1930 Budd Austin 7 Saloon

[Henry Harris]

From the Austin Seven Facebook page, posted by Bob Cunningham

   

'HEY BUDD: HERE'S AN UNSOLVED AUSTIN 7 MYSTERY
In my personal archive are four high quality, 8x10 vintage photos of an Austin Seven saloon dated May 2, 1930. The photos came directly from the dismantled archives of Budd Manufacturing, a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania coachbuilder with a colorful history filled with innovation and achievement. Since this body design does not appear in any of the many Austin Seven reference materials I've seen, I wonder if this might be an undocumented proposal rejected by Austin Motors in England. And, since it heralded from Pennsylvania in the USA -- the same state in which the American Austin Car Company was established just months earlier -- might it have been a rejected American Austin proposal? That firm began delivering its new cars in July 1930, two months after these photos were taken.
Budd’s Austin Seven shared styling characteristics found on more expensive cars. The fender beads wrapped around the front and rear lips where they merged and pointed back toward the center crowns. The belt line included deep, accentuating scallops below the side windows, and wrapped up the cowl in front of the windshield, nearly merging at the radiator cap. The bottom edges of the ventilation louvers in the hood followed the front fender contour, which was a treatment found on Duesenbergs of the era. Two-piece door windows opened on slider tracks, and rear side windows opened on B-pillar hinges to facilitate flow-through ventilation. A section of ribbed metal between the top of the radiator and the plated shell added visual interest. And the windshield raked rearward to reduce glare from oncoming headlights.
Each of these features, and more, differentiated the Budd Austin Seven from any other Austin Seven—and from the American Austin prototypes which had been introduced at auto shows but had not yet been delivered to distributors and dealers. 
I believe the Budd Austin Seven would have been more readily accepted as an American Austin than the actual American Austin, simply because it carried a family of four whereas the accepted American Austin carried only two passengers. 
But I have no idea whether Budd created the proposal for the European or the American market. If any of you Austin Seven experts can shed light on my mystery car, I would welcome your insights.'
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[Mike Costigan]

Fascinating!

In view of the fact that the car appears to be right-hand drive, I suspect this was probably a proposal for an all-steel body for the UK market rather than an option for the States. In 1925 William Morris had set up the Pressed Steel Co in the UK in a partnership deal with the Budd Corporation, so perhaps they were pitching for Austin's business too. Morris would probably have vetoed any deal with Pressed Steel, but Budd could still be free to deal direct with one of Morris' competitors.

[Tony Griffiths]

Henry - is the first time this picture has been shown? Your description of how this Austin mirrored contemporary American car styling is most interesting (though the sloping windscreen would have reduced the reflection from headlights behind - the standard Seven sometimes having a rear-window blind to do this - although the Budd appears to have one of those too). The radiator carries an ordinary Austin script and what might be standard UK-market headlights; could this indeed have been an attempt by the Austin Company to have a saloon styled for the American market - or even for the home, just as many car companies have brought in outside designers to freshen their range? One wonders if Austin ever contemplated a proper, all-welded, sheet-steel Budd body? https://www.hemmings.com/blog/article/edward-g-budd/ What elegant front wings - with the wide beaded edge echoing the pattern employed on UK Sevens from around mid-1930.

[Mike Costigan]

David Howe has pointed out that Budd also had a share in the Ambi-Budd company that were already supplying bodies for Dixi/BMW, so there was already a link with Austin, albeit somewhat remote. I think this was an attempt by the Philadelphia company to expand their sales, perhaps at the expense of any approaches from the Berlin company!.

[Mike Costigan]

Henry, I don't use Facebook; would you mind asking Bob if he is prepared to supply some high-res scans of the photos plus any comments he may have regarding the American style influences - I think there's scope for a Magazine article here.

[Bruce Nicholls]

Like the flap open back windows.

[Henry Harris]

I've always thought that the 1928 Ford Model A Tudor might have provided inspiration for the steel R L, M, N, P. 
Didn't Herbert Austin visit the Ford River Rouge plant in 1928?

This is a Budd prototype all steel Model A which is similar to the Austin Budd in detail. The Budd design claims to be all all steel, whereas the Ford Tudor and Austin 7 steel saloons used rudimentary wooden framework. 


  Screenshot 2020-03-21 at 15.33.26.png (Size: 1.04 MB / Downloads: 290)

and an interesting article,  https://www.hemmings.com/blog/article/th...d-model-a/

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Bob Cunningham has just posted again on Facebook...

