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Posted

Art, speaking of versatility, wouldn't a 1952 Lincoln fit the bill? It could do everything the Moebius Chrysler and Hudson kits have done.

Nice car of course, but I would wonder if it has the desireability in mass numbers?

Art

Posted

Art, I bet the same questions were asked on the 55 Chrysler too !

Ed, the '55 (and now forthcoming '56) Chrysler C300 had a lot more going for it. First of all, across the range of car enthusiasts, the first two years of 300 letter cars will turn heads--on the street, on the shelves of the hobby shop, and I would suggest on display tables at a model car event--far more emphatically than a '52-54 Lincoln, simply due to their literally legendary status. Those years of Lincoln, on the other hand, while they would fill a void in a fair number of model car collections, just do not have that almost built-in recognition unfortunately.

Granted, the 52-53 Lincolns did well in the Carrera Panamericana (Mexican Road Race), but that was about it and those were sedans. Couple that with the rather stodgy styling of the 52-55 Lincolns (little more than gussied up Mercurys, which in themselves were basically a longer version of the Fords of those years, a Mexican Road Race Lincoln wouldn't be much in the way of customizing material either I suspect.

Now, this is not to say Lincoln didn't produce some cars that would make great model kits, for they did: Any '36-'39 Lincoln Zephyr coupe would get my vote in an instant, given that such a kit would build up sharp as a stock model, and the customizing possibilties are nearly endless.

It's even amazing that the Lincoln Motor Car Company/Lincoln Division even managed to survive to reach the 1961 model year, given that from Lincoln's inception in 1921 through the 1960 model year, the company (sold in 1922 to Ford) never even managed to break even, let alone turn a profit, in spite of being assigned the production of Ford and Mercury bodies from the middle 1930's well into the 1950's.

Art

Posted

Art, I bet the same questions were asked on the 55 Chrysler too !

Yes, and the team that came up with that idea for Moebius was able to note a lot of reasons for the fame of the first Chrysler 300's: Styling was one, certainly the first 300hp (354cid Hemi) was another, that being the first mass-produced automobile with 300bhp (yes, the Duesenberg SJ reached 320hp, but only about 25 of those were built (doesn't count Model J's that had superchargers added after the fact) 1932-37, which does not qualify that version of the Duesey as mass-produced; and last but not least, the '55-'56 Chrysler 300's dominated Nascar both years, with FAR fewer cars in the race fields than Hudsons enjoyed 1952-54. In addition, '55-56 Chryslers period have a fair level of customizing potential.

All of those characteristics gave the nod to the Chrysler, for their potentially "long legs" as model kits out there in the marketplace.

Art

  • 2 years later...

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