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Nice read, Guscha. The Budd story is especially interesting, showing once again how strange the idea of the "foreign" automobile is. The Russians "appropriated" the dies from the (originally) jointly run German body factory after the war... I bet they did! And so, the Eastern Bloc automobile business was given a shot of steel-body technology. I'd be interested in hearing some comments on this piece. It's quite educational. That link, again:

http://www.coachbuilt.com/bui/b/budd/budd.htm

The elephant on the roof photo was take as part of a publicity stunt done at Coney Island before a crowd of witnesses. It was well publicised in newspapers and magazines at the time.

Chrysler, or at least Dodge, was a pioneer of all steel body construction.



"During the 1930s Budd's largest customer was the Chrysler Corporation, and in 1932 they staged a publicity stunt at Coney Island in which a 5-ton elephant stood on the roof of an all-steel Budd-built 1931 Chrysler Straight-Eight sedan while the doors were opened and closed to demonstrate the strength of the all-steel body. Upon examination of the photo, the elephant stood on a specially-constructed platform placed on top of the roof, which most certainly could not have held the weight of the huge beast in its stock configuration. "

The platform was to give the elephant a solid footing and to distribute the load. The body itself was strong enough to carry the weight without distortion.

One error in the excellent Budd article: Chrysler pioneeded the Budd disc brake on the 1947, not '67, Imperial.

Randerson,

You must've read the whole article. What do you think was the most impressive part? I admit I didn't get through it all yet.


Nice backstory Rusty. Some pretty crafty engineering nonetheless to figure out how to distribute the load-- and be sure they could pull it off without embarrassment, or danger to the pachyderm.

Guscha, I thought I saw something familiar in the Chrysler film. Just before the narrator says they were testing in the mountains of Ligonier Pennsylvania, I spotted the famous landmark "The Ship on the Mountain". We used to stop there every summer and put some nickels in the pay binoculars. If memory serves you could see three states and seven counties, but how could you tell?? Here's a link:
http://brianbutko.wordpress.com/2009/01/16/still-time-for-ss-grand-view-ship-hotel-stories/

Randy,

Did you ever have a Packard trip out to that location with your family? Or, maybe you could make it a Packard Dream trip??

My daughter keeps asking me when I'm going to drive Best Other to Lino Lakes. I told her the day the flower blooms!

Okay, so at least your daughter has a Packard Dream!

55PGuy: I was very impressed with how much technology Budd pioneeded worldwide working even with Citroen, Pressed Steel in England, etc, besides the US companies, in developing the first actual monocoque unit bodies; they must have been the world leader in these areas. Was also not aware they were now a part of Thyssen/Krupp. The article is well worth reading.

The scope of Budd's contribution was astonishing, I thought.

The transition from "coach-built" to more diversified body suppliers serving sectors of the auto manufacturing market, to "captive" body making divisions of auto manufacturers (Fisher comes to mind as an example) until finally various levels of "in-house" body manufacture, is a fascinating journey... I still don't pretend to fully understand the various transitions that took place. None of it seems to have been part of a careful plan of action by the auto manufacturers. Kind of an ad hoc collection of players.

What does this have to do with Packard Dreams? Dunno, but it's a fun tangent.