Re: Packard Plant update....

Posted by Leeedy On 2023/2/27 16:52:10
Quote:

JeromeSolberg wrote:
I guess I was thinking is that they maybe they still had some buildings at East Grand where they, say, made trim pieces for interiors or the outside of the bodies, or components for the dash, or brackets, or whatever. It would seem insane to try to move all of that stuff to Conner Avenue and Utica. Maybe by that point all that stuff was being made outside by suppliers.


Most of this stuff was being made by outside vendors. For instance the vacuum tanks (on the splash well in the engine compartment) were made at a company on Detroit's east side. Interior trim (much of it) was done at Mitchell-Bentley in Ionia, Michigan. And on and on...

Postwar Packard production was not like many imagine it today. The foundry buildings and work (which was actually located north of Harper Avenue where nobody today realizes the plant extended) had all been shut down by the V-8 era. The foundry contents were already being auctioned off.

This points out yet another reason why the death of Packard in Detroit was so very crippling to the city. At one time, Detroit (and southeast Michigan) was peppered with little shops and companies that did everything from manufacturing small parts and assemblies to tool & die making. When Packard went down in flames, so did many of these little companies!

And businesses like Creative Industries, Mitchell-Bentley and Modern Engineering could create cars and components cheaper and easier than Packard could itself. So? They farmed this work out to what were believed to be competent vendors.

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