The Pre-War Opel Admiral: An Interesting Mélange

General Motors took over the German automobile builder Opel around 1930.  In 1937, GM established a design studio at Opel, part of the staff (Strother MacMinn, John Coleman and George Jergenson, led by Franklin Q. Hershey) coming from Harley Earl's Detroit Art & Colour group.  Their first effort was the 1939 Opel Kapitän.

The Opel Admiral, subject of this post, was announced for 1937.  According to its Wikipedia entry, only a few were built that year: the main production run was in 1938 and 1939.

Since development of the Admiral took place before Hershey's team arrived, it is difficult for me to associate its design to a stylist.  However, it seems highly likely that Hans Mersheimer was involved.

The Admiral's styling interests me because of its odd collection of borrowings.  The images below are mostly from the time the cars were in production, and their quality is mediocre.

Gallery

Here is a factory photo of the Opel Admiral.  The front end ensemble might have been inspired by some cars pictured farther down.  An advanced feature is the almost-hidden running board.

Two-piece, V'd windshields had been around for a few years, but the Admiral's has some of the feeling of 1940 American versions.  That is mostly due to its relationship to the comparatively flat (for its time) all-steel top.

The S-curve where the passenger compartment profile transitions to the trunk area strikes me as being unusual for a four-door sedan of its era.  Contemporary American cars with similar shaping were usually two-door coupes.  Perhaps a sharp-eyed reader can remind us of any late-1930s four-door cars with a similar treatment.

This is a post- World War 2 photo showing the Admiral's rear design.

This seems to be a photo of either a prototype Admiral or perhaps a very early production car.  The bumper lacks guards and the hood side venting trim differs from cars in the previous images.  Note that the Opel lettering on the hubcaps have been carefully aligned to the horizontal for what seems to be a publicity shot.

1935-38 Volvo PV36 "Carioca"
The 1937-vintage Admiral's frontal design looks like it might have been inspired by this Volvo that must have been known to Opel body designers such as Mersheimer.

1935 Chrysler Airflow
The initial facelift of the 1934 Chrysler Airflow featuring a more prominent grille.  The Volvo PV36 was probably inspired by the '34 Airflow.

1934 Hupmobile
The headlight treatment (blending the lights into the hood) is similar to the Admiral's, and it is likely that its designers were aware of Hupp styling.

Return of the Three-Piece Windshield

Wraparound or panoramic windshields (both terms refer to the same thing) reached mass-production in the USA in the form of 1954 Oldsmobiles, Buicks and Cadillacs.  (However, a few expensive, low-production Oldsmobile and Cadillac convertibles with such windshields were marketed during the 1953 model year.)  Such windshields became practical once glass-forming technology reduced breakage rates to an acceptably low level.

But such windshields turned out to be a fad.  By the 1961 model year, wraparounds where the A-pillar was either vertical or leaned forwards were gone.  Some European brands followed the same pattern, but lagged slightly behind the Americans.

Before those 1954 one-piece wraparounds appeared, a few companies marketed cars with what amounted to three pieces of glass grouped in a panoramic manner.  Large center sections used flat glass and were flanked by small glass panels that were within the state of glass forming art.  In one case, the flanking panels had flat glass, and in the other, the glass was curved.

What I find interesting is that a car was recently introduced with what amounts to a three-piece windshield in the spirit of 1930s forebears.

Gallery

1934 Hupmobile
Hupps had three-piece windshields only for the 1934 model year.  All the panels had flat glass.

Tatra 77 from 1934 or 1935.  Only the center panel is flat.

1937 Panhard Dynamic - sales photo
Panhard introduced three-piece windshields on its 1935 line and continued the practice on its redesigned 1937s.

2015 Fiat 500L
The concept returned on the Fiat 500L, perhaps due to packaging considerations (note how close the front door forward cut line is to the wheel opening and how far forward the windshield extends).

American Business Coupes

Wikipedia deals at some length here with the coupé (in America: coupe) body type.  A few lines of the link deal with the business coupe: "A coupé with no rear seat or a removable rear seat intended for traveling salespeople and other vendors who would be carrying their wares with them."

The American business coupe was part of the product mix for many brands from the late 1920s into the early 1950s.  Most were advertised as business coupes, but some coupes had more general names, yet could be used for business purposes.

The logic of using a coupe for traveling salesmen, consulting engineers and many other business activities requiring road travel was that coupes were: (1) usually inexpensive to buy; (2) had a usefully minimal seating capacity; and (3) had small cabins but also the long wheelbases of large-cabin cars so that there was room for a larger than normal trunk for carrying stuff.

Below are examples of this long-departed type of automobile body in chronological order.

Gallery

1929 Buick Master-Six Business Coupe
An early example.  The trunk is fairly small, so this body might also have had a rumble seat version.

1934 Hupmobile Aerodynamic Coupe
This is probably a rumble seat coupe.  I show it because of its very small cabin that seats two (or perhaps three in a pinch) and its long trunk area.  The rear-mounted spare tire would have made this an inconvenient business coupe because it would have interfered with loading.  A business coupe version would have been possible if the spare tire was repositioned.

1936 Oldsmobile Eight Business Coupe

1936 Buick Special Business Coupe
Two General Motors business coupes from mid-range marques.  I suppose these were offered for salesmen or business representatives requiring a more substantial image than that offered by entry-level brands.  The cars shown here used the same basic body.

1936 Packard One-Twenty Business Coupe
Another example of a mid-range business coupe.  Surprising, given that it was from the maker of luxury cars, but Packard had to enter a lesser market range in order to survive the Great Depression.

1937 Graham Cavalier Series 95 Business Coupe
A business coupe from a minor brand.  Note the illustration showing how the spare tire was stored, providing more convenient trunk space.

1939 Plymouth Business Coupe
A business coupe from Chrysler Corporation.  Like the Graham, it is a four-window coupe, something becoming common for business coupes by the late 1930s.

1939 Chevrolet Master Deluxe Business Coupe
This publicity photo shows a business coupe being loaded.

1939 Graham Combination Coupe
The text (click on the image to enlarge) mentions that a business version of this coupe was available.

1940 Chevrolet Master 85 Business Coupe
I include this brochure page image because it shows storage variations.

1941 Dodge Luxury Liner Deluxe Business Coupe
A nice example of a small cabin on a long-wheelbase car with the resulting large trunk.

1941 Oldsmobile Special Business Coupe
Yet another view of business coupe storage.

1949 Dodge Wayfarer Business Coupe
Business coupe production continued post- World War 2.  This one has Chrysler Corporation's redesigned postwar body style.

1951 Studebaker Champion Business Coupe - Mecum Auctions photo
Perhaps the flashiest business coupe of the lot, though that 1939 Graham comes close.  These small-cabin Studebakers have always fascinated me.

1950 Chevrolet Styline Business Coupe
Even General Motors continued business coupes into the early 1950s.

UPDATE: Further research shows that Chrysler Corporation's Plymouth brand offered business coupes as late as 1957.