(first posted 4/20/2013) Back in the Middle-Carstecone Epoch, cars were transported on trucks that were built by the the same company. Well, mostly. Obviously, AMC (and Packard earlier) didn’t build trucks. Richard Bennett forwarded me these, which seem to originate from hankstruckpictures.com. I’m not quite sure what to make of the sign on this one.
Studebaker had its car-hauling bases covered, though.
As did Ford.
And Chrysler.
Actually, Packard did build trucks until 1923, but after that they had to resort to the competition.
Uh-oh; these folks are cheating. At least, they could have used an International. Speaking of which, the AMC carriers I remember seemed to favor International.
This one’s not from hank’s. I’m not sure how common this Peugeot 404 car carrier arrangement was, but here it is.
Even VW took advantage of its own (limited) resources at the time.
Hank’s site is a cornucopia of vintage truck pictures, so don’t get lost there.
Nice!
Ive seen a cut down VW ute just like that one somebody must have copied that foto
Awesome pics, horrible website. Clicking on “truck pictures” just takes you to more ads. Better make a donation to CC before Paul gets any ideas.
It’s quite sad to notice 5 of the 8 makes, all American, ended up going BK in one form or another. PSA won’t be able to hang on much longer on its own.
Hanks is a non-profit site with partially supported by donations. The Banner Ads that are there are mostly hobby related and are just covering the hosting cost.
Click over to the forum area and you can find almost as my pics as on the main site broken down by category. No where else on the internet can you find 25 pages of Plows or 5 pages of airport fuel haulers from everywhere in N America.
God, I hope Paul doesn’t! TTAC has some kind of JavaScript hijacking spammy ads on their site that are taking me either to porn sites or to the apple AppStore to candy crunch saga app. Even with complaints to the editor, their systems people don’t seem able or willing to bring the spamjacking redirects under control….
No worries on that account!
Scho guert! Merci vielmals!
I don’t remember this but expect the sign is touting the safety of Buick automobiles. Cool find.
“The accident that you’re concerned about won’t happen!” I think that sign is to assure other motorists that the cars won’t fall off the truck! By the way, I like 1955 Buicks.
Today Freightliner and PACCAR products are the most common car-haulers. GM was out off the truck business by the late 80s and Ford sold their heavy truck business to Daimler in 1995.
GM was still sort of in it with Volvo-White-GMC trucks in the 90’s.
I hope that Studebaker has an engine larger than the 170ci flathead 6 that they used in most trucks.
Might have had the 245ci 6, 100 ponies just snorting to go.
I believe such size truck would have the V8. In Israel though Kaiser-Ilyn who assembled Studebakers under licence used Swedish Scania-Vabis trucks to transport new cars to dealers. Strange given the fact that Scania owned SAAB back then and that Kaiser-Ilyn was also assembling Renault Dauphines – a competitor of the SAABs of that time. No idea why the big Studebaker truck with the Detroit Diesel was not imported into the country, but I suspect it had something to do with the agreement between the administration at the time and Leyland Lorries which gave Leyland control of the heavy truck market in Israel for some time.
Okay the Chrysler pic is the one that has me drooling..
I am anxiously awaiting the delivery of my new ’56 Studebaker President Classic. It’s on the top of the carrier in the middle. It was specially ordered with all power options and air conditioning.
(Wishful thinking on my part – the 56 with a/c below is for illustration purposes only)
Mr. Bill
Hamlet, NC
Thanks for covering car carriers of years past. I’ve had an abnormal fascination for car carriers that goes back to when I was child. After all, trucks, cars, and trucks carrying cars, it doesn’t’ get any better than that.
BTW, I have spent countless hours on Hank’s.
Hanks is a great site. A friend introduced me to hank’s, but I introduced him to CC.
Once you learn how to navigate it’s fantastic.
Pretty neat, huh???
My aunt sent me these last night and I thought that Paul would be able to put these to good use.
