Re: What would a traditional Packard "Senior" have looked like in 1951?

Posted by Packard5687 On 2017/8/2 1:28:25

<i>"measuring the body height of blue car vs. artist's, appears the later was sectioned 1.5 inches which is exactly what Reinhart had wanted to do, though I think he also intended the greenhouse to grow taller by same ..."</i>

Yes, Rinehart wanted a lower belt line and taller greenhouse, but engineering and the bean counters dictated the higher belt line because "glass was more expensive than steel." It's sad to know that the bean counter mentality existed even at Packard!

<i>"Christopher tried to make decent Seniors out of the Clipper ..."</i>

It was Christopher who refused to build more Seniors in the post war sellers market, opting instead to flood the market with the lower-price Juniors. He hated the Senior cars and did all he could to end Packard's dominance of the luxury market. He fully succeeded in that. You are quite right that he went completely wacko in wanting to rework the Clipper a second time.

Ferry missed the opportunity to correct what Christopher had done with the launch of the Contours in '51. They deliberately didn't build very many of the Seniors - and for heavens sake, he should have killed off the two door sedan and ESPECIALLY the business coupe!

<i>" Mason ... was as tone deaf as the rest of them when it came to styling and proportions."</i>

Amen to that! Proof: the post war bath tub Nashes - so ugly they made the Packard bath tubs beauty queens in comparison! And Mason insisted on that low wheel well opening on the front wheels. Nash couldn't get rid of it until Mason died. That low wheel well opening ruined the turning radius of the Nashes.

<i>"Nance had a better feel but was still lacking. Case in point: he should have ditched the Contours for 1955 because they were fundamentally deficient by then and still with no provision for a properly proportioned Senior."</i>

He wanted to do just that - but there was not enough time from when he arrived in '52 to launch the new body for '55. New car development lead time was four years in those days. Also, Nance found that with the expenditure for Utica and then the shock of losing Briggs as the body supplier and the subsequent scramble for where to build the cars, there was no money to tool for the desired new body for '55. All of that combined with the loss of the Defense contracts dried up the money for the new body. The prewar decision to give Briggs Packard's body building business is another example of how Christopher sowed the seeds of Packard's demise.

I remember your Panther work up. It is quite handsome. The front of the Panther as penned by Teague was pretty gruesome, but the sides and rear are quite nice and your workup of it as a sedan came off quite well IMO. The Panther really benefitted from the cathedral taillights when they were retrofitted to a couple of the Panthers.

<i>"AMC put Packard's V8 into the big Nash and Hudson and what happened to sales? Absolutely NOTHING.</i>

If Packard was going to re-take the luxury crown from Cadillac, it would have to have been done with a V-8 under the hood, as Lincoln and the Imperials were V-8 powered as well as Cadillac. Packard, the "Master Motor Builder", really should have had the V-8 ready for the new body in '51. Even as late as '53, they could have made gains in their market share with a V-8.

IMO the Packard V-8 (the 320) in the Nashes and Hudsons didn't sell well in no small measure because Romney was trying to kill off the full-size cars and because he really didn't want to share components with Nance. Romney threw every monkey wrench at his disposal at every aspect of anything that got in his way of making the Rambler THE backbone of American Motors. Nance begged Romney to supply OHV inline sixes for the Studebaker Champions to replace the Studebaker flat head six, but Romney refused. I believe the problem with the sales of the Packard-powered full size Nashes and Hudsons was Romney, not the presence of the Packard V-8 in those cars. On the Hudson side of the equation, traditional Hudson buyers were alienated by the "HASH" much as Packard buyers were alienated in '57-'58 by the Packardbakers.