1954 Hudson Hornet Special

Browniepetersen

So what is fact and what is fiction with these cars? I have read what is in Butler's book but what I am wondering; is there any numbers on production? I know there were three models; but, is there any breakdown of production of the various models. I also understand that they came about after AM bought Hudson and they have an AMC tag on them? Where would that tag/id be? The buyout was effective 1 May, so does that mean that the Special production was from May to September? Any thoughts....

lostmind

Don't know the answers. I had a brougham that I parted out . Seemed like it was half Wasp and half Hornet. It was way to rusty to save , folded at the roof on the way to the wrecking yard.
It had a hydro instead of Borg Warner, so I guess it was at the end of production.

StillOutThere

I never saw an AMC tag on my coupe. It was my understanding that there was an abundance of Wasp exterior and interior trim on hand but they had been selling Hornets quite well so the combination of trims with the Hornet long wheelbase gave them a lower price point to promote to move all the remaining inventory out the door. Out of that the world got the one year only Hornet club sedan using the brougham two door sedan body shell which wasn't selling well either and needed to go. It made for a GREAT looking car as Steve Blake's survivor example attests.

Glowplug

Having parted out 4 Hornet Specials I am with Wayne, I have never found an AMC tag on any of the cars I have owned or examined either.

53jetman

AMC tags were only used on cars built (or assembled) in Kenosha.

464Saloon

I have a 54 Hornet Special two door sedan. It has a Hudson tag in the door jamb nothing AMC, An interesting note though. When trying to figure out what the original color was under the cheap red that was on it, I could not match the firewall, door jambs with anything Hudson offered in their books, With the help of Lance Walker (aka Hudzilla) he had me look into 55 Nash color offerings and wallah! there it was 1955 Nash Coral Red. My car was built in September 54. Lances take was they were running out of everything Hudson so to finish the cars they started using the Nash paint colors.

oldhudsons

the most unusual one I ever saw was a green HS brougham with green factory leather interior & B/W tranny! It was a very nice original car which I stored for my friend for a while. He later sold it, have no idea where it is now ~

Aaron D. IL

Hornet Specials should have serial number that start with 6D if I remember right. The vent windows on them had latches instead of the roll-out kind and no armrest in the middle of the back seat. Story goes they were a way for Hudson to use up the inventory they had on hand. I heard rumors the race car drivers favored them because they wanted to be able to buy a stripped-down Hornet anyway.
I also heard the '54 Hudson Hornet Special Club Sedan (aka Brougham) conception was tied to the fate of the '54 Wasp Club Sedan. I owned one of those case at one time it was green with a matching interior. A HET club member supposedly had a factory document that stated Hudson would stop '54 Wasp Club sedan bodies at a production of 30 cars. All 30 cars were Spring Green with matching green interiors. (probably to use up paint and upholstery supplies) The remaining Club Sedan body production was to be made into to Hornet Specials because Wasps were not selling. I've only heard about 5 Wasp Club Sedans in existence. I've only actually seen 3 with my own eyes. Now is this accurate fact Brownie? I really don't know. I wish I could've been hanging out around the factory in 1954. It was probably a very depressing time to be there though.

RL Chilton

Aaron-

Are you counting Ken Cates' '54 Wasp Club Sedan?

53jetman

Ken Cates car is a "Super Wasp" - had more outside trim and a more deluse interior. Most of the dealers were pleased with the fact that Hudson decided to make the Club Sedan available in the Hornet Special, as most sherif depts and State Highway Police used two doors. I know for a fact that the Ohio State Highway Patrol purchased a significant number of Hornet Special Club Sedans to patrol the Ohio Turnpike as well as the other four lane divided highways that were being built during that period. We had several of the SHP cars to service during this period.

Jerry

RL Chilton

Jerry-
I thought all '54's Wasps were "Super Wasps"? Is that not correct? Didn't all Wasps become Super Wasps starting in '53?

Geoff

My understanding is that the Wasp designation was the replacement for the Pacemaker, and had 232 motor. Super Wasp had 262 motor. Real abberation was in the Hash version, which had the 202 Jet motor.

