 quad headlights. Add in the dash and pillar-mounted red lights and there’s a lot going on with this car … but it just sort of works.

This ’58 Studebaker Highway Patrol car may not be cut out for chasing speeders today, if it ever was. Although as the saying goes, you can’t outrun a radio. With two days of bidding left, the price has just eclipsed $7500 as of this writing. That’s a bit more than we’d expect a standard Champion to bring, but the added cop car appeal (authentic or not) of the lights and siren could easily explain why this unique car is drawing some heat.

The post Oklahoma Highway Patrol Studebaker is welcome in our rearview appeared first on Hagerty Media.

For those of us without the cash or space to build a collection of actual cars and trucks, the next best thing is automobilia. While some of the least expensive and most popular auto-related collectibles are miniature diecast vehicles, ephemera offers a direct, authoritative connection to the vehicles we love.

Delyele “Del” Beyer’s collection started with ephemera—dealership catalogs, manuals, magazines, and the like—when he was a kid growing on a Wisconsin farm in the 1920s and ’30s. When Beyer became a successful businessman, he began buying just about anything related to the auto industry, from bigger items like vehicles, gas pumps, and signs, to more and more literature. Now, nearly five years after Beyer died in September 2017, and almost four years after Vanderbink Auctions sold off his automobiles in September 2018, Beyer’s massive stash of smaller paper-based automobilia is being auctioned by Matthew Bullock Auctioneers.

Online bidding begins on Saturday, April 9, at 10 a.m. Eastern Time. Before you bid, it is important to note that in addition to the hammer price, there is an 18.5 percent buyer’s premium, a 7 percent tax, and an additional charge of 3 percent for invoices paid by credit card, as well as shipping charges. That’s a lot. It may be worth it, however, for some of the unique items that Beyer collected through the decades.

Among the 641 items on offer are dealership catalogs, paint charts, upholstery samples, manuals, parts catalogs, racing programs, stock certificates, postcards, trading cards, and games. Marques range from well-known names like Ford, Chevrolet, and Cadillac to obscure ones like Hotchkiss, Le Francis, Lloyd, Klein, Paramount, and Russon.

There are also bound books of Motor Magazine from 1906–43, Blue Books from the 1920s and ’30s; Branham Reference Books from 1920–56, Motor Age magazines from the early 1900s, and bound volumes of Automobile Quarterly (including Volume 1/No. 1 from 1962).

Tractor aficionados can bid on items from Oliver, Case, Fordson, Allis-Chalmers, Ferguson, Wallis, Avery, Huber, Frick, Hart-Parr, and, of course, John Deere.

Here are 12 of our favorites (in the order they appear in the online catalog):

The Beaulieu Encyclopedia of the Automobile Coachbuilding

Selling on eBay for $150 or more, The Beaulieu Encyclopedia of the Automobile: Coachbuilding covers history of coachbuilding and includes an alphabetical list of makes with informative history of each, along with a supplementary list of lesser-known carrozzeria where there is insufficient information for a full entry. First published in 2002, it is considered the Bible of coachbuilding.

Group of 25+ original 1920s Indianapolis 500 photographs

One of several original photo lots on offer—including a binder with 40 images—this one is the most historically significant. Among the 25 black-and-white images is one of 1920 Indy 500 champion Aurora Gaston in his Chevrolet #4 Monroe Special. A notation on the photo reads, “The Winner: Fate made a sudden and dramatic entrance into the annual 500-mile race; snatched success from Ralph de Palma and dumped it in Chevrolet’s lap.”

Group of 3 Chicago Automobile Salon souvenir books

The Chicago Auto Show, the nation’s largest auto show, was first held in 1901. This lot includes three hard-to-find “Salon” souvenir books from the early 1900s: 1918, 1920, 1929. How much fun would it be to pore over these on a rainy day?

1915 Milwaukee Automobile Show program

The earliest show program in the auction, this one from the 1915 Milwaukee Auto Show features a simplistic but beautiful cover and has a horizontal format, unlike most magazines and programs that are oriented vertically. In addition, it is measures only 6.25 inches by 9.25 inches, which must have made it easier for showgoers to handle while they ogled the cars on display.

1915 “Funny Stories about the Ford” pamphlet

This little booklet offers some amusing stories about Henry Ford’s motor car. You’ll find some hidden Ford propaganda in there, too.

