These guys didn't get the memo for 1959: longer, lower, wider. It's a nice car. It looks like it escaped over the Berlin Wall.
Rambler built a solid car, but they lacked the style to sell in sufficient volume against the other Detroit offerings. It made the company hard pressed to finance and engineer new models.
hey Clifton.ra check out Motor Trends car of the year for 1963. Rambler didn't run into money issues till Roy Abernethy takes over and tries to retool like the big three. Their philosophy up until then was to do as little retooling as possible to keep costs down. Keep up the good work, love this blog.
"...Rambler didn't run into money issues till..." They were losing market share with each passing year, and moving closer to the eventual Chrysler buy-out of American Motors. It was Mom and Pop next to Walmart. The question was when? The sales volume forced an economy of scale which funded innovation and the annual styling cues. The OHV engine and AT, and AC and creature comforts were becoming desirable features and sales were lost if you didn't engineer in the changes. Those items remove engineering and tooling funds out of any profit, and it helps when you are splitting the cost over several divisions and rotating changes across chassis'. You always have a "new" model. GM would even, eventually, stop separate power-train development. "I bought a Buick with an Olds engine...." brought law suits. The poor economy during the Great Depression hastened the industry-wide mergers, which momentarily slowed with the return to post-war production at the end of WWII. After the war, all the manufacturers could sell anything which rolled, high demand for new cars to replace old worn out Depression and rationing depleted cars. There were actually new companies formed to take advantage of the war surplus industrial capacity and surplus labor supply idled from war production, Tucker and Kaiser and Muntz. The '50s rolled up the few remaining independents. Kaiser sold auto production to South America. The Depression ruined the market for the ultra-prestige makes like Auburn, Pierce Arrow, Cord, and Duesenburg. The custom coach-built cars of the '20s saw less demand in the thirties. Cadilliac and Packard introduced lower priced models to maintain sales volumes. It was just a matter of time before the reaper would knock.
You might be right Cliff, but while the firm was healthy, they cranked out some awesome stuff. Only problem I had was finding the parts needed to keep these cars running. With the '50's and early '60's models, you had a Willys engine mated to Studebaker tranny and so on. At least that's what my '62 Classic had in it. Boy, do I miss that car.
Best of OPC. 
8 comments:
Way to go Ben! You're hitting them out of the park!
How Cool Is This?
Who wouldn't love to drive this thing?
Don't know how OPC does it. Amazing work and Ben and Tony make it look easy.
Kudos Ben
Beautiful. Love the fins.
These guys didn't get the memo for 1959: longer, lower, wider.
It's a nice car. It looks like it escaped over the Berlin Wall.
Rambler built a solid car, but they lacked the style to sell in sufficient volume against the other Detroit offerings. It made the company hard pressed to finance and engineer new models.
hey Clifton.ra check out Motor Trends car of the year for 1963. Rambler didn't run into money issues till Roy Abernethy takes over and tries to retool like the big three. Their philosophy up until then was to do as little retooling as possible to keep costs down.
Keep up the good work, love this blog.
How did I miss seeing this? I live on the other side of the street a few doors down from where this was parked on N.Omaha Avenue.
"...Rambler didn't run into money issues till..."
They were losing market share with each passing year, and moving closer to the eventual Chrysler buy-out of American Motors. It was Mom and Pop next to Walmart. The question was when?
The sales volume forced an economy of scale which funded innovation and the annual styling cues. The OHV engine and AT, and AC and creature comforts were becoming desirable features and sales were lost if you didn't engineer in the changes. Those items remove engineering and tooling funds out of any profit, and it helps when you are splitting the cost over several divisions and rotating changes across chassis'. You always have a "new" model. GM would even, eventually, stop separate power-train development. "I bought a Buick with an Olds engine...." brought law suits.
The poor economy during the Great Depression hastened the industry-wide mergers, which momentarily slowed with the return to post-war production at the end of WWII. After the war, all the manufacturers could sell anything which rolled, high demand for new cars to replace old worn out Depression and rationing depleted cars. There were actually new companies formed to take advantage of the war surplus industrial capacity and surplus labor supply idled from war production, Tucker and Kaiser and Muntz. The '50s rolled up the few remaining independents. Kaiser sold auto production to South America.
The Depression ruined the market for the ultra-prestige makes like Auburn, Pierce Arrow, Cord, and Duesenburg. The custom coach-built cars of the '20s saw less demand in the thirties. Cadilliac and Packard introduced lower priced models to maintain sales volumes.
It was just a matter of time before the reaper would knock.
You might be right Cliff, but while the firm was healthy, they cranked out some awesome stuff.
Only problem I had was finding the parts needed to keep these cars running. With the '50's
and early '60's models, you had a Willys engine mated to Studebaker tranny and so on. At
least that's what my '62 Classic had in it. Boy, do I miss that car.
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