Prices at the Dawn of the Gasoline Age, Dusk of the Equine

JV Puleo
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They are setting twin updraft carburetors. That engine has 2 separate intake manifolds, probably because as an engine gets bigger it becomes much more difficult to design a single carburetor that can accommodate the range of fuel/air mixture it requires. Huge T-Head engines as in American LaFrance & Seagrave fire trucks had a huge single carburetor, but they also had very little speed range, low compression and didn't actually operate all that efficiently. The picture is 1932 ... the truck may be from the late 20s or early, so it is near end of the use of updrafts. They may have had a vacuum gauge to set them - or they may have done it by trial and error. The best person I ever saw at setting carburetors did it by ear - he could do the triple Austin Healey setup much faster than the guy with the fancy test equipment.
Gordon_M
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Morning Pat, and everyone.

I'm guessing QM Corps Standard Fleet - unfortunately there just isn't enough there for me to nail it down.

I might try the ATHS for this, they are quite good on these things.

regards from cold wet Scotland

Gordon
Pat Holscher
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Nice photograph of snowy conditions in NYC in the horse powered days:

http://old-photos.blogspot.com/2011/12/ ... the+Day%29
Pat Holscher
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Pat Holscher wrote:Nice photograph of snowy conditions in NYC in the horse powered days:

http://old-photos.blogspot.com/2011/12/ ... the+Day%29
Traveling in 39:

http://old-photos.blogspot.com/2011/12/ ... the+Day%29
Gordon_M
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The nice people at the American Truck Historical Society took a look at it and came up with a definitive answer;
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Everyone who said QMC take a bow. Brian Kelly was the 1st to get this, and all of Bill White's info is right on the money also. This behemoth is a 1932 QMC Group V 10-12 ton 6x6. This is the largest of the Standard Fleet models built between 1928 and 1932 at the U.S. Army Quartermaster Corps shops (hence the name "QMC"). This truck was powered by a twin-carbureted Sterling Petrel LT6 6 cylinder engine displacing 779 ci and developing 177 hp, which were big numbers for the time. Sterling Petrel engines, no relation to the Sterling Motor Truck Company, were used in many trucks and buses in the 1920's and early '30's.

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Full thread and additional pictures can be viewed here;

http://forums.aths.org/InstantForum2010 ... day-121211

I should point out that the image credit belongs to the original poster, not to me.

Gordon
Pat Holscher
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Thanks Gordon. Remarkable truck.
Pat Holscher
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With the US returning to net fuel exporter last year in part due to the rise in raw and refined fuel, I have to wonder how the current price compares to prices of a century ago or so, in real terms?
selewis
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Pat Holscher wrote:With the US returning to net fuel exporter last year in part due to the rise in raw and refined fuel, I have to wonder how the current price compares to prices of a century ago or so, in real terms?
Pat, here is an interesting article from 2005 that addresses your wondering: http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/ed ... edit_x.htm

If, in addition to professor Perry's interesting analysis, you factor in the added mpg achieved by many modern cars and trucks you arrive at the sure conclusion that the cost of driving has never been cheaper than it is today- by far.

Doesn't feel that way though does it? Though our problems today are very real, particularly the fiscal sort, I'm leaning more and more to the conclusion that the deepest and most worrisome ones are attitudinal.

Sandy
Pat Holscher
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selewis wrote:
Pat Holscher wrote:With the US returning to net fuel exporter last year in part due to the rise in raw and refined fuel, I have to wonder how the current price compares to prices of a century ago or so, in real terms?
Pat, here is an interesting article from 2005 that addresses your wondering: http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/ed ... edit_x.htm

If, in addition to professor Perry's interesting analysis, you factor in the added mpg achieved by many modern cars and trucks you arrive at the sure conclusion that the cost of driving has never been cheaper than it is today- by far.

Doesn't feel that way though does it? Though our problems today are very real, particularly the fiscal sort, I'm leaning more and more to the conclusion that the deepest and most worrisome ones are attitudinal.