ArkieJazz

Hornet Specials did NOT have any AMC badging and they were not painted any Nash colors. The Hornet Specials were built in Detroit, not Kenosha. It would have made no sense at all to send paint from Wisconsin to Michigan. Interior fabric for the Special was the same as Super Wasp. Some Hornet Specials had carpet while others had rubber mats. Outside trim was the same dimension as the Super Wasp. Hornet Specials lacked the "halo" stainless around the roof and were also sold without the 4 pieces of stainless trim found above the rear bumper on the 7D Hornets. This trim could be added on order or by the dealer. The steering column on the 6D was painted, while the 7D was chrome. No Hollywoods and no convertibles were offered in the 6D line up. As Pete mentioned, there apparently a few of these cars sold with factory leather interiors. I personally saw a solid green gold 6D Special Club Sedan with green factory leather interior. If I live long enough, I plan to put leather in my Club Sedan. My car is equipped with overdrive, radio, heater, and windshield washers. I will add twin h at some point. For now, it's my daily driver (in good weather).

Aaron D. IL

Yep Geoff is right. Wasp (232) Super Wasp (262) two different model lines. All the '54 Engines got a slight horsepower boost. A consolation prize for not having a V8 I guess.

-- Russell - Ken Cates is the one who told me about the factory document regarding Wasp Club Sedans.

Glowplug

Thought I would add some information to the thread so that those reading have some pictorial references.

RL,Hudson designated two Wasp models in 1954. The Wasp (4D) and the Super Wasp (5D). The Wasp was available in 2dr Club Sedan, 2dr Coupe and 4dr Sedan. The Super Wasp was available in the same models as the Wasp, plus Hollywood and Convertible.

The leather interior pictures are of the factory interior of the Yellow Hornet Special Club Sedan. Several years ago, this car was Rat Rodded and the top chopped.

Blue car- Super Wasp Club Sedan previously owned by Glen Johnson now by Steve Traut.

Black and White Wasp previously owned by Steve Blake, Ron Fellows and now Ken Cates

54Hollywood

Aaron-

To add to your comments, my father's second ever new car was a '54 Wasp Club Sedan purchased new on 11/2/54 from the "Hudson - Lindell at Grand, Inc." dealership located at 3540 Lindell Blvd. in St. Louis. Serial # 4D-305837. He traded in his '53 Super Jet sedan for it. The car was Pasture Green (dark green) with a green interior. Plain Jane, 3-on-the-tree, no radio, just heater and undercoat. I grew up with this car and still have all the sales paperwork. Sure wish I knew if it still existed.

Tim in WI.

RL Chilton

Oldfarmer and Arkiejazz-

Thanks so much for the info. Most informative. I'd like to add that the black and white one was also formerly owned by Ken (the first time around), about 35 years ago or so. It is currently being restored.

54SuperWasp

My 54 Super Wasp sedan has the 262c.i. Twin-H and my 53 Super Wasp sedan had the 308 single carb. At first, I thought the 53 had a replacement engine until I checked the serial number and it matched the body number. So, could it be that a Super Wasp was available with a 308 as an option? Michel

Frankvintagefullflowcom

My guess: New dealer installed engine with s/n stamped at time of installation, possibly when new.
I have a '51 Super six with a number matching narrow block 262, presumably for the same reason.
Frank

54SuperWasp

@Frank,
Thanks, Michel

super-six

A 262 engine is factory standard equipment in a 1951 Super 6, but it shouldn't have been a narrow block. Strange transplant.