For instance: “A farmer living ten miles out in the country went to town to buy a Ford. He wanted to drive the car home immediately, and the agent went along to show him how to handle the car. When the five-mile post was reached, the car came to a dead stop. The agent jumped out, looked over the car, saw that there was plenty of gasoline and oil, then raised the hood and exclaimed, ‘Well, I’ll be blamed if the factory didn’t forget to put a motor in this car.’ ‘Well, how on earth did it run this far?’ ‘Oh,’ the agent replied, ‘A Ford will go half way on its reputation.’”

Real subtle, Henry.

Large group of Mobil gas truck photographs

The best of two lots chock-full of Mobil gas truck photographs, this one has so many black-and-white pics that the auctioneer didn’t bother to count them, although there must 50 or more. There are also two matted color images. The fun of this lot must be finding the cool surprises hiding in this collection.

1966 Ford Gold Truck Award

If you like Ford, love Ford trucks, and own a 1966 model, how could you possibly take a pass on this? The shadow box award features a “gold” model of a ’66 pickup and was given to a Ford dealership “in recognition of truck sales leadership.”

Group of 2 Superior Cadillac hearse and ambulance brochures

Unique because of the subject matter and age, these Superior Cadillac Hearse and Ambulance Brochures (which look to be 1949 models?) are colorful and detailed, and they would make great conversation starters. We were struck by the image of the smiling, dancing girls across the top of the ambulance brochure, which left us scratching our heads and wondering, “What in the world is that about?”

1954 Studebaker Engineering Manual for Salesmen

If you’re into Studebakers—and even if you’re not—you’ve gotta love this “Inside Facts” salesman’s manual. Horizontally formatted with tabs for Specs and Index, Beauty, Comfort, Performance, Economy, Safety, Dependability, Transmission, Power Steering, and Accessories, the manual lauds the ’54 Studebakers as “distinctively different.” The same can be said for this spiral-bound beauty.

Group of 7 1953 Corvette brochures

It would be cool enough to own one sales brochure from the inaugural edition of America’s Sports Car, but how ’bout seven? “With an eye to the future, Chevrolet introduces an experimental model.” Well, that experiment certainly turned out to be a successful one. With a ’53 Corvette valued at $224,000 in #2 (Excellent) condition, this might be the closest that most of us will ever get to owning one … let alone seven.

1960 Ford: All The Facts binder

Less colorful than the Studebaker salesman’s book above, this spiral-bound binder covers everything about Ford’s 1960 model line, from the Falcon and Fairlane to Thunderbird and station wagon. Fascinating, especially if you love Ford.

Hart-Parr Tractor catalog

We just had to include a tractor catalog, and what better one to choose than Hart-Parr? Never heard of it? If you’re a farmer, you have. That’s because Charles Walter Hart and Charles H. Parrnames are widely credited with having designed and built the first successful gasoline-powered tractor, the machine that revolutionized agriculture—giving this vintage catalog a cool connection to both automotive and farming history.

Other treasure catch your eye among the listings? Let us know in the comments below!

The post 12 original brochures, catalogs, and photos to jump-start your automobilia collection appeared first on Hagerty Media.

I grew up in South Bend, Indiana, and my parents took me to my first Studebaker show in May 1984, when I was 18 months old. As they tell it, I’d walk up to various Studebakers and critique them. My dad’s friend, Paul, was a big Studebaker guy and had a red and white ’53 Commander, which is the very first car I remember. I spent the next 35 years dreaming of the day I’d have my own Studebaker.

In 2007, while I was home from grad school, Paul, my sister, and I went to the Studebaker Swap Meet. As was tradition, Paul bought us T-shirts and barbecue sandwiches. At the nearby Osceola Dragway, a black ’54 Commander Starliner caught my eye. Built with a Corvette 327 by hot-rodder Dick Steinkamp, it was the coolest car I’d ever seen. It turns out that “S2D,” as it was called, was fairly well-known; it had been in the Grand National Roadster Show and had won trophies elsewhere.

A decade later, at a car show in Baltimore, I met a guy named Ed Ellis, who brought two gorgeous ’53s with him. He mentioned he had a 327 Corvette–powered ’54 back home. I asked if it was S2D, and he was astounded that I knew the car. We exchanged information and he offered to stay in touch.

By early 2020, I was finally ready to buy a Starliner of my own, and I purchased a mostly original yellow and green ’54. I emailed Ed to tell him, and he asked if I also wanted to buy S2D. I was floored. We negotiated a price, and a few months later, I had a second Studebaker.

My mom was on hand to see the yellow ’54 delivered and said it reminded her of that day in 1984. When S2D arrived, I wore the T-shirt Paul had bought me, and my friend and I went out for barbecue sandwiches, just like Paul would have wanted. Buying these Studebakers was truly a dream come true.