Sandy
There's a lot to your point. Indeed, there never was a "golden age" as people like to imagine, no matter how they imagine it. Things in many ways were much rougher in the past. One thing that's easy to forget is what the big worries of the past were, such as the constant fear of disease in the 18th Century. And when we look back on some ancestors and admire how "tough" they were, we often forget how much closer to the sharp edge of things they often lived. When we sometimes here "we couldn't do that today", in many cases what we probably ought to hear is "we wouldn't do that today and don't have to".

Still, those who point to some troubling developments in recent years aren't without a point. Here's an interesting spin on it by liberal columnist Froma Harrop:

http://www.sunjournal.com/news/columns- ... ne/1133806
Pat Holscher
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This is a bit off topic for the forum (of course the thread in general is) but it's a question I have that maybe Joe or one of the other folks knowledgeable on vintage autos can answer.

For years, I drove a single cab truck. But, with two kids, it became impossible. Now I drive a crewcab truck, and I hardly ever run across a true single cab anymore. When I do, it's usually a company truck. I also have an old Mercury Cougar "Sport Coupe" which I bought well used as it has a 4 cyl engine, was cheap, and gets good gas mileage. It's a "sport coupe" as it has a hatch back and back seats, but my son can hardly sit back there now, and it's not practical if more than two of us are going anywhere. As its' a daily driver for me (and I'm really cheap. . .I haven't fixed the heater in the past two years, which if you know our winters. . .) it works out okay.

Now, here's my question. In the early auto days families were generally larger, and I'm under the impression that most families had a car. But I know that coups were popular.

Why?

Image
A car owned by my grandfather.
JV Puleo
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They were nearly always called "business coupes" or "doctor's coupes"...a two passenger car with a trunk rather than a rumble seat. Doctor's were especially early and enthusiastic users of the automobile and a car specially suited to their needs was very good marketing. This begs the question of why? Because in the day of house calls, which ray right up to the 30s at least, the expense of keeping a horse - or more likely two horses, feed stabling and other services was a real drain. They were an ideal market in that they needed what the automobile provided and usually could afford the initial investment.

Business men were another major targeted market... presumably they could afford a car and a good many of them could afford to keep a car for business purposes... If they had a family they could have a sedan or touring car as well. My mom's godfather, a wealthy man who was an adult when the automobile was a new invention, kept a car at his summer home so the chauffeur could drive him to the train every morning... a distance of about 1/4 mile!

There are probably many more reasons, not the least of which was that they "looked good" in the popular mind and that frequently took precedence over practicality - as it still does.
Pat Holscher
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JV Puleo wrote:They were nearly always called "business coupes" or "doctor's coupes"...a two passenger car with a trunk rather than a rumble seat. Doctor's were especially early and enthusiastic users of the automobile and a car specially suited to their needs was very good marketing. This begs the question of why? Because in the day of house calls, which ray right up to the 30s at least, the expense of keeping a horse - or more likely two horses, feed stabling and other services was a real drain. They were an ideal market in that they needed what the automobile provided and usually could afford the initial investment.

Business men were another major targeted market... presumably they could afford a car and a good many of them could afford to keep a car for business purposes... If they had a family they could have a sedan or touring car as well. My mom's godfather, a wealthy man who was an adult when the automobile was a new invention, kept a car at his summer home so the chauffeur could drive him to the train every morning... a distance of about 1/4 mile!

There are probably many more reasons, not the least of which was that they "looked good" in the popular mind and that frequently took precedence over practicality - as it still does.
It's interesting that you note that they were called "business coupes". That's how my father referred this car, of his father's. It was a "business coupe".

I think they do look sharp. I once passed on a 1939 Plymouth Coupe that was a very reasonable price, and I really regret it.
Couvi
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It was my understanding that a lot of the coupes were used by salesmen because of their tremendous trunk space. They could carry their merchandise and deliver their goods saving the shipping charges for themselves.
Pat Holscher
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Pat Holscher wrote:This is a bit off topic for the forum (of course the thread in general is) but it's a question I have that maybe Joe or one of the other folks knowledgeable on vintage autos can answer.

