1947-1949 Studebaker Starlight Coupe Walkaround

When they first appeared in 1946, the 1947 Studebaker Starlight Coupes were a sensation.  That's because they were seriously futuristic compared to other brands' offerings that were warmed-over 1942 designs.   About that same time, the new Kaiser and Frazer brands appeared, but their design was not nearly as sleek as Studebaker's.

Some background can be found here.

This basic Studebaker body platform remained in production through model year 1952, with major frontal facelifts beginning in 1950.  Today's post focuses on 1947-1949 models whose appearance was largely the same over that period.

I think the model that most closely typified postwar Studebakers was the Starlight Coupe, the subject of this post.

Gallery

1947 Studebaker Champion Starlight Coupe - factory photo
The basic Starlight as first publicized.

1949 Studebaker Champion Starlight Coupe - car-for-sale photo
Champions had a 112-inch (2800 mm) wheelbase.

1948 Studebaker Commander Starlight Coupe - Barrett-Jackson Auctions photo
Whereas the Commander line was longer, with a wheelbase of 119-inches (3023 mm).  The additional length is found forward of the cowling / A-pillar.

1947 Studebaker Commander Starlight Coupe - for-sale-car photo
Showing the four-segment wraparound back window design - a strong brand-identification feature.

1947 Studebaker Commander Starlight Coupe - for-sale-car photo set
Now for the walkaround.  Commanders had different grilles than Champions.  Two-tone Studebakers apparently were rare in those days, as only  a few images showing them have turned up on the Internet.  On the other hand, note that Studebaker promotional material in those days always showed cars in one color only.

The one-piece windshield was only slightly curved.  First-generation postwar American car curved windshields came in two segments when curved greater than seen here.  Production glass formation technology was the factor.

The fender line with the attached rear fender became common for a few years as I wrote here.

The backlight window was never given more chrome trim than shown here in six years of production.

The trunk lid has a mild version of boat-tail sculpting.

The angles of the C-pillar and front edge of the rear fender match, helping to unify the design.

Altogether, a distinctive, attractive design.

Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint Speciale

Maybe it's a generational thing, but I've always thought that the Golden Age of Italian coachbuilding lasted from the late 1940s to the very early 1960s.  Of course there were fine designs created before and after that era, and a number of 1946-1961 designs were distinctly inferior.

One of the most interesting designs, though not a great one in my esteem, is Alfa Romeo's Giulietta Sprint Speciale whose bodies were by Bertone and styled by Franco Scaglione.  The prototype was revealed at the 1957 Turin Auto Show and production lasted 1959-1966.

Sprint Speciales were quite aerodynamic for their time, as can be seen in Gallery images below.  The first Wikipedia link above reports the car had a drag coefficient of 0.28.  That suggests the shape having been wind tunnel tested (after all, Scaglione had an aeronautical engineering background).

As an automobile design, I find his slightly earlier Giulietta Sprint better, because the Sprint Speciale strikes me as being too forced aerodynamically.  Readers may well strongly disagree.

Gallery

The first two images are of the 1957 prototype.  One recognition detail is its lack of a front bumper.

Other is its slightly shorter trunk lid.

Side views of a 1965 Sprint Speciale from Mecum Auctions.

Its passenger compartment greenhouse is nearly airfoil-like.  Not quite a fastback because the trunk lid has a subtly different angle.

Overhead side view of a for-sale 1961 Sprint Speciale.  Deviations from a totally smooth shape include the  distinctly raised front and rear fenders.  The latter probably added to the design's potential drag coefficient.

Now for three views of a 1965 Sprint Speciale via RM Sotheby's auctions.  The aluminum paint shows the car's shape well without reflections.

The front wheel opening detailing seems contrived.  A curved profile such as that of the rear wheel opening would have been better looking.  Plus, the raised sculpting strikes me as being unnecessary.

The rear seems pinched, but that was probably due to aerodynamic considerations.  Tail light assemblies seem especially susceptible to damage.

1949-Vintage Nash Body Types

Nash cars usually were styled close to current design fashion though the 1948 model year.  Then things changed, as I described here in my post "Nash Airflyte: 1940 Car of the Future Made Real in 1949."

By the late 1930s and early 1940s it was widely assumed that future automobiles would have highly streamlined, rather teardrop-shaped bodies where wheel openings were essentially eliminated to provide smooth sides.

An example is this 1941 rendering by Gil Spear for Chrysler.

As it happened, by the end of World War 2 when American car production resumed, the consensus had shifted.  Most carmaker's postwar redesigns were lower, longer versions of 1942 forms with bustle backs and flow-though fenderlines.

Only the redesigned 1949 Nashes followed the pre-war thinking.  It was a marketing mistake that was corrected when the boxy 1952 Nash line appeared.

An important problem with the 1949 Nash design was that the cars looked heavy, not lithe.  And their rounded shape led many observers, including the young me, to refer to them as "upside-down bathtubs."