The post My two 1954 Studebaker Commanders are a dream come true appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Knute Rockne was one of the most prolific coaches in college football history. The car named after him didn’t find the same success, however.

Rockne, a former Notre Dame All-American, took over as head coach of the Fighting Irish in the middle of the war-torn 1918 season and almost immediately turned the team into a powerhouse. In Rockne’s 13 seasons at Notre Dame, the Irish won three national championships, shared three national titles, and went undefeated five times, including Rockne’s final two seasons. With a career record of 105-12-5—the highest winning percentage of all time (.881)—Rockne was a huge celebrity, both on and off the field.

Studebaker, headquartered in South Bend, Indiana—also home to Notre Dame—hoped to capitalize on Rockne’s fame by partnering with the hometown hero. Inquiries began in 1928, and Studebaker president Albert Erskine ultimately offered Rockne a position as sales promotion manager for a durable, inexpensive car that would replace his own namesake vehicle, the slow-selling Erskine.

Rockne finally accepted the offer, but he never saw the car that bore his name. He was killed in a plane crash in March 1931, and the first Rockne didn’t roll off the assembly line until December 1931. Unveiled during the Great Depression, and without its famous spokesperson, the Rockne lasted only two model years, 1932 and ’33. A total of 37,879 were produced at plants in Detroit; South Bend, Indiana; and Walkerville, Ontario.

A Canada-built 1932 Rockne Model 65, owned by Ken and Joan Richmond, caught our eye at a recent Cars and Caffeine held at Hagerty headquarters in Traverse City, Michigan. Ken Richmond, who bought the Rockne in Hamilton, Ontario, five years ago, says the sedan “looks like a Model A, except it’s swoopier and curvier.”

“It’s a funny ol’ car,” he says. “Most people don’t know it nor care about it … The Ford guys will walk by it at first, and then they’ll stop and say, ‘Wait a second.’”

The Richmonds’ car is mostly original. Ken had to replace the roof, but he retained the headliner’s original chicken wire. He liked the look of it so much that he decided not to reupholster it. The two-door’s rear side windows were paneled on the outside at some point prior to the Richmonds’ ownership so that, Ken surmises, the car could be used as a utility vehicle.

The car—powered by a 66-hp, 3.1-liter straight-six—is based on a design by Ralph Vail and Roy Cole. The two originally created it for financially strapped Willys-Overland, which allowed them to sell it to other automakers.

Production of the 1932 Rockne 65 (110-inch wheelbase) began in February 1932, two months after the larger 75 model.

Although more buyers chose the Ford Model A and its more powerful V-8, the Rockne’s “new” L-head six-cylinder engine remained in production for decades. It powered Studebaker Dictator and Commander cars prior to World War II, as well as Commander cars and most six-cylinder truck models through 1960.

As for the Rockne, it still has a small but loyal following, one that Ken Richmond enjoys being a part of. “I bought it at a time when I really didn’t need another car,” he says, “but it was really different—something you don’t see every day.”

It certainly draws a crowd … once people realize that it isn’t what they first thought.

The post This Rockne isn’t quite as famous as the Notre Dame football legend appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Kevin writes:

My ’64 Studebaker Daytona has its original 289 cid V-8 and has had the cylinders bored out 0.060. Can you tell me what the displacement would be now?

Sajeev answers:

Oh man, I am totally getting flashbacks to grade school math class! Calculating engine displacement requires determining three values: The number of cylinders, the cylinder’s bore, and the piston’s stroke. Your Studebaker has eight cylinders (‘natch) possessing a 3.625″ stroke and a 3.563″ bore, but the latter was increased by 0.060″ to make 3.623″ bore. You can pop all that info into a handy-dandy online calculator, but where’s the fun in that?

Here’s a brief math lesson, manifested in a formula that, thanks to our publishing software’s inability to accurately reproduce mathematical formulas, must be written out as a sentence.

Engine displacement equals the engine’s stroke, multiplied by the bore (which is π, times the radius squared), multiplied by the number of cylinders.

I used this moment to (literally) dust off my solar-powered calculator, got major sixth grade flashbacks to the phrase “Pie are round? No pi are square!”, and eventually calculated a displacement of 298.816 cubic inches.  Which, to be fair, is essentially 299, and should be discussed at car shows as a motor with “just under 300 cubic inches”. (Math snobs who disapprove of everything mentioned above are encouraged to send hate mail to pistonslap@hagerty.com at your leisure.)