International used to encourage dealers to do a “drive-a-way” instead of using commercial transporters. Somewhere in the Wisconson Historical Society’s archives there is a scan of the IH Trail magazine touting the largest “drive-a-way” to that point in history with probably a couple of acres of trucks rigged up in similar fashion to the set up below.
Seems that one of the Chrysler divisions did a big drive away when the forward models came out. Maybe desoto?
Probably a publicity event at Chrysler’s expense. IIRC, Lido did the same with the introduction of the Mustang – a big driveaway to get a large number on the road and to make it news.
Expecting your dealers to haul off their own orders? No wonder IH is out of consumer-use light trucks. Can you imagine the COST, for someone, say, out in Fruita, Colorado? Four days, four nights, for four drivers to haul eight IHs back. And, towing one with another? TOWING, with a BRAND NEW rig, not broken in? BIG-TIME no-no. And the customer will NOT be pleased; not when he has all the problems of an improper break-in.
(That makes me think, though. My father had a 1968 Wagoneer…bought “new.” I put that in quotes because when he picked it up the speedometer was disconnected. And…that car was an absolute lemon.
It came with a trailer hitch…we didn’t order it and the dealer made a big deal of throwing it in with the deal. Now…Kaiser-Jeep being in the same situation as IH, and Cleveland being only 120 miles from Toledo…I can see the dealer being made to do a driveaway. With customer-cars as mules.)
It was not 4 drivers to bring back 8 trucks it was 1 driver to bring back 4 or 5 trucks, and it wouldn’t have been 4 days to get those trucks from Ft Wayne to say Fruita CO, 2 days tops.
IH did not make the dealers do it, it was optional for the dealers to do to save themselves some money. I know a couple of IH guys who inherited the disease from their fathers that were dealers and tagged along on some of those drive-a-way trips and they claim it was their father’s choice. In some cases it was the customer’s choice as they wanted the vehicle as soon as possible and there was a “prototype” at the Truck Sales Processing Center that fit the bill so as soon as the deal was done he and Dad would hop on a plane and go pick it up. Other times they were waiting for the truck to come back from it’s test lap when it was a true special order truck.
As far as towing before it was broken in, these were trucks that were going to expected to earn their keep as soon as they were delivered. So towing those other trucks isn’t really different that what would have happened to them as soon as they the owners took possession. Personally I’ve installed rebuilt engines in lots of commercial vehicles and they never got a break-in period. Truck would come in on the hook on Fri or Mon and went back on line to be filled to max GVW and go back out on route come Wed or Thur morning. Mon and Fri were the most common days for a truck to loose an engine for what ever reason.
With big trucks it is still the norm today. I used to live in the same town as the Kenworth truck plant. It was common to see a truck make a ~2 mile loop after it left the line and then got piggybacked with another truck or two to head to the dealer or customer.
Four days. Fruita to Chicago…pick it up…and then back.
Even if they took the train it would be over one day to get to the factory holding lot. And Holiday Inns weren’t as common then.
They typically hopped on a plane to go pick up drive-a-ways, though some likely did ride the train instead. Bottom line was that the dealers or factory branches CHOSE to do it because it saved them money, or the case of single units, to get it to a customer quicker to keep them happy.
I gotta reply to this…yer’ bringin’ out my inner Anal-Retentive. Indulge me.
First, Fruita is mid-point between Denver and Salt Lake. So, even a drive to Denver-Stapleton would have been almost a full day…more before they completed the Eisenhower Tunnel, 1979.
Second, we forget – before 1980 or so, air travel was NOT CHEAP. A one-way to Chicago would have cost $500 or so – a significant cost on a $2500 pickup.
Third…if they were going down there with an auto-rack, as pictured in the article…it wasn’t a driveaway. It was dealer-supplied transport.
I said, four drivers for eight pickups…because one truck could of course tow another. But to take a flatbed or rack, and pile three or four on them…that’s just plain ol’ transport.
The term is ‘decking’ or ‘decked trucks.’
I used to work at Kenworth and have visited many truck assembly plants. They will use one tractor as the tow vehicle and ‘deck’ two more behind it, with an adaptor that connects to the 5th wheel below and the front axle above. Freightliner does exactly the same thing at their plant in NC.
