'34 PE upholstery

Jim Benjaminson · November 20, 2007, 11:13:55 PM

Doran - that interior is gorgeous. How about some photos of the whole car?????

Richard Dryman · November 20, 2007, 07:59:02 PM

very nice topic for a '34 owner; and I copied it to an email to myself for my 'save' file.

Maybe this is a good time to remind folks that servers do fail and all posts can disappear forever; it happened on 2 car sites that I am a member of and I believe that this site also lost a lot former posts before it reconfigured.
This is not a 'sky is falling' post, but if you see something that you want to refer to in the future you might consider 'copy and paste' and storing in another file or even backed up on a CD--only takes a moment. BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY

oldplym · November 20, 2007, 05:51:46 PM

Doran:

So, you're the owner of the '34 coupe at the Antique Auto Shop in Hebron? Congratulations!!! It is gorgeous!!! I have followed the restoration of this car since it entered their shop because of the similarity to my '33. My work is just a mile or so from their shop and I frequently visit there on my lunch hour. It's always quite a learning experience. They do first class work!

Again, my heartiest congratulations!

Don

Doran Johnson · November 20, 2007, 10:57:14 AM

To update this subject, my upholstery is now in. The $6 dollar leather option in 1934 is considerable more in 2007. This is done in the same style as the cloth interiors.

Doran Johnson · February 26, 2007, 10:47:56 AM

To follow up on this topic I'm posting a link to a leather sample we'll probably use on our interior.

http://www.garrettleather.com/sample_detail.asp?item_number=C-963

I appreciate all the input I got from the club and forum members.

Doran

Ed Peterson · January 09, 2007, 08:39:18 PM

Hi, I have pictures of original upholstery patterns which I can email to you. My email address is

plymouth34[delete this bit 6a669af79068b][insert an at symbol here]hotmail[insert a dot here]com

. Email me and let me know what you are looking for and I'll try to help. I will also try to answer any other speciific questions you have. Ed

Doran Johnson · January 09, 2007, 05:27:04 PM

Carla,

We are now collecting samples of leather to choose from. I'll be glad to share the samples and our selection with you. I'm sure the supplier would be happy to also supply you if our tastes prove to be the same. Since I'm in KY and you in CA, its probably unlikely our cars will be seen together, but you never know.

Photos would be useful, and I have a few to share. Most notably from a PE Coupe discovered in a barn near my home. The owner allowed me to make photos, however the barn was as dark as night without lights. The flash did a fair job, but its not as good as natural light. As to my Coupe, the upholstery was redone in the fifties and most detail was lost. Some original material of the seat bottom and back survived the barn mice and can still be used to establish the original design. I am no help on carpeting, as I believe the coupe only had a rubber mat. Perhaps someone could clarify this. By the way, I looking for a mat. I also don't know if the trunk would have had a floor liner of some sort?

Do you suppose the headliner was not done in leather or leatherette? The parts book shows identical numbers for the Pile, Bedford Cord and Broadcloth headliner, but a different one for leather. I took this to mean that the headlining was probably also leather or leather facsimile.

Doran

Carla · January 09, 2007, 04:01:26 PM

Hello, everyone,

I'd agree about using a tan or very light brown colour, also, after seeing cars with black interiors.

Is it most probable that the door panels and other interior trim below the head-lining would have been done in an 'artificial leather' finished cloth of a 'pebble-grain' pattern, of as nearly as might be the same colour and grain pattern of the leather used for the seats?

Our upholsterer here wanted to have some level of assurance that the materials selected would be considered 'acceptable' as original option, by the people who are the most knowledgeable about those cars. We have no plans for entering our '34 for 'judging' in any display event, but, be that as it may, we'll do our best to preserve a reasonable level of originality.

Doran, if we can agree on the shade of coulour we prefer, should we use the same supplier for the materials, so as to have 'uniformity' of our 'optional' upholstery? Is the original cloth upholstery in your car 'all there' to use for patterns/exemplars for the new material? If not, ours is 'all there' albeit faded and a bit brittle in spots, so it could be a good reference. The floor carpetting is completely missing from our car, so it would be nice if we could find any photos of original carpetting details.

Should we exchange photos of the interiors of our cars, and try to get photos of other original interiors, to see whether there might have been subtle differences or changes in the production during the production run? I'd not be at all surprised to see that there might have been some detail changes from one month of production to the next, either as product quality improvements, or as cost-saving simplifications.