And with that, enjoy your 300-ish cubes of mighty Studebaker V-8 power!

Have a question you’d like answered on Piston Slap? Send your queries to pistonslap@hagerty.com, give us as much detail as possible so we can help! If you need an expedited resolution, make a post on the Hagerty Community!

The post Piston Slap: Pi are square in the Studebaker’s engine displacement appeared first on Hagerty Media.

If you’re an AMC owner and get tired of questions like “Why did they install a Chevy engine in an AMC?”, this story is for you. Ditto Studebaker folks who must deal with people asking about the Ford 289 in their Lark.

It wasn’t only Independents who used engines that shared displacements with a mill from another manufacturer, of course. General Motors had several 350- and 455-cubic-inch blocks over the years, though they didn’t always measure exactly as advertised, as we recently laid out in this article. Here are six engines that shared similar dimensions yet hailed from different manufacturers. We even tossed in a special Mopar example that has long confused enthusiasts.

327

Chevrolet’s 327, which powered the most pedestrian and the most sporting of Bow Ties, is legendary. However, the Chevy was preceded by Rambler’s 327, which debuted in 1957 in the celebrated Rebel. In the Rebel, the 327 put out 255 hp with mechanical lifters, a Carter four-barrel carburetor, and 9.5:1 compression. (A Bendix-developed electronic fuel-injected unit upped the rating to 288 horses but never reached production.)

The Rambler 327 also was available in swan-song Nash and Hudson models but, though it still made 255 hp, featured hydraulic lifters and slightly lower (a half-point less) compression. Alas, the limited-edition Rebel lasted but one year, though the 327 would continue to play the role of AMC’s big gun, powering American Motors’ senior Ambassador models through 1966; for 1965–66, the 327 was also available in mid-size Classic and Marlin models. Kaiser-Jeep also adopted it for several years. Peak horsepower during this era was 270 thanks to a Holley four-barrel and 9.7:1 compression.

In contrast to its Rambler counterpart, Chevrolet’s 327 was a solid middle-of-the-road offering for most of the decade. Debuting for the 1962 model year in full-size and Corvette models, the 327 evolved from the 283 and, in Chevy’s engine hierarchy, sat just below the big-blocks. It came in 250- and 300-horse variants, both of which used four-barrel carbs. In its final appearance in 1969, the 327 was only available in 235-horse, two-barrel guise.

The 327 truly shone in the Corvette. In addition to the 250- and 300-horse pair, Chevrolet also offered 340- or 360-hp versions, the latter sporting fuel injection. Horsepower peaked in 1965 with the 375-horse Fuelie, but the 1965–68 L79 with 350 horses was a popular compromise between horsepower and drivability.

The L79 was also available in the 1965–68 Chevelle (strangely skipping the ’66 model year) and the 1966–68 Chevy II, though the lesser, four-barrel versions were available too.

352

The styling worn by Packard’s all-new 1951 series’ quickly became outdated, and the brand’s dependence on its straight-eight was similarly out of touch with the times. When the redesigned 1955 models hit the streets, they signified more than just redemption—though history would prove that the vehicles arrived too late to save the company. The V-8 available in 1955 Clippers Customs and senior Packards measured 352 cu-in and was rated at 245–275 horsepower; the highest-rated versions used dual-quad carbs for ’55. The 352 also appeared in the 1956 Clipper, Nash Ambassador, and Studebaker Golden Hawk.

Worthy of the best Packard tradition, the over-engineered 352 featured, according to Mac’s Motor City Garage, “a beefy cast crankshaft with six counterweights, fully machined combustion chambers with generous squish/quench area, and symmetrical cylinder heads with siamesed exhaust ports.”

In contrast, Ford’s 352 began as a solid big-block in the all-new FE series but settled into an unremarkable offering though 1966. When it first appeared in 1958, the 352 produced 300 hp; in 1960, Ford offered a 352 with NASCAR in mind: 10.6:1 compression, an aluminum intake, mechanical lifters, and 360 hp. However, a succession of 390, 406, and 427 upgrades through 1963 relegated the 352 to a popular-yet-ho-hum big-block in the low/mid-200-hp range until 1966.