Nashes came in two model lines, the 112-inch (2856 mm) 600 / Statesman, and the 121-inch (3073 mm) Ambassador.  There were 4-door sedans and 2-door cars that were given a variety of names (Brougham, Coupe, Club Coupe) even though they looked the same.

1949 and 1950 standard Nashes were essentially identical in appearance.  One detail difference was found on front bumper guards.  Therefore, the images below are an assortment from both model years.

Gallery

1950 Nash Ambassador 4-door sedan - RM Sotheby's photo
General view of the design.

1950 Nash Ambassador 4-door sedan - for sale car
Side view of an Ambassadot 4-door.

1950 Nash Statesman 4-door sedan - Ben Piff photo
The Statesman version is the same abaft of the cowling, the Ambassador having a longer front end forward of the A-pillar door cut line.

1950 Nash Ambassador 2-door - Mecum Auctions photo
Two-door models had the same roof profile.  Front doors were wider and the B-pillar leans forward.  Aft side windows could be rolled down at least partially on sedans (and possibly on coupes as well).

1949 Nash 600 2-door - for sale
The 600 (1949) / Statesman (1950) model seems closer to the 1940-vintage streamlined concept than the Ambassadors due to the shorter hood.

Some Mercedes "Autobahnkurier" Examples

Streamlining - both aerodynamic and sylistic - was The Next Big Thing in automobile body design around the mid-1930s.  Mostly, cars were given a marginally aerodynamic treatment in the form of rounded rear ends, while front ends retained the usual pre-streamlining features.  In other words, little aerodynamic efficiency was gained.

This was happening in Germany as well as the other main car-producing countries in those days - USA, England, France and Italy.  The German firm Adler even made some cars that were aerodynamically more efficient, as did Hanomag and Horch.  Mercedes-Benz also made at least one aerodynamic passenger car, but mostly opted for the rounded rear option on a few cars called Autobahnkurier.

The term Autobahnkurier was applied to some Mercedes W29 Typ 500K and 540K coupés (the W denotes Werknummer - "Works Number" - a more precise designation than the Typ "Type" number that can and has been applied to more than one Werknummer over the years).  Wikipedia entries for the 500K and 540K are here and here.

Besides those coupés, some Mercedes Stromlinien Limousine - streamlined sedans - have been referred to as Autobahkuriers, though perhaps not by Mercedes.   (My personal library and the Internet are lacking regarding official Mercedes-Benz designations.)  Regardless, today's post presents some examples of both coupés and four-door sedans wuth traditional front ends and rounded rears.

As best I can tell based on Internet searches, some steamlined sedans were W18 Typ 290 based, and others were of W142 Typ 320.

Sources disagree regarding the number of true Autobahnkuriers built, also the number of survivors.  Some say ten were made, others claim 12.  As for survivors, for certain, one 500K exists, as does one 540K.

Autobahnkurier bodies were desined by Friedrich Geiger (1907-1996), who later was in charge of Mercedes styling.

Photo sources for the surviving 540K are extremely varied, and mostly defy citation, as the car has appeared in a number of shows and apparently lacks an official set of images.  Also, given the similarity of the streamlined sedans, the type designations found on the Internet might not be accurate.

Gallery

1934 Mercedes W29 500K Autobahnkurier
One of my sources claims that this was the original Autobahnkurier displayed at the February 1934 Berlin automobile show.  It's a very attractive design in line with the emerging "streamlining" styling details of the day.

Those details include teardrop-profile fenders, smooth downward passenger compartment greenhouse profile, V'd two-piece windshield, and the boat-tail aft planview of the greenhouse.  Note the high, tiny, impractical backlight window.  Compare the overall design to the 1933 Cadillac Aero Coupe.

500K Autobahnkurier owned by the Shah of Persia - photo via Wikipedia
This photo was taken at a Teheran car museum.  The hood is shorter than seen in other coupé photos.  Might the photos above actually be of a 540K?  Or perhaps the car in those photos was given a version of the longer 129.5-inch (3290 mm) wheelbase instead of the 117.3-inch (2980 mm) wheelbase chassis probably used for the car shown here.

540K Autobahnkurier - unknown photo source
From this perspective, the passenger compartment seems quite short, though the car's proportions are similar to the much-admired 500K and 540K roadsters.

1935 Mercedes W18 Typ 290 Stromlinien Limousine - factory images
The design shown here is on a W18 platform according to the Internet photo source, and it looks the same as that shown below as W142s.  Therefore, I cannot guarantee that the Werknummeren jibes with the images.  That said, the streamlining details are not as strong as on the Autobahnkurier design shown above.  For example, two-segment windshield is not as strongly V'd as the coupé's.

The greenhouse profile has a slight ogive curve.  The rear fender is not quite teardrop in profile, though it is spatted, like the coupé's.  Doors are hinged on the B-pillar, but that pillar is thin above the beltline.

The backlight window is two-piece, divided by that central fin or windsplit running down over the spare tire lid.