Jim, and Ed, I really appreciate the time and trouble you are taking on our behalf......would you be able to help us with factory or other period photos of the '34 interiors?.....and is there anything we can do in return? (we have a small machine shop here, and make/restore 'unobtanium' parts.)

cheers

Carla

Doran Johnson · January 08, 2007, 06:52:58 PM

Thanks for the post Ed. I talked to Earl a little about it at Hershey in October. He seemed all for the idea of doing it in leather, but like everone else, wasn't sure of the details. I think you're right, it seems logical that a beige or brown leather would have been offered. Thats about as conservative as you can get, especially if it is used throughout. I recently saw a black leather interior on a later model car. Everything was black. The way black absorbs light and reflects very little back, that car seemed way to dark inside. I think beige would allow a little more light to reflect around the interior, making everything a little easier to see. As I'm sure you know, our eyes aren't getting any better with age.

Doran

Ed Peterson · January 07, 2007, 10:39:10 PM

Hi Carla & Doran,
I have talked to Doran about leather upholstery previously. My research did not turn up the specific information about leather interiors you are probably looking for. The parts books do have parts numbers for leather and some items have a 3 number code. A few years back I planned on collecting serial numbers and upholstery swatches from original '34 interiors. When I had collected enough variety, I was going to contact Chrysler Historical and get copies of the shipping cards. If I recall, the cards have the upholstery code on them. Then I'd have a reference to the numbers. Chrysler Historical did not want to give a discount for the shipping cards so I abandoned the idea.

Unfortunately leather is not a common interior. The only original leather interior I have seen was on an Australian PE sedan. Everything was black leather. Looking at the parts books, I think it implies the same for US cars. If you are going to do an interior in leather, I believe it would have the same upholstery pattern as a cloth interior. I have seen an original '34 conv that had a beige leather interior. I can't say if that was only for a conv or would be available for all models. While you both are trying to match an original interior, I cannot tell you what color leathers were available. I feel pretty sure it could be done in black and maybe beige or brown. I would not do it in two different shades. If you have an original cloth interior now, look at how conservative it is and keep that in mind when doing your interior in leather. If you plan on bringing your car to a national meet for judging, I suggest you contact Earl Buton and get his opinion on the subject. Sorry I can't be more helpful.
Ed

Jim Benjaminson · January 04, 2007, 11:41:02 PM

Guys, I'm going to e-mail Ed Peterson on this. Ed has done a ton of research on various things, including if I remember correctly, the upholstery. I know I have a copy here, somewhere - but
probably just as easy to contact Ed as he probably has it closer to hand than I do!

Doran Johnson · January 04, 2007, 04:58:17 PM

Thanks Jim for staying on top of the leather upholstery questions, even though we can't produce much truly reliable information. I'll probably use a soft textured grain with a neutral light brown color (i.e, tan, beige, taupe) throughout the interior, and follow the same style of seams, pleats and buttons as the cloth materials.

The parts book mentions two codes with respect to the PE Business and Rumble seat coupes leather interior; 408 and 413 (409 on PF). These codes are only mentioned in reference to "cowl trim panels".

A comparision of part numbers also reveals some other interesting facts:
- Bedford Cord, Pile and Broadcloth interiors all used the same part number for "headlining & listing assembly", while leather was different
- The same is true for the "weather cord - body lock and hinge pillars", identical part numbers for all fabrics and different for leather
- Even more curious, same part numbers for "over rear window trim panel" for pile and leather, while different for Bed. Cord and Broadcloth
- Finally, "door trim panels" changed after body number 33251 on Bedford Cord, Pile and Leather, but not on Broadcloth

Go figure - I don't know what it all means. Let us know if anyone comes up with additional information. Carla, I'll send you a sample of our final selection if you want.
Doran

Jim Benjaminson · January 03, 2007, 11:55:49 PM

O.K. Make that 766 1934 Plymouth's on the registry now! Very interesting story on the car. I'll check Tod's site for the photos. You'll see my PE business coupe and PE two door on Tod's site as well, plus various other photos I've taken.

Didn't have any luck getting the phone number for the member with the leather interior 4 door. Our new roster shows his number, which I have in the files, but I get a "no longer in service" recording when I try it.

Despite the hundreds of photos I have of 34's, (many factory originals and photos of over 300 different cars), this town sedan is the only one I know of with leather, outside of the convertibles!

Carla · January 03, 2007, 09:23:32 PM

Hi, Jim,

I went to double-check the numbers on our '34, and am feeling a bit foolish.....I'd totally forgotten about the body tag on the cowling.

Our '34 appears to be a standard PE four door sedan, originally fitted with the vacuum clutch system. It had been fitted with a radio, which we've removed, but not a heater or other accessories.

The car number on the right-hand door post is 2224864, the number on the engine block and left hand chassis member is PE 41432, and the body number tag reads 600-21642 Briggs Detroit.