“The term is ‘decking’ or ‘decked trucks.’ “
Once, when I was a teen and feeling evil…I either said, or had a thought to say: So THAT’S how new trucks come to be!!
Doing the nasty, right there on the road.
Seriously…I was referring to smaller trucks; IH’s pickups and Travelalls.
Wow!
I’ve seen pictures of even crazier set ups, that was just one I knew where to find relatively quickly.
How did they load and unload that truck without resorting to a crane? Or did they?
Even Alfa Romeo made it’s own car hauler. The one pictured is a Mille.
The second one on top is a Giulietta Sprint Speciale ! Una bella machina !
Great pictures. I love old car haulers too. I remember seeing a cool book on 1940s-1990s car haulers at a Brentano’s. I thought it was a great book but for some reason didn’t buy it. Now I’m probably going to have to see if I can find a copy online. Thanks a lot
BTW I like the Studebakers the best–even though there aren’t any Starliners!
Just got to thinking about my late father and his (also) late cousin, Warren Reese, who was the owner of a Dodge franchise in Colorado (Laramie, IIRC).
In the late 40’s, as he was going thru B-school on the GI-bill, dad had two interesting summer jobs, the later one was polishing the front fender of every Hudson to roll down the line for IIRC two summers, the first one was where he (because he had been “Deuce-and-a-quarter rated” in the Army – hard to imagine as my dad was a lousy driver) somehow got a gig to deliver a load of Dodge Trucks out to cousin Warren’s shop.
Apparently the truck he drove was destined for a customer, and had like two or three additional trucks somehow attached to it; I don’t think there was a trailer, but the trucks were possibly stacked, or leaned upon each other.
This was in the days before the Interstate Hwy system, and my grandmother related that she was concerned about how such a load would perform as he went thru the mountains (dad survived the trip and lived a good solid life, so I guess the trip went ok!)
The other relation to car hauling was the late husband of my mother’s late aunt Florence. Uncle “Slim” (because he was like 6’7″ and thin as a rail, and to me looked like Burt Mustin), officially Reuben Steinaway (sweetest, salt of the earth guy one could ever know), was a driver for the late E+L firm, which IIRC was Ford’s primary hauler. The company had a great logo, looked like the NATO symbol with E+L super-imposed over it.
The last connection to car hauling is one of my schoolmates, the AFAIK Not late Jim Bell, was the grand-son of the owners of the Nu-Car Haul-Away Co, Inthink Chrysler was their primary customer. There must have been decen money in that business, as he got, in 11th grade (IIRC), his grandmother’s then 6 y/o triple-black ’73 Mk-IV.
I do recall reading ca. 15 years ago and verified by checking in auto news, that there were a bunch of mergers amongst auto haulers, and E+L and Nu-Car merged, along with several others, including part of the Penske Group, to form Performance Transport. This firm later went belly-up, after several gyrations thru the bankruptcy court, and ownership by private equity.
http://www.autonews.com/article/20080617/ZZZ_SPECIAL/610494357#axzz2R7n4EpMn
The link above is the fall and end of these companies, as well as some others.
Below is a short history of the beginning and rise of these companies:
http://www.coachbuilt.com/bui/p/pts/pts.htm
I had a late uncle that drove transports for Kaiser-Willys back in the days. Did I also tell you my paternal Grandmother also worked for Willys. My fathers families roots lay in the Toledo area if you couldn’t tell. Anyway a story my father liked to tell was the one summer he hitched a ride with his brother and took his first trip to the great southwest of this country. Now uncle Jerry had this down to a science. At the time most of the trucks he transported had folding windshields so he always parked those on the top rails. You see he had a lot of shortcuts and most of them had some type of overpass that was just a tad bit to low for the average truck to pass under safely. Well on this particular trip it started to rain so on one fuel stop my dad put the tops up so the seats wouldn’t get wet or something to that effect. Yes you can see where this story is going. After hearing this story a few times and not wanting to insult my dad I always told him he was just keeping the family business in business. Yep. Grandmas job was to sew folding tops and dads job was to rip them off.