289

Studebaker’s 1951 232 V-8 has a burly reputation, which is ironic given that its engineers drew their inspiration for the 232 from Cadillac’s high-compression, lightweight 1949 OHV V-8. (Studebaker engineers were even allowed to visit Caddy’s production facilities.) The 232 boasted a forged crankshaft, large main bearings, mechanical lifters, and a gear-driven camshaft. By 1956, Studebaker had bored and stroked the mill to create the 289, which offered between 195 and 225 horsepower. In 1957–58, the Golden Hawk featured a supercharged 289 with 275 horses. Not until 1963, however, did Studebaker truly give the 289 an injection of performance: The 240-horse R1 (standard in the Avanti) with 10.25 compression, and the supercharged 289-horse R2, with 9.0 compression. These engines, as well as the more pedestrian 289s, lasted until Studebaker abandoned South Bend for Canada, but not before it set several speed records.

In contrast, Ford’s modern, thin-wall 289 weighed approximately 150 pounds less than Studebaker’s. It appeared in the spring of 1963 after debuting as a 221 for the 1962 Fairlane. With 8.7 compression and a two-barrel carburetor, the 289 was rated at 195 hp, though it rose to fame as the 271-horse 289 High-Performance introduced midyear for the ’63 Fairlane. This engine, available for Ford and Mercury compacts and the Mustang through 1967, featured 10.5 compression, mechanical lifters, screw-in rocker-arm studs, cast-iron headers, and dual-point ignition. The 289 (mostly in two-barrel form) enjoyed widespread popularity in compact, mid-size, and pony-car Fords and Mercurys, plus full-size Fords, though 1968. The 289’s high point was the 306-horse 1965–67 Shelby GT350, with an optional supercharger adding another 80 or so horses in 1966–67.

Bonus round: 383

OK, so these two engines are not technically “brothers from another mother.” The Chrysler Corporation offered two big-blocks with identical displacements that hailed from similar-yet-different series. The first 383 to appear was in 1959–60 when Chrysler replaced the first-generation Hemi. As part of the RB (raised block) series, the 383 appeared only in lower-line U.S.-spec Chrysler models, with either 305 or 325 horsepower depending on carburetion. After that, Chrysler used the 361 and B-series 383 for lesser Chryslers.

That B-series 383 became the evergreen big-block that powered many Mopars throughout the decade and was later made famous by the 1968 Plymouth Road Runner. Compared to the RB 383, the B-series 383 featured a different 4.25 x 3.38 bore and stroke and lacked the raised block. It first appeared as one of two D-500 options for 1959 Dodges (with 320–345 horsepower, the highest-rated boasting dual quads). Ram induction appeared the following year yielding 330 hp, a configuration which was also available on the ’60 DeSoto and ’61 “Sonoramic Commando” Plymouth. A 343-horse cross-ram version of the 383 was available for Dodges and Plymouths in 1962, and then there was little effort to pump up the 383 until the Road Runner in ’68. After 1971, the 383 was replaced by the 400.

Can you think of other engines from different OEMs that shared similar dimensions? Post them in the community below, and we’ll perhaps gather enough examples for another iteration of this engine-geek investigation.

The post V-8 pairs that share displacements but not manufacturers appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Hagerty readers and Hagerty Drivers Club members share their cherished collector and enthusiast vehicles with us via our contact email, tips@hagerty.com. We’re showcasing some of our favorite stories among these submissions. To have your car featured, send complete photography and your story of ownership to the above email address.

Today’s featured car is a 1962 Studebaker GT Hawk owned by 20-year-old Jake R. Kaywell, whose love for classic automobiles was sparked by a fire-engine red 1966 Austin-Healey 3000 Mk. III. Its owner would take young Jake along for rides for the sheer enjoyment of driving, and the experience imprinted itself on Kaywell’s mind: “To hear the raspy roar of that 3.0-liter straight-six engine backed up by a chunky four-speed was nothing short of glorious.”

Inspired, Kaywell began saving every penny he earned. He worked summer jobs and embarked upon independent business ventures such as selling Valentine’s Day cards when he was 11. By the time he was 16, Kaywell had $10,000 to his name. His father, an enthusiastic support of his son’s automotive fervor, also pitched in. During many late nights spent on the internet, Kaywell educated himself on basic car maintenance and automotive history, eventually settling on the “independent” camp—American companies that survived WWII but were not affiliated with any of the Big Three. Kaywell determined to find a Studebaker, attracted by the marque’s reputation for thoughtful engineering, solid build quality, and avant-garde styling.

The car that Kaywell eventually bought, however, didn’t wear the most cutting-edge sheetmetal to emerge from the Studebaker factory. Essentially identical, on the outside, to the ’53 Loewy coupe, Kaywell’s ’62 GT Hawk wears an upright grille and narrow proportions that look dated—even for the ’60s. “I certainly don’t mind,” writes Kaywell. “It looks and feels like a blend between European and American design philosophies, which I believe makes for a better car.”

