1952 Chevrolet 3100 1/2-Ton Truck

The 1952 model year was the sixth of Chevrolet's all-new postwar "Advance Design" trucks. The 3100-series, on a 116" wheelbase, was the light-duty variant, rated for a half-ton payload. It could be had as a pickup truck, a sedan delivery, a bare chassis cab, or as the now-famous Carryall Suburban proto-SUV.

The interior was spartan and the floor of the load bed still consisted of wooden boards. The standard transmission was a column-shifted "three-on-the-tree" Synchro-Mesh gearbox, with an optional four-on-the-floor.

Under the hood could be found a Thriftmaster OHV inline six, the latest version of Chevy's prewar "Stovebolt" motor. Displacing 216 cubic inches, it had a single-barrel carburetor, a 6.6:1 compression ratio, and was rated at 92 SAE gross horsepower.

Although crude, if not downright agricultural, by modern standards, these were considered pretty plush and advanced for a truck in their time. This Forester Green example could have been ordered with luxuries like a radio, forced air ventilation, a cigarette lighter, and even a windshield washer operated by a foot pump.

This one was photographed in March of 2024 using a Canon EOS-1D Mark III and an EF 24-105mm f/4L IS zoom lens.

1952 Bentley Mark VI

Launched in 1946, the Bentley Mark VI standard steel sports saloon represented a number of firsts for the company, as their first postwar luxury car, their first car with all-steel coachwork, and the first Bentley assembled entirely, from the bottom of the tires to the top of the roof, at the Rolls-Royce plant in Crewe.

 

Riding on a 120" wheelbase and weighing a bit over two tons, the Mark VI was initially powered by a 4.3L "F-head" engine, in which the intake valve was in the cylinder head, but the exhaust exited a sidevalve in the block.

In 1951 this motor was bored out to give a displacement of 4.5L. With a 6.4:1 compression ratio, a brace of SU carburetors, and dual exhausts, it put out... well, the manufacturer famously never reported horsepower as anything but "adequate".

A contemporary road test in The Autocar of a 4.5L car comparable to the 1952 model seen in the photos returned a zero-to-sixty acceleration of 15.2 seconds and a top speed of 100 miles per hour.

   

This one was photographed with a Panasonic GM1 and an M. Zuiko Digital 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 zoom lens in July of 2019.

1952 Plymouth Cranbrook

Plymouth's initial postwar lineup consisted of the Deluxe, available in short or long wheelbases, topped by the long wheelbase Special Deluxe. For the 1951 model year, refreshed sheet metal and refreshed naming heralded what ad copy called "The New Plymouth".

The short wheelbase Deluxe was replaced with the entry-level Concord while its long wheelbase brother morphed into the Champion. The top of the Plymouth hierarchy was now occupied by the Cranbrook.

While other automakers were starting into their "longer, lower, wider" years, Mopar styling in the early Fifties was still resolutely upright, with tall greenhouses, largely due to the insistence of Chrysler's then chairman, K.T. Keller, that a gentleman should be able to operate a motor vehicle while wearing his hat.

K.T. Keller had a lot to do with the design of Chrysler's vehicles from the time he became president in 1935 until he retired from the presidency in 1950. Whenever mock-ups of new cars were displayed Keller would show up with a hat and two dairy containers in tow. As well, Keller was not a thin man, although not as hefty as George Mason at Nash. Keller would climb into the front seat of each car wearing his hat and jounce around. The stylists would be standing at the sides, watching Keller's hat. For if his hat hit the ceiling, the car's roof line would have to be raised. And he would do the same in the rear. Once that was done, he would open the trunk and put his dairy tanks in and close the lid. If the lid closed, the stylists breathed a sigh of relief. If not, work would begin to raise the trunk line. And now you know why Chrysler's trunks and rooflines were so high through 1954. The 1955 models were the first since the 1937 models not done under Keller.

The '51 and '52 Cranbrooks were powered by Chrysler's 218 cubic inch flathead straight-six, the basic architecture of which dated back to 1924. Installed in the 1952 Cranbrooks, like the Lido Green sedan in the photos, it was rated at 97 SAE gross horsepower, and backed with a column-shifted three-speed manual transmission.

This one was photographed with a Fujifilm X-T2 and an XF 16-80mm f/4 R WR OIS zoom lens in April of 2022.

1952 Packard 200 Deluxe

The 1951 model year saw Packard introduce an all-new "junior" model to complement the "senior" 300 and 400 model lines. Less expensive than the longer and more luxurious senior Packards, the new Packard 200 rode on a shorter 122-inch wheelbase.

Just to let you know that you weren't getting the full luxury experience of a senior Packard, in addition to the shorter wheelbase, you had smaller vertical taillights and no graceful swan hood ornament. You could, however, order all sorts of luxury options on your 200, like carpeting, a heater, a radio, and tinted window glass.

In 1952, Packard added a Deluxe model to the 200 sedan lineup. The one above is a 1952 Packard 200 Deluxe Touring Sedan in Argentine Gray. While it got the extra chrome teeth in the grille and the chrome jet intake doodads on the side that aped the more luxurious senior Packards, the small non-wraparound rear window still let you know you were sitting in the Packard Motor Car Company's cheap seats, almost like a plebeian forced to drive an Oldsmobile or something.

The base 200 Deluxe Touring Sedan started at $2,675 in '52, a bit over $31k in today's dollars, several hundred more than the Olds 88, and going wild with the options list could add up fast. Under the hood was the Thunderbolt flathead straight-eight engine, displacing 288 cubic inches and rated at 135 SAE gross horsepower. For another $45 a buyer could opt for the 327 cubic inch version of the Thunderbolt, which bumped output to 150 horsepower. Coughing up another $189 could get you the Ultramatic transmission, the one that came standard on the Patrician 400.

The 200 only lasted for two model years, 1951-52, before Packard shuffled model designations again and the revived Clipper nameplate was used for the cheaper cars... "cheaper", of course, being relative. Packard meant cheaper like Oldsmobile, not like the Pontiacs and Dodges driven by the rabble across the tracks.

These photos were taken probably a decade or so ago... 2014? 2016? I was standing in the parking lot of a Kroger that is long closed now and I have no idea what the photos were taken with. Just looking at them I'd guess either my first or second smartphones, an LG Optimus V or a Samsung Galaxy SII.