[AMC-List] Re; '61 Original original "retail price label"

["John Elle" <johnelle@xxxxxxxxx>]

Looking at the following
 
Snip
Who wants to see an original "retail price label"  for a '61 Wagon?
 
See it here:     <http://www.indianachevelles.com/pellwagon.html>
http://www.indianachevelles.com/pellwagon.html   (scroll
to the bottom).
Snip
 
Reminds me of some of the automotive infrastructure of the time as the
industry as it existed then as it experimented with aluminum engines and
parts such as cylinder heads etc. and for the most part proved to be a
short term failure. Not so much as the technology or design was bad but
the engines were prone to over heating problems after a bit of time and
related types of failures including blown head gaskets etc. 
 
The retail price label makes a point of adding "anti-freeze" to the
option list. Think about that one for a minute. This is something that
you would expect to see in your cooling system today. However in 1961 is
was quite common to just run straight water if you did not live in an
environment that did not include winter freezing weather. In fact in an
area of the south that I lived in at that time during the summer months
anti-freeze was not available in the auto parts stores at all.  At that
time I owned a French car with an aluminum cylinder head that I blew the
water pump gasket out of racing a Jaguar. Upon getting the car back home
and making the repair I was unable to purchase anti-freeze to refill the
radiator so reverting to common practice of the area I just used water.
Why not? Everyone else did. "sides I had never heard of electrolysis
before and I knew when I got back north I could get a gallon of
Prestone. 
 
However about 6 months later I started having overheating problems as
the interaction between the aluminum head and the cast iron block caused
the radiator to plug up causing the overheating problems. 
 
Of course now it was winter weather time and after boiling out the
radiator I was able to purchase a gallon of Anti-Freeze at a Christmas
Sale or something of that nature.
 
No wonder aluminum engines or heads got bad press. 
 
Of course the other thing to do is to compare the retail price list to
what is on car windows now as we read the saga of how much smog
equipment is installed as "Standard" equipment, as if I really cared or
how it is equipped with things such as steering wheels, seats and tires
and other basically essential items we have taken for granted that
"must" be present on a car in order to consider buying it. 
 
My! How the automotive world has changed, both for what is offered and
our expectations of what we get. 
 
Some good, some bad and an awful lot just ridiculous. 
John. 
 
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