Working for GM dealers the better part of my life I can attest that as far as GM went or should I say as the carriers went that they tried to stay marque compliant for as long as they could. Most if not all of the cars and trucks I see today are transported by International. I was an OTR driver for a few years and that brand had the reputation of offering the lowest cab roof height available. For GM the equavalent would be todays Volvo. Maybe Mack since they are owned by Volvo. I always wanted to try my hand at transports. Not delivering the class 7 and 8 trucks but regular cars and trucks. At least I wouldn’t be stuck waiting around for a load out of town like when I was running dry vans. Unload your stuff and dead head it back to the lot.
Here’s a pic I saw posted last week on one of my favorite sites. This is from Lordstown, I think? I’m guessing 74 from the Vega taillamps and Chevelle. I dont recall when they stopped making Kingswoods and vans on that line but that Chevelle looks out of place if it is Lordstown. Looking at that pic I’m going to guess that the driver in the first truck got a ticket from the DOT for not having a tire on its front screw(thats trucker talk for axle). These trucks are 8000-8500 series Chevy Bruins and GMC Brigadiers.
I did a little more research and the pic I posted may have been Southgate assembly in LosAngeles. For a brief period around 1975 they were kicking out A-B-Bodies and the H-Body,all at the same time. I can’t explain the G-Van in this pic. I didn’t know that the H-Body was built anywhere other than Canada and Lordstown. Part of the reason for the UAW strike in 72 was the ramped up assembly line at Lordstown. They were kicking out over 120 cars per hour on that line. I have no figures for Southgate but I’m assuming the GM average of around 45-50 CPH. Now my Cosworths were built at Lordstown and there are some things I can see where they took a shortcut or two on but I’m kind of wondering what the build quality was for the Southgate cars. It might blow a hole(a very small hole IMO) of the DS status of the Vega if one was to base that theory on build quality alone.
Looks like an old bank head tractor trailer
Here is the Rootes Group effort – a Commer truck with the TS3 ‘Knocker’ engine (supercharged diesel 3 cylinder, 6 opposed-piston) with a triple-deck trailer carrying 8 Hillman Imps.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/brimen/5053865265/
Time for a 1/64 M2 hauler!
I picked up one of those, but a model with a trailer design very similar to the top few pictures here. Comes with the two orange mustangs in the picture (which were a little disappointing in detailing/scale IMO) but not the blue and green ones up top (Greenlight and Auto World, respectively).
Sad -looking Studebakers (were they the stripped Scotsman models I wonder) and fat Packards from 1948-50. The trucks were more interesting than the cars!
Scotsman models were stripped of everything. No chrome except bumpers. The ones on the top of the carrier must be Commanders or Presidents or whatever the upper models were alled at that point. They were all sad anyway because they were superficially facelifted 1953 cars which were behind the competition at that point in many ways, including being narrower and having cheesy dashboards and tackier interiors etc.
“The accident you’re concerned about won’t happen….”
No, it’s the accident you’re *not* worried about that’ll get you. Soon, maybe; possibly around the next curve. No need to worry, though. Probably. This soothing message brought to you by the Car Haulers of America. Look out!
Around that time Buick had a reputation for poor brakes. This sign was probably to try and counteract that.
The top picture with the two Buick’s is the best picture I have ever seen that marks the visual difference between the 3 porthole’s 122″wb and the 4 porthole’s 127″wb. Both cars are the same height but the 127″wb makes it not only look longer but makes it look lower and sleeker. The other one has a more upright look.
Indeed. Looks like the one on the left is a Special while the one on the right is a Super.
In southern California, the two I used to see that I liked were the P.M.T. GMC tilt cabs that hauled most of the G.M. cars and the Convoy Co. Dodges that hauled Chrysler product, along with some foreign cars.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4035/4398934789_f6b508c7cc_b.jpg
https://farm8.static.flickr.com/7591/16932701635_a9041e4a3d_b.jpg
I had a car carrying delivery truck toy as a kid – I can still remember rolling those corgi toys on and off the trailer.