This particular Hawk, s/n 3295, boasts the larger 289-cu-in V-8 mated—per the specifications of one Helen Potter, of Sacramento, California—to a Borg-Warner four-speed manual. Ms. Potter also ordered air conditioning and the Twin Traction limited-slip diff  but, mysteriously, did not opt for power steering or power brakes. “Good heavens, Helen, what were you thinking?” writes Kaywell.

Kaywell has no intention of ever selling “Daisy Mae.” “Driving her and telling her story is important not just for myself but also for everyone I meet,” he writes, “so that they too can experience a lovely stop on a less-traveled path.”

The post Rides from the Readers: 1962 Studebaker GT Hawk appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Hagerty readers and Hagerty Drivers Club members share their cherished collector and enthusiast vehicles with us via our contact email, tips@hagerty.com. We’re showcasing some of our favorite stories among these submissions. To have your car featured, send complete photography and your story of ownership to the above email address.

Few automakers can claim they helped settle North America before building cars. Studebaker can. Founded in 1852, the company was originally known as the Studebaker Brothers Manufacturing Company, specializing in wagons, buggies, and carriages. This Conestoga station wagon, manufactured from 1954–55, hearkens back to the horse-drawn, canvas-topped models that forded Appalachian rivers almost a century before this orange beauty rolled off the assembly line. Although Studebaker did not invent the original Conestoga wagon design, it used the name on its combustion-powered wagon to honor the original 18th-century design and give a nod to its wagon-building roots. However, this steel-bodied Conestoga shares more than a name with its wood-paneled forebearer; both vehicles have saved lives.

When a car slammed into owner Keith Wahl and his 1955 Studebaker Conestoga wagon, he naturally stomped on his brakes—but when those locked, Wahl skidded nearly 200 feet and came to a stop perpendicular to oncoming traffic. The car was then T-boned, breaking the driver’s seat brackets and pushing the seat across the cabin and through the passenger door. Wahl credits not wearing a seatbelt for his survival; he picked himself off the ground with nothing more than a generous dose of road rash.

The Conestoga, however, suffered a bit more than a gravel-encrusted scrape. Wahl had a restoration project on his hands.

Every panel on the wagon was damaged—including front and rear chrome, windshield, driver’s side door—since after the wagon was hit it bounced into the center median. Wahl did some painstaking research and found another 1955 wagon. This one, however, didn’t pack his original wagon’s supercharged Avanti-sourced mill; it had a Chevy 350 instead. He considered dissecting the new wagon, scavenging the parts needed, and selling off the more-modern powertrain. However, he couldn’t resist the opportunity to restore not one, but two Conestogas to their former glory.

Seven months later, Wahl is the proud owner of a pair of Pima Red and Shasta White Conestogas. “I’m a lucky and grateful person,” he writes. Wahl’s takeaway from the experience? “Be kind. Drive safe.”

We second that.

The post Rides from the Readers: 1955 Studebaker Conestoga wagon appeared first on Hagerty Media.

Nestled in the rolling hills just west of Minneapolis/St. Paul is the farmstead that was home to Virgil Marple, his family, and well over 100 cars—the majority being Studebakers and Avantis. This extensive collection is up for online sale through Vanderbrink Auctions.

Born in 1939 and raised on the family farm near Wendel, Minnesota, Marple went on to attend the University of Minnesota, attaining a PhD in Mechanical Engineering in 1970. His doctoral dissertation and subsequent lifetime area of expertise concerned research in the field of particle technology and aerosol science, specifically in the design of inertial particle separation devices. These are used to collect airborne particles for chemical analysis. He attained more than 25 patents for airborne particle impactors and associated devices for industrial and medical use. The commercial extension of his patents enabled him to be a business partner in MSP Corporation, which produced and licensed his designs.

Marple’s work helped better analyze airborne particles to allow for cleaner air and better health, but the last few years of his life were, ironically, spent fighting a debilitating lung condition. He passed away on Christmas Eve in 2017.

The appeal of Studebakers

His patents and business success allowed Marple, in later decades of his life, to start acquiring the vintage Studebakers and Avantis that he loved. “When I first met Virgil, in his office he had a large poster of a 1955 Studebaker President Speedster,” said Trevor Nye, a former Minnesota professor and Virgil’s on-site support person for the collection.