The anecdotal history of our '34 is that it was bought, either new or as a nearly-new car, by a couple in the Willow Glen area of San Jose, CA, who used it gently and kept it carefully preserved until they passed away, in the '70's, after which it went through three or four owners who just kept it in dead storage. It appears to have been originally black, and resprayed once in black, an 'enamel job' of the '40's or '50's, I suspect. The painter....or someone.....attempted to re-stripe the body, but didn't do it very well.

It now has 58K miles showing on the odometer, which may well be correct, given the general appearance, relative lack of wear in some areas, etc. It would seem probable that the car wasn't used much after the '40's, as it had badly deteriorated pre-war tires on it when we got it. We had to replace the tires and many of the brake system parts, to make it reasonably safe to use on the road.

Our '34 was in a truly impressive state of preservation, in some respects. The chassis frame, and underside of the body and fenders, had never even gotten any light surface-rust. The original black chassis paint was pretty much completely flaked off the metal, showing the silvery steel. When we first got the car, I had a helper working under it for several days time, cleaning and lightly sanding the metal, after which we gave it two good coats of black Rust-oleum paint and a coat of tarry undercoat material, to preserve it.

cheers

Carla

Photos of our '34 can be seen on Tod's 33Ply web-site, ours is the black '34 PE which he shows in front and back quarter views.

Jim Benjaminson · January 02, 2007, 07:16:09 PM

Evening, Carla. Doran Johnson (also a club member) has posed that question to me earlier, regarding the pattern on the leather seating in a '34. I had photos of a '34 Town Sedan with original leather and I distinctly remember the seat pattern as being the same as the cloth seats. I've gone thru hundreds of photos but can't find that particular photo, so I must have loaned it to someone and not gotten it back. Doran's question was what was used on the door panels and headliner. Over Christmas vacation I tried to call the owner of the Town Sedan and got a message that the phone number I had was no longer valid. Off hand, I don't know who supplied the trim for the 34 Plymouth's but I'm sure it was supplied by an outside supplier but the coverings were probably installed in the factory trim department. I would doubt the Imperial folks had anything to do with it - the Plymouth was built at Lynch Road and the Imperial would have been across town at the Jefferson Avenue plant. Seeing as you live in California, its possible your car came from the Los Angeles plant. Which brings up a question - has your car ever been registered in my '34 Plymouth registry? To date, I have verified the existence of 765 - 1934 Plymouth's. I know there are a lot more 34's out there but I don't add the car unless I have the identification numbers of the car to verify it.

I'm going to make one more attempt to call the person that owns (owned ?) the leather interior town sedan. It might be that I have an outdated area code.

Carla · January 01, 2007, 06:31:38 PM

Hello, all,

Has anyone ever been able to find out any information on the leather upholstery option for the '34 PE cars?

We have our '34 stored away for the winter here (yes, I know, winter in California is nothing at all compared to some other parts of the country, but we do have a 'monsoon season' here with a lot of rain-storms) and I'm planning to take the seats in to our excellent local automotive upholstery person to have them correctly re-upholstered.

Well, if we can't get any good direct information on the optional leather upholstery for the PE cars, would it be realistic for me to assume that a leather option would have been done in the same factory trim department which would have been regularly doing the leather work for the Chrysler Imperial cars, and would have been done with the same materials and techniques?

With that idea in mind, if I were able to get photos and material information from correctly restored mid-'30's Imperials, would that be considered adequate to establish 'original option' status for the upholstery in our PE car?

(or.....and please be patient with my level of ignorance here, but I really don't know.......were the '34 PE sedan bodies built/assembled 'in house' at the Chrysler works, or were they supplied by a subcontractor, such as Budd or Briggs? If subcontracted, were they supplied 'in the white' or already painted and trimmed? Could there have been multiple sources for the trim work or trim materials in the '34 production?)

As another thought, our local upholstery person has a good bit of experience on pre-war British cars, and knows the details of the standard materials/techniques for those quite well. If we specify the same quality level of materials/techniques as would have been used on the pre-war Jaguar cars, would that be considered 'acceptable' in terms of reasonably approximating an original option for our PE car?

Can anyone think of any other ideas in this respect? Since we'll be going to all the work and investment level to have the car redone, I'd really rather invest the little bit more for the nicer option of real leather, and not just use mohair or Bedford cord.

The original mohair in our car is still 'all there' but is dried out, brittle, and faded. Is there, possibly, any way of salvaging the original material by applying some substance to it, to re-moisten the material, analogous to using the 'Connelly Hide Food' or similar leather oils on leather seats?

cheers

Carla