Also good to use for jacking up the car to change the brakes or lube up the chassis. It would be good for changing the tires too, if it didn’t use the spare tire itself as a jack.
People have enough trouble backing now. Imagine the things you could slam those rear quarters into when you misjudge the arc of your radius. Also, is there a brake on that spare? If not, I could see things going bad very quickly in tight quarters.
Plus I doubt most people would have the patience to wait for the spare tire to engage with the drivetrain. You’ll notice that duration was abbreviated from the film clip. Let alone issues with rust/road debris, and the drive wheel seizing up, as this device wouldn’t be engaged very often by drivers. Let alone attempting to remove the spare if you needed to put it to use.
A wonderful example of the good ol’ American ingenuity that we were known for during most of the 20th century. Reminds me of a 1950s version of “Shark Tank” (that’s “Dragons’ Den” to our friends outside of the U.S.).
Imagine what the contents of the trunk would look like after driving this car in a rainstorm, or down a gravel or dirt road…obviously not as big of a deal in SoCal.
It also serves as a humble reminder that, while I haven’t had a driving accident in years, I manage to have a minor “parking incident” every few years or so while pulling into my narrow garage, or navigating up and down a driveway lined by a native stone wall.
I would have done this a bit differently. One or two smaller wheels, on scissors jacks, driven by a 12V motor. I can’t even imagine just what kind of Rube Goldberg device was in that trunk, to make the “spare” be driven from the rear axle?!
It was easier to teach drivers to park properly than fit these Rube Goldberg devices back in the day now not so much its easier to teach the cars I can park a 70ft truck/trailer at the curb reverse park it maybe not the self steering rear axle makes that kinda hard
Nice parking job. I’ve driven trucks before myself and know how hard they can be in tight spaces. Personally I always had the most trouble when backing up with a trailer.
If I were to take as guess as to how this were setup, the inventor probably stuck a four wheel drive transfer case between the driveshaft and pinion flange and ran a shorter driveshaft from it directly to the “spare”. I could envision a cable actuated brake drum as well. Use first gear or Drive to swing the back out of the space, and use reverse to swing the back into the space.
What fun! Imagine you’re back in high school …. how would you use this wonderful feature?
“Son, you wanna tell me why the spare tire is bald?”
My father’s first car was a 1953 Cadillac! I don’t think it had this feature though… 🙂
Great for making u-turns on narrow roads!
Also good to use for jacking up the car to change the brakes or lube up the chassis. It would be good for changing the tires too, if it didn’t use the spare tire itself as a jack.
People have enough trouble backing now. Imagine the things you could slam those rear quarters into when you misjudge the arc of your radius. Also, is there a brake on that spare? If not, I could see things going bad very quickly in tight quarters.
Plus I doubt most people would have the patience to wait for the spare tire to engage with the drivetrain. You’ll notice that duration was abbreviated from the film clip. Let alone issues with rust/road debris, and the drive wheel seizing up, as this device wouldn’t be engaged very often by drivers. Let alone attempting to remove the spare if you needed to put it to use.
My mother would have liked this. She never would drive my dad’s Cadillacs, too hard to park
A wonderful example of the good ol’ American ingenuity that we were known for during most of the 20th century. Reminds me of a 1950s version of “Shark Tank” (that’s “Dragons’ Den” to our friends outside of the U.S.).
Imagine what the contents of the trunk would look like after driving this car in a rainstorm, or down a gravel or dirt road…obviously not as big of a deal in SoCal.
It also serves as a humble reminder that, while I haven’t had a driving accident in years, I manage to have a minor “parking incident” every few years or so while pulling into my narrow garage, or navigating up and down a driveway lined by a native stone wall.
I would have done this a bit differently. One or two smaller wheels, on scissors jacks, driven by a 12V motor. I can’t even imagine just what kind of Rube Goldberg device was in that trunk, to make the “spare” be driven from the rear axle?!
It was easier to teach drivers to park properly than fit these Rube Goldberg devices back in the day now not so much its easier to teach the cars I can park a 70ft truck/trailer at the curb reverse park it maybe not the self steering rear axle makes that kinda hard
Nice parking job. I’ve driven trucks before myself and know how hard they can be in tight spaces. Personally I always had the most trouble when backing up with a trailer.
If I were to take as guess as to how this were setup, the inventor probably stuck a four wheel drive transfer case between the driveshaft and pinion flange and ran a shorter driveshaft from it directly to the “spare”. I could envision a cable actuated brake drum as well. Use first gear or Drive to swing the back out of the space, and use reverse to swing the back into the space.
Should be fun to do doughnuts with 🙂