Marple didn’t really get the bug to start collecting until the 1980s.  His first collectible Studebaker was a 1955 Champion four-door sedan, because his family had one like it when he was growing up.

“Virgil liked the mechanics and aesthetics of cars,” said Nye. “One of his heroes was Raymond Loewy. Virgil liked all of his designs, especially the Avanti.”  Marple bought several Studebaker Avantis, but he didn’t stop there, purchasing a few of the later-generation Avantis in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He and Nye almost opened an Avanti museum in Shelbyville, Tennessee, around 1999, when the company moved from its native Ohio to Georgia.

Nye isn’t exactly sure how, but Marple acquired a number of prototype components from after Avanti’s Youngstown, Ohio, plant closed in 1991. The haul includes body bucks and mold patterns for the short-lived four-door Avanti. Not only was Virgil an original owner of a four-door, but he eventually owned six of the approximately 90 total examples that were made. The second of these rare models is up for sale in the auction.

“Virgil had me take the truck out to Youngstown to pick up some material that was left from the company,” said Nye. “They were set up in what was basically a defunct strip mall, and it looked like everyone just walked away from it.  The new developer was just as happy to get rid of everything. I brought it to Shelbyville, storing it there while we thought we were going to get the museum going. When that didn’t happen, I brought it all up here to Virgil’s place.”

The first to call, and never with a counter

While Marple was a big fan of Studebakers, he wasn’t active in any of the Studebaker clubs. He did, however, make sure to get the Studebaker Driver’s Club’s Turning Wheels magazine delivered overnight from the printer. “When it showed up, anything he was doing stopped, and he went straight to the classifieds and start calling folks who had cars for sale that he wanted,” said Nye. Not only did he act fast to contact sellers, but he did not negotiate on price. “If he wanted it, he bought it, and that was it.”

Nearly one of every Studebaker series and body style represented in Marple’s collection. A few of his cars have been restored (such as this 1955 Studebaker President Speedster), but for the most part, he gathered for the sake of gathering. Marple filled up barns with cars and added sheds on his farm to store the growing collection.

While Studes represented the bulk of his interest, Marple also collected a host of other cars. He had an affection for independent manufacturers, orphan car companies, and automotive outcasts—Edsel, Pinto, Pacer, Subaru XT Turbo. Even a 1935 Pierce-Arrow V-12 sedan.

Since Marple’s passing, his family sold off around 100 of his cars. But with the property now sold, as well, they contacted Vanderbrink (noted for selling the Lambrecht Chevrolet collection of Pierce, Nebraska in 2013) to conduct a no-reserve auction of the remaining 112 cars and trucks. The sale also includes vintage tractors and new-old-stock Studebaker parts. Vanderbrink originally intended to have both an on-site and online component, but with the current pandemic and uncertainty around when Minnesota’s stay-at-home order will be lifted, the sale has fully transitioned to online. Lots close May 30.

The post Minnesota man’s 112-car collection, bound for auction, is nearly half Studebakers and Avantis appeared first on Hagerty Media.

When Porsche announced the production of the Panamera four-door sedan in 2010, you would have thought the world was coming to an end. In fact, Porsche had considered building a four-door sedan as far back as 1952, although it never came to pass.

The story starts with a man named Richard Hutchinson, head of Studebaker’s export operations. The independent automaker was looking to become more of an international presence, having built a plant in Hamilton, Ontario, and negotiated agreements to build Studebakers overseas. In the midst of this, British authorities, then occupying the part of Germany that included Wolfsburg, offered Studebaker the chance to take possession of the Volkswagen plant as an outright gift. The plant was a bombed-out shell and the car’s Nazi association was an anathema. But Hutchinson was fascinated by the Beetle, and had one shipped to Studebaker’s headquarters in South Bend, Indiana, with the idea that Studebaker would become the American distributor. But Harold Vance, Studebaker’s president and the former head of production, wouldn’t even look at the car, and the deal went nowhere.

But Max Hoffman, Volkswagen’s U.S. importer, kept at Hutchinson, arranging for a delegation from Porsche KG to meet with Studebaker management in South Bend. While many enthusiasts consider Porsche as an automaker, the company started as a design and engineering consultancy, which kept the car company alive during its lean years.

That’s why in May 1952, Ferry Porsche, chief designer Karl Rabe, chassis engineer Leopold Schmid, and body designer Erwin Komenda arrived in South Bend along with a Porsche 356 and the Porsche Type 530—a prototype 356 with a longer wheelbase, larger doors and a raised roof.

But they arrived on a Sunday, so they couldn’t get a drink after their long trip. They hoped things would improve on Monday.

