Nothing could have saved Studebaker because of the mind set of the upper management at the time. I lived through this era and so I realize that there was a lot of prejudice against new ideas like ball joints instead of A arm bushings and king pins.

All of there "New" cars were built on the old stuff and they never up graded. Take the fins off a Silver or Golden Hawk in the 60's and you have a 53 Commander, with all all the duplication of parts and added weight. Ditto the deck lid. The hood was new, but thats all. Never went to a decent cylinder head, always used a common port for the center cylinders, so even with blowers and such couldn't get good exhaust flow.

Studebaker had MANY good ideas, but I feel like sticking to old less efficient manufacturing methods killed them. My parents car had a "Hill Holder", no one else thought of that. I recently heard of one of the Jap cars having a "new" feature like anti creep. My 55' President had that. -- JHF

I doubt that anything could have saved the old Stud-busters by the '60's. The Avanti was an interesting stop-gap, but the Conestoga-wagon mentality of the company pretty much doomed them. But, hey, the Conestoga wagons they built a century before were excellent!

Hi Enviroman. As I said in my other post, I agree with you completely. Now days they talk like 30 MPG is really something in a small car. My parents had a '47 Champion Starlite coupe that got 33 MPG and even though I was only 5 years old, that car was big!

You mentioned the Avanti, unfortunately it was on that 40's platform with that obsolete engine. -- JHF

Yep, they went the way of all buggy-whip manufacturers. I used to have friends in Studebaker car clubs, and they all bragged about 30+mpg from their old flivvers. Remember the, I think '50 or '52 Stude, with the round nose and trunk? Looked like a jet plane, ran like a lumber wagon!

And it's a good thing they had red lights on one end and white on the other or you couldn't tell the front from the back! -- JHF

AMEN! (1951 white light end)

What year was the Studebaker Lark brought out?

I believe it was introduced in 1959. It was actually highly successful, and nearly saved the company, but a few years later they were in financial trouble again.

The Lark, too, was just new fenders on the old center section on that obsolete platform. In my other post I said 40's platform, I think the suspension actually goes back before the war. The frame was strong and rigid with that heavy "X" in it, but, again, Detroit was finding that all that weight and expense of construction was not necessary. By the time the lark came out Chrysler was using the now standard uni-body type construction.

It also used the old engine with those early 50's heads. -- JHF

Yeah, innovation just wasn't their strong suit. Funny how that worked, considering the early history of success due to product improvement (covered wagon style). I'd always heard the Studebaker brothers were quite avant garde in their time. To end up with the Avanti, well, that was another story...