Packard Forum Index » Studebaker Built Packards (1957 - 58)

I really like your work-ups here on the Packard and the Studebaker!

Revisit of old problem using new insights. Carryover Studebaker President chassis instead of extended axle-to-dash. Needed width added, probably 3-4 inches, welded to carryover door inners, giving broad shoulders. V8 and Ultramatic still shipped from Utica to South Bend per '56. Probably a $10M effort. Even if the cash had been found, no guarantee of profit. But an interesting car to my eyes.

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Better looking that what was produced IMO. Aside from money, wasn't part of the big picture and ultimate problem in consolidation being the Stude line could not accommodate any wider bodies than what they had. Supposedly forced into what they did produce, could they have added body width and still used narrow frames or how would that have been overcome.

Even though it was a few years later I vaguely remember the marketing hoopla of the "wide track" 59 Pontiacs supposedly being so much more stable than the previous models. Would that have been something additional Packard would have had to overcome along with all the other problems if they had wider bodies but narrow frames? They had several unkind reviews with the looks of the 22-23 wider (fat) bodies on essentially the same earlier narrow frames.

Good point, the plant reportedly was constrained somehow such that it couldn't make the big Packards. Whether it would have been able to assemble wider-bodied Studebakers with little or no manufacturing cost would have been a question that would have needed answered soon after idea was offered.

I would think a wider body could have been welded to the inner structure using new tooled parts that connected the outer panels to the inners. Again, a study would have needed to be done to bubble up the difficult issues and determine if resolvable and affordable.

Am not a proponent of vehicles with tracks that are too narrow for their bodies, looks and handling both issues. Was going with the flow on this work-up because the 57 Program has similar situation, just in a wider body/chassis.

The work-up would have still been a bit too tall, not optimally proportioned. On the other hand, taller is easy to get into. A stop-gap in the end. Am going to post a new thread shortly on New Yorker-based Packard, much nicer! And not possible.