464Saloon

Arkie Jazz, your correct on all of your details as that is how my car is. I would out of common sense agree with you on the paint but it is what it is. I went around in circles on Auto Color Library.com trying to match what was under that red repaint amongst other sites. As soon as Lance suggested 55 Nash I went to that and there it was. Coral Red matched my firewall and trunk which were still original perfectly. My interior was poorly redone somewhere along its time but the dash was original and green. Has the 3 spd with OD. I found the car on this site back in 06. The owner claimed it had 66,000 original miles and that he purchased it from the original owner in Seattle who was a Hudson dealer. Unfortunately my lack of knowledge at the time has burned me bad. The red paint and the interior pictures had I known at the time would have set off warnings that this was not an original 66,000 mile car owned by a former Hudson dealer. The car being in Minneapolis at the time I was not able to get to the car to see and it was sold to a guy in Nebraska. Six months or so later I got in contact with him and he made the car sound good and was willing to sell it. Very long story short I purchased the car and had it transported to California. The car was a mess. It broke down constantly even to Hudson club get meets. The worst being the motor coming back from Arizona. Most of the mechanicals have been gone through now and the last two years have been spent stripping and repainting the car. Quite a bit of rust and a couple of poor repairs from accidents were found. Ohh if this car could talk and tell me its real history. Hopefully sometime this coming year it will be back on the road completely restored.

54SuperWasp

@464Saloon, this reminds me of one of my father in law's story. Back in the sixties, he purchased a Plymouth from a dealer who said it came from a bishop of a nearby parish.
The car had very low miles on it. One day, he was at the hotel ( he spent quite a lot of time there...) and a guy asked who owns the Plymouth. My father in law was very surprised to know that the this guy, the previous owner, was not a bishop but... a taxi driver...and that the car had passed the 100,000 miles...so to explain the very low mileage on it... Michel

Frankvintagefullflowcom

The taxi driver's name was Bishop.

Frankvintagefullflowcom

I'm very aware that the original engine for a '51 S-6 would be a 262. I had surmised that N/B was a factory install in an effort to use up existing stock of the narrow version, but a Hudson Guru said it wasn't possible. Hmmmmm. They're identical engines with that one exception so it makes no functional difference. I was just curious and I'd imagine that it was a replacement at some point in its life. The only time it will matter is if a future owner buys a head gasket for a '51. Surprise!
I may just rebuild a W/B for it and ignore the S/N.
F

ArkieJazz

464Saloon, the problem with factory color identifiers for '54 was that the color code was "inked" onto the i.d. plate. Over the years, this ink fades to the point of being only barely readable and in some cases, not at all legible. I wish I could see a photo of your car's original color. I almost bet that it was Roman Bronze.
One other thing to mention about the 6D cars is that there seemed to be not a lot of consistency when it came to interiors. I have seen at least 2 6D coupes which had the interior fabric from the 1953 Super Wasps. It's my belief that toward the end, Hudson was using the 6D cars to rid itself of unwanted inventory of left over bits and pieces from the parts bins

464Saloon

Roman Bronze was my first guess too but it was too brown. I don't know if anyone knows the stepdowns better than Lance Walker. He makes his living solely on them and he said there was no rule for the Specials, they were throwing anything and everything they had at them. He even said some trim parts would be stainless on one side and chrome steel on the other. Mine fortunately is not that but it have a special badge under the Hornet badge on one side but not on the other. My body guy said there was no evidence that there ever was one on the other side and he said he could tell the fender had never been replaced, Lance said this was typical as they were running out of parts. Mine is a pretty late car. I had a paint store put a scanner on the firewall and they came up with a formula and sample. It was as close to the chip samples for the Coral Red as you could come.

ArkieJazz

What is the serial # for your 6D? We can see approximately when it was built. I assure you they didn't ship paint to Detroit from Kenosha. And if there was no "special" badge on one of your front fenders, that fender had most likely been replaced, no matter what Lance says...LOL

53jetman

I have to agree with Arkie - However, I would vote that the car was originally Lipstic. This color tended to fade very rapidly, as back then they did not use a clear coat to protect the pigment of the color, and even the color coat on the firewalls would deteriorate with time. Even at the time of production (back in '54) the consistency of the tint of Lipstic varied from one car to the next. We sold an order of four 6D coupes to a local business - all were supposed to be Lipstic, but there was definitely a big difference in the color of these cars. They were not consecutively numbered Vins, so were produced on different days of the week. They were however delivered by the same transport.

Jerry

Glowplug

xxx

ArkieJazz

Jerry, you['re probably right. I initially thought Roman Bronze because RB was such an unusual color....but lipstick makes more sense.