For years, I drove a single cab truck. But, with two kids, it became impossible. Now I drive a crewcab truck, and I hardly ever run across a true single cab anymore. When I do, it's usually a company truck. I also have an old Mercury Cougar "Sport Coupe" which I bought well used as it has a 4 cyl engine, was cheap, and gets good gas mileage. It's a "sport coupe" as it has a hatch back and back seats, but my son can hardly sit back there now, and it's not practical if more than two of us are going anywhere. As its' a daily driver for me (and I'm really cheap. . .I haven't fixed the heater in the past two years, which if you know our winters. . .) it works out okay.

Now, here's my question. In the early auto days families were generally larger, and I'm under the impression that most families had a car. But I know that coups were popular.

Why?

Image
A car owned by my grandfather.
Looking back on this post, I realized that this was actually my father's car.

In a blown up print, this coup has been converted into a pickup truck. The trunk has been removed, and a box added. I recall him telling me about the car, but this is the first time that I've actually seen a photo of it. I converted this from a slide I'd never seen.

There's something written on the door, but I don't know what. At any rate, this is an interesting example of how vehicles of this era were rough enough for some use that modern cars probably wouldn't be suitabler for.
JV Puleo
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That sort of conversion was extremely common. I once reassembled a 1921 Springfield Silver Ghost roadster that had a big wooden box where the rumble seat had been and had spent about 40 years delivering machine parts in Ireland.
I suspect the style lasted because it was very convenient... if you didn't need extra seating the space was used for stuff - much like pickups have become though for what most suburbanites carry around in their pickup, a coupe would be a better choice. I once had a Volvo station wagon with a fold down rear seat that was one of the most useful cars I've ever had...

Joe P
Pat Holscher
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JV Puleo wrote:That sort of conversion was extremely common. I once reassembled a 1921 Springfield Silver Ghost roadster that had a big wooden box where the rumble seat had been and had spent about 40 years delivering machine parts in Ireland.
I suspect the style lasted because it was very convenient... if you didn't need extra seating the space was used for stuff - much like pickups have become though for what most suburbanites carry around in their pickup, a coupe would be a better choice. I once had a Volvo station wagon with a fold down rear seat that was one of the most useful cars I've ever had...

Joe P
I've been told that all Model T light trucks were conversions. Is that correct?

Turning this back to horses a bit, there were the coupe equivalent of buggies. At least at one time they were sometimes called "dog carts", although I'm sure there were other names. Apparently at one time they were quite fashionable for the young single man about time, sort of like the coupe sports car. I guess I'd ask the same question in regards to two seat buggies, what was their intended use?

What about "doctor's buggies"? Truly an item that was marketed to doctors? Any other occupational specific horse drawn vehicles? I suppose that there must have been.

I sometimes see references to officers in the 19th Century having "ambulances", which obviously means something other than what we commonly think of today. How common was a sort of buggy or wagon for officers?
selewis
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There maybe other uses for the term dog cart but the one I am familiar with designates a cart with a compartment below for transporting hunting dogs. The ones I have seen were one horse with two bench seats back to back and fairly high wheeled to make room for the boot where the dogs were kept. They were sporting vehicles in the sense that they were used in hunting but not classy in the sense that one would think of a modern sports car. I wonder if the term doctor's buggy might not a term that grew out of its association with that profession in the movies. I don't know, the term may be older.
selewis
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Pat Holscher
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selewis wrote:There maybe other uses for the term dog cart but the one I am familiar with designates a cart with a compartment below for transporting hunting dogs.
Not the same thing.

These "dog carts" were small buggies pulled by a single horse and seating only two. I think they were probably called that derisively, as they were so small that they resembled the type of car that, elsewhere, could be pulled by a dog. They were popular with "swells" in the East in the late 19th Century.
hbtoday98
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Hi Pat
dog cart is in english terms a two wheeled or four wheel and two day are used for the dressage for four in hand also called a hunting break in europe.They would be use on an estate for running staff to town, the train hunting, birds shooting .they were high so the driver could see and could be driven at speed .
A US buggies being lighter would give the horse more speed and endurance to get the doctor .regards mal
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