1938c Mercedes W132 Typ 290 Stromlinien Limousine - unidentified photo sources
As mentioned, the body design is the same as the one just pictured.

This photo might be via Daimler Benz's museum.  Tail lights appear here, but not on the W18 images.

The three-pointed star at the bottom of the fin/windsplit is a cute detail.

Note the contrast between the traditional front and "streamlined" rear.

Aston Martin Lagonda Series 2: Low and Angular

Nearly ten years ago I wrote about the Aston Martin Lagonda Series 2 design.  Since then, more images of  those cars have appeared on the Internet, so now I can present a walkaround sequence showing the styling in much greater detail.

There were four production series: Series 1 (1974-75), Series 2 (1979-85), Series 3 (1986-87) and Series 4 (1987-90) with 645 built, all told.  The first series amounted to fewer than ten cars, as the second link above mentions.  It also states that its cars were based on Aston Martin components, whereas Series 2 and later cars had a unique platform.  A prototype was displayed in 1976, but production cars were not marketed until 1979.

In my earlier Aston Martin Lagonda post, I noted: "[I]n my judgment the design suffers because of the dimensions of the 'package.'  The car is simply too long and too low; its proportions would make almost any styling seem wrong."

Keep in mind that a long-term design trend was to increasingly low car bodies.  By the early 1970s this yielded some sports cars and show cars whose height had reached levels essentially impractical for everyday use: for example, the 1966-73 Lamborghini Miura and 1968-78 Lamborghini Espada.  At the same time, the current styling fashion was for cars to be angular-looking: razor-edge all-over.  Both factors dominated the Aston Martin Lagonda design created by William Towns.

Here are Series 2 dimensions as reported in the Wikipedia link: wheelbase, 114.8 inches (2916 mm); length, 208 inches (5282 mm) and height, 51.3 inches (1302 mm).  Clearly, overhang was enormous.

Gallery

Circa 1966 Volvo 144
An example of angular styling on a car with practical passenger packaging dimensions.

1984 Lagonda Series 2 Saloon - Gallery Aaldering photo
And here is an Aston Martin Series 2 Lagonda.

1980 Lagonda Series 2 Saloon - Bonhams auction photos
Now for the walkaround.  Plenty of razor-edge angularity.

Yet the styling is professional, with few errors aside from the overall proportions.

Long hood, short, all-overhung trunk.  Note the chin spoiler at the front.

The full-length rub-bar transitions to the upper edge of the rear bumper.  I'm not sure of the purpose of the panel on the C-pillars; seems set too low for a potential knock-out opera window.  Perhaps one is a fuel filler cover.

Tail light and reflector assemblies are geometrical.  But other lines are subtly curved, as on Greek temple columns.

Sigh: If only the car were slightly taller, all might have been well.

The steeply raked windshield helps aerodynamic efficiency.

Consistency: the rub strip meets the top of the front bumper, as it does the rear bumper.  The body flares outwards near its lower edge.

The cockpit is quite angular in spirit with high-tech details.  The steering wheel's single spoke recalls that of the Citroën DS.

Giugiaro's Alfa Romeo Giulia GT by Bertone

One of famed designer Giogetto Giugiaro's best designs when he worked for carrozzezia Bertone was the Alfa Romeo Giulia GT Coupé, the subject of this post.

Although a 1960s effort, it was still in the tradition of classic late 1940s and 1950s Italian coachbuilding.  Moreover, its styling language derived from earlier Alfa Romeo coupés by Bertone such as mid-1950s Giulietta Sprints designed by Franco Scaglione.

Giugiaro's design was so good that it remained in production from 1963 to 1977 with minor changes, according to the link.

Gallery

1967 Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint GTV - Bring a Trailer auction photos
The passenger compartment greenhouse was tall and airy.

Note the large backlight window.

1967 Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint - Bring a Trailer auction photos
Earlier Giulia Sprints had an air vent opening along the front edge of the hood.

Wheels were simple by today's standards.

1971 Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint - Gallery Aaldering photos
This later model lacks the hood air intake, cleaning the design a bit.  Post-Giugiaro, however.

The quad headlights are unfortunate, but at least have differing diameters to provide some visual variety.

GT Sprints were short, having a wheelbase of 92.5 inches (2350 mm).  But the design was crafted so that the car seemed longer and more graceful than its actual size should have permitted.

Rear end details in the bloc where the license place and tail lights are found are only slightly linked to side sculpting.  This might have been necessary to maintain the subtle side profile effect mentioned above.

Raised fender tops add interest and sculpting to the rear of the car.

Aside from bumpers, the only brightwork abaft of the grille is for window framing.

Wheel well openings are large, but the aft ones have flattened upper profiles so as to relate better to the strong side sculpting and busyness in the area of the C-pillar.  A round profile would place too much visual activity in that area.

Grilles retained the Alfa Romeo shield shape, but details changed over the years.  Raised front fender tops echo those at the rear, providing continuity.