Electel Blogspot

The great Depression of the 1930s affected the Hudson Motor Car Company to the extent that, aside from its ill-fated 1953-54 Jet compact car, only two basic body series were used between 1936 and 1954.  That was when the company merged with Nash to form American Motors and the final Hudsons were based on Nash bodies. I wrote about 1936-1947 Hudsons and their facelifts here . The present post presents Hudson grille designs during 1948-1954 model year production of the second of those basic body series.  That was a period of seven model years during an era when General Motors, Ford and Chrysler tended to offer redesigned bodies every three or four years on average.  But Hudson did not have their financial resources and relied on facelifts longer than it should have for corporate longevity. Unless noted, images below are of cars listed for sale on the Internet. Gallery 1948 Hudson This was the debut grille design for the radically redesigned postwar Hudson line. 1949 Hudso...

I have written many times about visual automobile brand identification on this blog, not to mention my e-book "How Cars Faced the Market: Grille Design Continuity."  In general, luxury and other up-market marques tend to maintain identification continuity more than do brands farther down the price/prestige scale.  A common means of doing this involves continuity of grille design themes.  My usual examples of this are Rolls-Royce and Packard. Another strong example is England's Daimler , a now-dormant luxury brand that for many years was favored by British royalty.  Daimler grilles' distinctive feature was tube-like ribbing across the top part of the grille frame.  Its origin is explained in the link above. This ornamentation feature is truly distinctive.  Also unattractive, which might explain why no other important brand's stylists bothered to design variations on that theme.  (For example, Ford's Lincoln brand sometimes featured grilles reminiscent o...

The BMW 7 Series , the company's line-topping model, first entered production in 1977.  In theory, upscale sedans tend to be more conservatively styled than lesser models.  Even so, the most recent 7 Series cars have features grille designs that strike me as being excessively large. Let's take a look.  So far as I can tell, all the images below are sourced from BMW or client agencies. Gallery 1933 BMW 303 This is a very early example of BMW's iconic "twin nostril" grille design.  It is large, but in those days grilles were sized to cover the radiators behind them. 1939 BMW 335 By the later 1930s BMW grilles had become narrower, sized to the width of the hood. 1968 BMW 2002 An example of the classic 1960s grille design.  The "nostrils" are small and flanked by essentially rectangular openings. 1995 BMW 7 Series The main radiator air intake for this 7 Series BMW is below the bumper.  The grille elements are now horizontal in keeping with the still-boxy bod...

America's Kaiser brand lasted less than ten model years (though production continued in South American a while longer).  During that time only two basic body designs were used, the original one plus a complete redesign launched for the 1951 model year.  To freshen the designs, grilles were restyled on occasion, the subject of this post.  I wrote about 1954 Kaiser styling here . Unless noted, images below are of cars listed for sale. Gallery 1947 Kaiser Here is an early Kaiser.  The grille opening is the rectangular element immediately above the bumper.  The raised ornamentation between it and the Kaiser name simply covers some hood sheet metal. 1949 Kaiser, RM Sotheby's auction photo The original grille was carried through the 1949 model year.  The 1950 redesign shown here is much more bold, featuring the kind of large, fat chrome bars that were fashionable on postwar American cars.  This design is much cleaner and more attractive than the rather fuss...