Ferry’s idea of a sports car with space for four, the Type 350’s performance didn’t impress Max Hoffman or Studebaker executives. This was not the sort of car they wanted. Yet the meeting led to an agreement calling for Porsche to design a car with a front-mounted, air-cooled, six-cylinder engine car with more power and less weight than the 1952 Studebaker Champion. A subsequent agreement also called for the development of a water-cooled engine as well.

In return, Studebaker would pay Porsche approximately $500,000 (or $4.9 million when adjusted for inflation), money Porsche needed to construct a factory. Until then, Porsche had leased space in the Reutter body factory in Zuffenhausen, a Stuttgart suburb. The new facility, still in use today, was designed by the Stuttgart-based architect Rolf Gutbrod.

What Porsche delivered two years later was a four-door sedan on a 111-inch wheelbase, four inches shorter than that of the Champion. Two versions were delivered: the 542L with an air-cooled engine that produced 98 brake horsepower, and the 542W with a water-cooled engine that generated 106 brake horsepower. Unlike Studebakers of the time, the 542 had a fully-independent suspension, although it did use many Studebaker components, such as door handles, steering wheel, brakes and wheels.

But as the car was being developed, Studebaker was facing its own challenges.

The company had launched the stunning Starlight Coupe for 1953, but the coupe was conceived as a single model, not as a sedan or wagon. The decision was made to apply the new look to the 1953 sedan, which had already been styled. The company rushed to change the design, with all sedans save the Commander Land Cruiser using the corporate 116.5-inch wheelbase, rather than the Coupe’s 120-inch wheelbase. As a result, sedans and coupes didn’t share most body panels and trim. The missing length sabotaged the sedan’s styling, yet managers actually thought consumers would prefer the sedan over the coupe and scheduled production accordingly. Once the coupe appeared in showrooms, orders flooded in.

But as the company began production, the ran into a major snafu: the front-end sheetmetal didn’t mate properly to the body. This resulted in production stopping until January 1953 in an era when automakers’ new models came out in September 1952. Sales declined as demand for coupes outstripped supply and sedans sat on lots. As a result, the company lost $8.3 million (or $80.7 million adjusted for inflation) in the first quarter of 1953, a trend that would continue as the year came to a close when General Motors and Ford unleashed a sales war. The effect on independent automakers was immediate: sales dried up for Nash, Hudson, Packard, Willys, Kaiser, and Studebaker—whose 1953 production was 66 percent lower than in 1950. The staggering sales drop and a lack of cash led the company to merge with Packard on October 1, 1954.

It was against this backdrop that the Porsche Type 542, also code-named Studebaker Z-87, came to completion.

When it arrived, it was no lightweight, as anticipated. Instead, it was 550 pounds heavier. And while engineers found the car to be well-balanced, but the head of advanced engineering, John Z. DeLorean—yes, THAT DeLorean—was critical of the car, noting its excessive vibration, tendency to oversteer and bug-like appearance. “This vehicle has a large amount of technical appeal, but a number of items need refinement to increase its overall appeal as a small car to the average American car buyer.”

Certainly, DeLorean was no different than many American automotive executives, who were all guilty of the “not invented here” syndrome. It’s a trait that would serve him well at GM.

Undeterred, Porsche offered up the Type 633, a two-door sedan with a horizontally-opposed, air-cooled engine in the rear—an American Volkswagen. Studebaker declined.

By this point, the South Bend automaker was mired in losses, despite the merger with Packard. With management distracted by the new arrangement Type 633 and cash dwindling, any chance of an American Volkswagen was kaput.

While most people are unaware that these two automakers worked together, Porsche does acknowledge the project to this day.

Accompanying the sole photo on its website is this description: “Porsche KG receives a major development assignment from US car maker Studebaker. During this two-year period of cooperation, Porsche develops Type 542, a modern four-door saloon regrettably never to enter series production due to a shortage of funds on the part of Porsche’s U.S. customer.”

Studebaker would go on to distribute vehicles from another German automaker, Daimler-Benz, from 1957–64. Dealers sold about 12,000 Mercedes-Benz, Auto Union, and DKW vehicles annually, but Daimler paid Studebaker $5 million to break their agreement in 1964 despite having six years left in the contract.  The company then formed Mercedes-Benz of North America in 1965 in New Jersey, using the top dealers from the old arrangement.

The following year, Studebaker exited the car business.

The post Porsche’s first four-door sedan isn’t the Panamera appeared first on Hagerty Media.