When most of us think of Speedsters, the first thing that comes to mind is the drop top Porsche Speedster, but when Studebaker debuted their Speedster in 1955 they had a slightly different take on what it meant to be a Speedster. This one year only car was based on the President Coupe and had a fixed roof, unlike the Porsche. It also wasn’t a barebones car, it was actually the opposite. It came with every option and feature Studebaker had to offer, plus some that were only offered for this model. They only built around 2k of these luxury coupes, making this one quite rare. It is going to need a complete restoration, but the seller believes it is about 80 percent complete and they may find more trim pieces as they sort through the extra stuff that came with it. They have listed it here on eBay with a $2,500 Buy-It-Now, which includes a rebuilt transmission. This Studebaker is going to need a lot of work, but in the end you would have a rare machine that would make for an interesting conversation piece everywhere you go!
The Studebaker Speedster was quite a bit like the Packard Pacific. Both were sporty two door cars that were one year only and were built on the senior series chassis/body and used bits from other models but had rare model specific trim also.
IF I was younger, ‘n didn’t have my ’78 Clenet Roadster and ’40 Ford Pickup to yet finish (the ’40 was last licensed in 1963), I’d snap that Stude up in a heartbeat, as my Dad had one like that back in the day.. sigh* Keep up the great work, I look forward to your articles every day.. Cheers from WY, Rob
Another great car.
Wish I didnt have so many projects alreafy. I love studes. My uncle Tom (god rest his soul) had at least a dozen.
I remember back in the 70’s when I was in hi school one of the kids had this same car with the gold trim parts, two tone salmon and brown or some retro combination like that… and it sported a Factory supercharged motor! It was in “project” status even back then, but what a cool car!
Psst,
It’s not a coupe. It’s a K-body, a hardtop. The coupe is a C-body and has a B pillar and little rear side windows. Trunk lids, hoods, bumpers, engines, transmissions, frames, suspensions and lots of other stuff is interchangeable between the K and the C bodies but Speedsters were never “Coupes”.
One way to easily tell a ’55 President Speedster from a ’55 President Hardtop is to look for a glovebox. Even if it has everything else you’d expect to see on a Speedster, if it has a glovebox it’s a President Starliner and is not a Speedster. (In Studebakerese, a Starlite is coupe and a Starliner is a hardtop).
‘Cuz I thought you all would want to know ;).
Studebaker owned or such Paxton superchargers and so you could have one installed from the factory, the 54 I think had 4 instrument cowles and you could equip your car with a factory tachometer, rear anti roll bar and adjustable shocks. The silver and golden Hawks had BIG finned brake drums and one could get an overdrive with your three on the tree. Properly optioned, these were pretty good GT’S. Of course the 57 and 58 Golden Hawks had the supercharger and the 61 Hawks got disk brakes and 4 speeds–but no blower–tho you could order it!