   

MORE ABOUT BUDD AND THE MYSTERY AUSTIN 7
Herbert Austin hoped to enter into negotiations with a person or firm willing and able to manufacture and market the Seven under license in the United States and Canada. To that end, he displayed four of his Sevens at the 1929 New York Auto Show. At that time, no automobiles of less than one ton were built for sale in North America, and the public was enthralled by his well-built little cars. 
Within six months, the American Austin Car Company was established and a contingent of businessmen from Butler, Pennsylvania, had finalized a manufacturing agreement and royalty arrangements with Austin Motor Works. Since European styling was considered outdated and too conservative for American tastes, Austin solicited design concepts from American coachbuilding firms. Exactly how many firms submitted designs is unclear, but two finalists emerged: Amos Northup, of the Murray Body Company, and Russian Count Alexis de Sakhnoffsky, of the Hayes Body Company.
Both designers submitted concepts based on the two-passenger, wide-door Austin Seven Type B Coupe, with body lines adapted to American tastes. American Austin’s board of directors chose the de Sakhnoffsky proposal, which featured cars of somewhat fuller outlines when compared to Northup’s versions. Hayes was instructed to begin tooling up for production at its plant in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The first American Austin car body shells were delivered from Hayes to the Austin plant in Pennsylvania for final assembly and delivery in July 1930. In October, Mifflinburg Body Works, of Mifflinburg, Pennsylvania, also participated by supplying panel truck bodies.
To date, no record has emerged of Budd submitting American Austin design proposals, either on paper or as a rolling prototype. But that’s not to say it couldn’t have happened. Since 1912, Edward Gowan Budd’s specialty had been stamping all-steel automobile bodies at a time when others in the industry were still tacking metal skins to wooden skeletons. The firm’s enormous machines were capable of stamping the entire side of a full-size, four-door sedan from a single sheet of steel and Budd often built prototypes on pure speculation. He believed that clients were more apt to place sizeable orders if they could actually see and sit in finished concept cars.
As a result, creative, one-of-a-kind Budd bodies were routinely fashioned in an attempt to land contracts. Over the years, Budd had presented unrequested prototypes to Hupmobile, Chevrolet, Chrysler, Overland, Oakland, Plymouth, Dodge, Reo, Ford and other large manufacturers. A few of the projects produced orders, and Budd expanded his Philadelphia plant during the mid-1920s to accommodate the manufacture of the first mass-produced “monopiece” auto bodies, the Victory Six, for Dodge Brothers. By 1929, the firm was churning out thousands of Ford Model A panel truck bodies and pickup beds while crafting a few dozen elegant, low-slung Ruxton shells.
In Germany, Budd partnered with Arthur Müller to set up a steel pressing plant called Ambi Budd Presswerke, which stamped a small number of bodies for the Austin Seven chassis, although they carried a design that was different than the one pictured here, which was photographed on May 2, 1930.
The four images I have of this car have no accompanying text. So if anyone has additional information about this particular Budd-built Austin Seven, I would love to hear about it!

[Mike Costigan]

Ah! That makes sense: a proposal for the American Austin based on a Longbridge-built chassis would explain the differences to basic items like radiator shell, bonnet and wings. Had it been a speculative proposal for the UK market, I think they would have stuck to the Longbridge style which was used across the range (Twelve, Sixteen and Twenty all used the same style of wings). I wasn't aware of the speculative proposals for the American Austin, I though the design was all in-house.

[Mike Costigan]

Having thought about this for a couple of hours, I'm going to say this is a prototype for the British market, not for American Austin.

First of all, if these photos are dated May 2nd, then that is surely too late for an American Austin prototype, as production started on May 21st, and pre-production examples of coupe, roadster and delivery van had already been shown at the New York Auto Show in January.

And looking at the details, especially the second view, if this was intended for the American market it would surely have an American-style licence plate and left-hand rear light? The only puzzle as far as I am concerned is whether it was commissioned by the Austin Motor Co or was it a speculative effort on the part of the Budd Corporation - I favour the latter, especially as Bob suggests such an exercise was commonplace with Budd.

[JonE]

for info first RL produced for export 27 May 1930... so this presumably was before they had started thinking of the increase in floorpan.

Come to think of it, there was a document about that and USA on FB a while ago that no-one had commented on. I'll try and find it.

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This was posted by Martin Prior's brother and seems like it is quite important 
  Austin USA.jpg (Size: 86.88 KB / Downloads: 181) . I've photoshopped it but perhaps this and the Budd images could come together as one article, Mike...