Even today, when I see a car carrier, I check out the make of the truck to see if it is the same as the cars. I see International a lot for the Chrysler cars coming out of Brampton.
Great pix!
I don’t know Loco, but I think that special is a real cutie Pretty fast too if you
were smart enough to get it with a stick instead of the doggy dynaflow!
Here is an early Matchbox version, not mine, I actually have the truck but don’t have the older cars to suit it , yet…
A couple of each 22b Vauxhall Cresta and 45a Vauxhall Victor would be the perfect matching load for the Bedford S car transporter.
http://www.vintagebritishdiecasts.co.uk/1index/gg22b.htm
http://www.vintagebritishdiecasts.co.uk/1index/gg45a.htm
(I see you’ve already got one Victor)
Then.
Now.
My mother’s aunt’s husband, Reuben, a quiet salt of the earth ex-farmboy, who we knew as “Uncle Slim” (because he was tall and, well, slim do everybody called him “slim”), was a career-long driver for E&L Transport. The job afforded him and Aunt Florence , kids Julie and Bill, a nice home in Dearborn.
E&L was IIRC, a mostly, and possibly largest, Ford Carrier (as a kid plying the highways of Detroit, in the back seat, I don’t recall ever seeing Ford MC products on anything but E&L trucks (which, BTW I think were exclusively Ford trucks.)
LoL I just looked at the 2013 and realized that I already wrote substantially the same thing about E&L, in long form, back then.
I wonder how many trucks not only matched the makers of the cars but also the makers of the farm tractors being hauled…
International-Harvester, Volvo, Renault, Fiat, Mercedes-Benz and Ford come to mind.
International hauling Deere? The horror! The horror!
By the way, those Packards do really look like overturned bathtubs from that angle. How unfortunate.
Coddington would not like the cut, of those Packards jibs….
A friend was hauling new cars for Ford back in the late 70’s. He said that he could get 13 Fiestas on his rig at one time. The same rig would only fit 6 Lincoln Continentals.
That’s interesting. But I’ll bet the 6 Lincolns generated more profit than all 13 Fiestas put together!
Back in the ’60s Hadley Auto Transport (IIRC) was the local hauler for Ford, using F-series Super Duty tractors. I remember reading in some professional magazine that the car haulers were mostly gasoline powered until some time in the ’70s.
Probably until Ford quit making the Super Duty V-8. Many of those blue and white Hadley Fords ended up with the studios after Hadley was through with them.
I had one of these as a kid complete with three plastic Falcon cars that fitted on it Buddy L I think was the brand
Saw those in the toy catalogs, but never had anything that nice.
Speaking of VW car haulers, here’s a nice one uniting generations and eras.
Very nice ! The picture also shows an advantage of a FWD light commercial vehicle: you can build pretty much any body or cargo bed behind the cab.
Here’s a RWD Ford tractor unit, with dual rear wheels, hauling two modern Ford panel vans.
A couple of interesting photos on eBay right now. This one struck me ’cause it seemed unusual to see the wheel covers *on* the cars:
1954 Olds’s—do they all seem to have the same two-tone combination?
Chevy, 1960:
Said to be the very first Shelby Mustang shipment out of the factory. I sure wouldn’t mind if it pulled up to my house tomorrow:
That C-series hauler is interesting in that it has some kind of roof scoop and the rear small side windows are covered by something. Maybe someone out there will know.
That’s an a/c unit on the roof. And that’s an aftermarket sleeper on the back.
One more “Cobra” truck (race car hauler, apparently):
How would you like to get stuck behind that VW car hauler on a hilly, curvy, two-lane road?
I haven’t read through all the comments, so please excuse me if this has been noted, but some of the car-hauling trailers are works of art-deco beauty.
Anybody heard of a Trucking firm called Mid Manitoba Auto Roll from the early fifties that worked between Windsor, Neepawa and Yorkton. Had a fleet of red and black Mercury COE trucks.