Re: Merger of Nash/Kelvinator, Packard & Hudson

Posted by Rusty O\'Toole On 2015/4/15 17:27:42

Interesting idea about using the Nash full size body for Packard. In their 1952 ads Nash claimed their Ambassador was 2 inches wider than a Cadillac.

Since width is the hardest thing to change in a car body, this is a good thing.

The cowl, windshield, and front door area is the most complicated, expensive and hardest to change.

Length is easy to change. Packard made different junior and senior bodies by lengthening the same body behind the front doors. The seniors had a different roof and rear window, different rear quarters and slightly different rear doors.

Plymouth and Dodge, and probably others did the same trick.

I can see a senior Packard based on the Ambassador shell with different rear doors and roof line, and different rear fenders.

It is also fairly simple to lengthen the engine compartment and move the front suspension forward as Nash did between the Statesman and Ambassador.

Would it have been possible to adapt the torsion bar suspension to the unit body Nash shell?

I think it would have been possible to make Nash based Packards. Depending on how much they could afford to alter the body. This was common in the industry, GM had been making everything from Chev to Cadillac with just 3 basic body shells since the thirties.