51 chevy bel air vs 50 oldsmobile

[youpey]

wasnt the 51 chevy bel air and the 50 oldsmobile basically the same body except for minor changes to bumpers and emblems and such.

the reason i ask, i bought the amt 51 chevy and the revell 50 olds and the sizes are not the same. my thought was i would take the 51 chevy body and put it on the frame of the olds since the olds has much better detail, but the wheelwells dont line up, the frame is sticking out past the body, and overall just doesnt come close to fitting. they are both supposed to be 1/25 scale

is this just a case of one of the manufacturers being off scale or were these cars not the same like i thought they were.

in case anyone cares, the 51 chevy from amt looks decent as far as parts and such. i cant speak for fit and finish because i just got it in and havent done anything on it.

[pharoah]

I'm pretty sure the Olds was a bigger car,especially the 98. Not sure about the 88 Olds. I had a 1949 Olds 98 many,many years ago,and it was a big car. More like a Buick or Caddy.

Swapping in the Olds one piece windshield was popular back then.

[Harry P.]

1950 Olds 88 wheelbase 119.5, overall length 202.

1951 Chevy Bel Air wheelbase 115, overall length 197.5.

Not a big difference in 1/25 scale, but noticeable, assuming that both kits are scaled correctly! There's no guarantee of that. They may be... they may not. But there definitely was a size difference between the two cars.

[Ace-Garageguy]

The Olds Club Coupe does have a longer wheelbase in reality (as Harry notes above), the extra length being between the front axle centerline and the cowl. The Olds front fenders are noticeably longer to accommodate this.

Both Revell and AMT did a pretty respectable job getting these two models scaled correctly, as is illustrated in my swap of the coupe and fastback roof sections between the two.

Edited April 7, 2014 by Ace-Garageguy

[youpey]

thank you very much for the information. it is very helpful. i appreciate the help guys

[GLMFAA1]

The Olds Club Coupe does have a longer wheelbase in reality (as Harry notes above), the extra length being between the front axle centerline and the cowl. The Olds front fenders are noticeably longer to accommodate this.

Both Revell and AMT did a pretty respectable job getting these two models scaled correctly, as is illustrated in my swap of the coupe and fastback roof sections between the two.

Hey! I need a 'How to" on this subject, Just what I want to do to make my father's go to work car. Very nice work

greg

[Art Anderson]

To carry this a bit farther:

From about 1931 through 1958, General Motors had a 3-body program across all divisions. They went as follows:

"A Body"--this was the body shell used by Chevrolet and Pontiac, and at various times, the smaller, lower-priced Oldsmobile.

"B Body"--B-bodies were used by the larger ("Senior) Oldsmobile and at least the lower price/size range Buick.

"C Body"--this body size was principally Cadillac, but from time to time used by Buick for their larger, more luxurious cars.

As a general rule, these body shells did not vary in their major exterior shape when shared between multiple divisions of GM--note that the lower body sheet metal surfaces aren't completely structural, so GM Styling was rather free to give each division's cars at least some unique "wrinkles in the sheetmetal" below the bottom edges of the side windows--but for the most part, everything above (windshield, roof panels and back glass) remained the same whether the body was a Chevrolet, a Pontiac or an Oldsmobile 76 or 88.

The individual GM Divisions were pretty much free to design their own engines, chassis, suspension systems as well as most sheetmetal and trim styling, but since the body shell itself is the most expensive single portion of any car, they were expected to use these shared body shells. As was typical of the era, body shells got longer as you went up the price range ladder, along with chassis needing to be longer when an inline (straight) 8-cylinder engine was to be installed, but even low priced cars could, and were built with straight 8 engines which put them supposedly in direct competition with Ford's mass-produced flathead V8's.

Back to the '50 Olds vs '51 Chevy length: From the early 1930's through 1948, Oldsmobile offered not only an inline 6-cylinder engine, but also a straight eight (as did Pontiac through 1954) which dictated a longer chassis forward of the firewall. In those days, size meant status, so the longer wheelbase and overall length was seen by car buyers as having more status (rather like the comparison between say, a McMansion and a suburban "tract house" today), so when the straight 8 engine disappeared from production, and even with the lower-price level Oldsmobile 76, a chassis longer than that used by Chevrolet was necessary to fulfill customer expectations that with an Olds, a car buyer was getting a better, more prestigious car with greater luxury than with say, a Chevy. So that's why the longer front clip (sheet metal forward of the firewall), and a correspondingly longer trunk out back (the trunk actually wasn'tconsidered structurally part of the body, even though it was faired into the body by the sheetmetal quarter panels). Oldsmobile had two series of cars back then, the "98" which shared its C Body with Buick, and the "88", which while using the same Rocket V8 and offering the same transmission choices as the larger car, was built around the smaller, shorter (and lighter!) GM "A" body, which made for a car that looked to be not much bigger than a Chevy, but would sure blow the doors off any Bowtie at the stoplight. (Olds still had the "76" which was the very same car as the "88", but with lesser interior trim and using the last of Oldsmobile's flathead inline 6's, and I believe stick shift only--the "88" being available with either stick or with Hydramatic transmission)

Even Pontiacs of the era were longer than Chevrolets, and used their own distinctive chassis underneath, due to Pontiac's offering straight 8 engines clear through to the end of production of the 1954 model year, but Pontiac still was restricted to using the smaller A-body shells.

Art

[GLMFAA1]

I had an uncle who got into the used car business after WWII and he would mix and match the body panels of the GM and sell Olds/Buicks, Chev/Buicks, etc

greg