1933 Hudson Phaeton

Jon B
Jon B Administrator
edited November 2011 in HUDSON
Here is the stunning and rare 1933 Hudson phaeton recently restored by Mr. Nitin Dossa of Mumbai, India. There are only a handful of 1933 Hudsons left -- less than 20 known -- and most of these are 4-door sedans or coupes. A convertible would be rare, but Mr. Nitin's car is certainly the only phaeton remaining.

Comments

  • ski4life65
    ski4life65 Expert Adviser
    Wow! Any more pictures?
  • oldhudsons
    oldhudsons Senior Contributor
    has to be only one extant!
    Right, sure like to see MORE of it!
  • essexcoupe3131
    essexcoupe3131 Senior Contributor
    stunning
  • Unknown
    Unknown
    edited November 2011
    That '33 is certainly unusual,is that foreign design coachwork?
    Still,I would love to see a '33 Major Eight Brougham, as NONE are known to survive! Hope someone can prove me wrong....
  • Jon B
    Jon B Administrator
    edited November 2011
    We are all in luck!

    Due to your pleadings for additional photos, I just (this evening) e-mailed Mr. Dossa in India, and he promptly replied. He will be sending additional photos tomorrow (Thursday), and states that he has not published them anywhere on the web yet, "because I thought [they] should be first posted on a Hudson site". I'll post them here as soon as they arrive.

    By the way, I believe that the 7-passenger phaeton was in fact a Jefferson Avenue product. At least I recall seeing it in a 1933 sales catalog. Possibly Mr. Dossa's was in fact custom built in India but it would indeed also have been available from his local friendly Hudson dealer in 1933.

    There still exists a 1932 7-passenger touring car (I'm using phaeton and touring interchangeably, maybe I shouldn't) and it in fact spent its life in Nepal. In later years it was disassembled and carried out of the Nepalese mountains on the backs of porters, and shipped to America. That too, is probably a lone survivor, though there are marginally more 1932 Hudsons still extant than there are 1933's.
  • StillOutThere
    StillOutThere Expert Adviser
    edited November 2011
    Still waiting on those additional photos out here, Jon. Update?

    The '32 and '33 both 7pass photos below with the '32 in Nepal and the '33 looking like an artist's rendering.
  • Jon B
    Jon B Administrator
    Here are some recent photos of the car. When Mr. Dossa obtained it, there wasn't that much there beyond the shell itself, so a lot of the upholstery, interior, etc. is guesswork. He desires to make the car as authentic as possible and is planning a trip to the U.S. soon, in order to carefully examine other 1933's so he'll have some concept of how to make the car more original.

    If you know of anyone with a '33 who might be willing to let Mr. Dossa inspect and photograph it, could you please contact me at detailed @ verizon.net? Thanks!






  • oldhudsons
    oldhudsons Senior Contributor
    brings up all sorts of intriguing questions as notice it's RHD.
    Was probably built, at least the chassis, to export as RHD, OR was it shipped to India or England as a chassis only & bodied there?
    Was it bodied in Detroit, built to order as a RHD model. If so someone with a LOT of $$$$$ ordered it to have it shipped 1/2 way around the world.
    Was it done on one of the earlier premises & shipped "Down Under", bodied there, then exported to India (or from S. Africa, lot of HETs down there too).
    ??????? is the body builder???????
    There are practically no '33 Hudsons extant & as far as I know, the only phaeton.
  • StillOutThere
    StillOutThere Expert Adviser
    The car is GORGEOUS. Kudos to Mr. Dossa for his tenacity towards authenticity. Surely one of the world's greatest surviving products of Hudson Motor Car Co.
  • Jon B
    Jon B Administrator
    Well, actually there are at least 15 (and doubtless more) 1933 Hudsons around, though for all purposes they're practically extinct. I can only speak with authority because I co-authored an article on '33's for the WTN a few years ago, and spoke to a number of '33 owners. There probably aren't many more '32's, come to think of it.

    Many of us know about the '32 phaeton that had spent its life in Nepal and was transported, in pieces, out of that mountainous country, for shipment to the U.S. in recent years. That's in Florida now. My guess is that some enterprising Hudson dealer in India had some wealthy as a customer and sold him the '33. As to the right hand drive, Hudson exported a lot of cars in those days (my own Terraplane was exported to Denmark when new and has its own "factory" kilometer speedometer, for example). Changeover to RHD was fairly easy due to Hudson's symmetrical dashboards.

    Since Hudson did produce this body style it would not have been necessary for an Indian (or Australian, or British) bodybuilder to replicate it. And if they had, it would probably have taken on a "British look" which Mr. Dossa's car does not. However, as we learn more about this car, its history may come to light.
  • Old Fogey UK
    Old Fogey UK Expert Adviser
    I wonder whether this was a product of the Hudson UK assembly plant on the Great West Road in London ?
    It seems likely. The plant assembled CKD kits from Detroit. By 1934 they were using a lot of English-made components in them to get round the taxes imposed on cars of foreign origin in Britain in those days. As the car was intended for the Indian market (India was then part of the British Empire), the same taxes would apply to cars built outside the Empire. So called "Imperial Preference" meant that the punitive taxes wouldn't apply to cars built within the Empire. I think that the requirement for a proportion of Empire built components in these cars gradually increased over the years.
    Similarly, British built Terraplanes had the option of a smaller bore motor to get around the heavy annual tax in Britain on large capacity engines. As an example, my 1934 Hudson Eight would in the 1930s have attracted an annual "road tax" of nearly 1000 UK Pounds in today's values. A small bore Terraplane Six had an annual tax of half that.
  • Aaron D. IL
    Aaron D. IL Senior Contributor
    Clarence Konecki has a '32 or '33 sedan I think. They're beautiful years of Hudson's and if not for the depression it's amazing more people didn't want them but I guess Hudson had to offer cheaper cars to survive.
  • oldhudsons
    oldhudsons Senior Contributor
    old fogey's comments back what I'd opined about earlier; sure like to know who built the body. I don't believe Hudson built any of their open bodies from the late '20s thru '33.
  • StillOutThere
    StillOutThere Expert Adviser
    It has to be 40 years ago I saw the Konecki car in restoration at his house. It was a rare terrific original car to work with. Took pics that day but have NO IDEA what became of them.
  • Jon B
    Jon B Administrator
    edited November 2011
    Spoke to Ed Souers (who has a number of '33's) and he said Murray built Hudson's phaetons in those years. Murray also built one or more other body styles, possibly the '33 brougham as well.
    B16729.jpg
    (Linked to an auto literature website so this may not remain posted)
  • oldhudsons
    oldhudsons Senior Contributor
    Aaron - right. '32 & '33 the worst years of the Great Depression based on unemployment %. Between '29 & the end of '33 a lot of U. S. manufacturers had gone out of business & many HETers believe if it hadn't been for the introduction & sales of the '32 & '33 Essex-Terraplanes, which sold in the 10s of thousands, Hudson would have joined the others.
    In '33 of the nearly 41,000 HET cars built, only 2401 were the big Hudsons.
  • StillOutThere
    StillOutThere Expert Adviser
    If you drive a Hudson, Thank an Essex-Terraplane !!!

    Right on, Pete.
  • oldhudsons
    oldhudsons Senior Contributor

    here's a pic of a '33 H8 coupe that was brought to the Nashville National
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