Here’s your chance, two-doors-too-many car lovers – there are no excuses on this one! This split-screen sweetheart is a 1951 Chrysler New Yorker 2-door club coupe and it’s located in beautiful, historic Carson City, Nevada. It’s listed on eBay with a single $100 bid but of course the reserve isn’t met at that price. The seller has a $4,500 buy it now price listed.
I can think of a couple of excuses, I guess: “If it were only on the other coast” and “If it wasn’t such a big project” would be another one. Both are valid exc.. I mean reasons for not jumping on a rare two-door Hemi-powered New Yorker. I’ve been there myself, saying that if I didn’t have two garages and even more storage units full of oddball cars and oddball mini-motorcycles. Or, if I wasn’t too busy for another project, etc. We all have our reasons for not grabbing a vehicle that we would own if money wasn’t an issue. For many of us that isn’t the case, so we pick and choose our projects wisely. If I would have gotten Microsoft stock when I graduated high school in 1980 instead of a rusty 1971 Toyota Corolla 2-door wagon I would buy this car and immediately send it off to be nut-and-bolt restored, along with the 2,398 other cars that were in the midst of being restored. Hagerty lists a #2 excellent condition 1951 New Yorker Club Coupe as being worth $21,800 so you’ll have to watch your pennies on this restoration, but if the interior and drivetrain check out this would be a fun project. The seller says that it’s a “very straight body very little rust power train redone. Lots of spare motor and transmission parts.”
This is it for photos on this one, unfortunately. I know, you’ll have to hit up the seller for interior and engine photos. Hey, I’m right there with you, three photos?! And not even a single photo of the legendary, revolutionary Chrysler 331 cubic-inch 180-hp FirePower Hemi engine? It sure would have been great to see a photo of this engine. Not to mention what would have been a big, luxurious – for the time at least – interior. 1951 was the first year that power steering was available in an American production car and Chrysler gave it to us in the New Yorker with HydraGuide power steering. This car also has Chrysler’s Fluid-Torque-Drive transmission that only used a clutch pedal for going between reverse and forward gears. It was one of the strongest made. So, when it comes down to it, what’s your excuse for not jumping on this great looking project New Yorker? You had better make it a good one, we’re all going to judge you! (just kidding)..
My excuse? No damned room in the four-car garage (it currently has three cars two motorcycles and three scooters, with the mentioned-elsewhere ’61 Fuji Rabbit motorbike and a TGB 101S scooter to arrive on Wednesday!) and things rust quickly when left outside in a place that gets a heck of a lot of rain.
I’m concerned about the lack of information in the eBay ad, let alone photos.
That is a car I could seriously dig.
It will need a lot of cash spent on it just to bring it up ti even a #3 condition. You could be upside down in this New Yorker in s hurry. But……what the Hey…….if you like it and have always loved this vintage, and the Hemi, why not.
I love seeing black and yellow plates with the A on them.
It makes me wonder exactly when they were issued, I mean day and month.
So what was it that compelled Americans to drive tanks like this after the war, while our European friends had 18 hp Fiat’s? Bigger is better? Safer? Army tank technology? We had deserts to cross? I’m sure future generations will question that. If you’ve ever driven cars like this, they are clearly tanks. Take a lot to get this baby lumbering again, but a great start, anyway.
Availability of crude oil feedstock and refining capacity? Continuation of pre war manufacturing sensibilities? Economic drain of post war infrastructure rehabilitation? Lack of a burgeoning working/middle class driving mass production and societal change utilizing enormous profits and productivity omprovements generated by the newly energized military/industrial complex? Loss of millions upon millions of consumers/workers due to deaths associated with war? Relative scarcity of raw materials and industrial capacity?
This was the average size of American cars at the time. Smaller cars, such as the Nash Rambler, Henry J did poorly in the marketplace and were discontinued. For example, Buick, about the same size as this Chrysler was number three in production during these years, only behind Chevy and Ford.
Not shabby! With a recently gone through drivetrain there’s a good chance it’s driveable, or close, as it sits. Even if the interior is rough you could still throw some blankets over the seats, hit the exterior with a case of spray on black primer and get the attention of a rockabilly girl.
I don’t think this is a “club coupe”. It looks like a two door hardtop, which was rather new in 1951. My Father had a 1951 Dodge Diplomat with a similar top and side window/rear window arrangement. The rear side windows pivoted around their rear sides and disappeared.
Having grown up with a Gyromatic, (Dodge’s name), I would have to update. I always wondered if a later Torqueflight three speed would bolt in behind an older Hemi. It would be a vast improvement.
A lot of the early hardtops had chrome banded windows. It wasn’t until later the engineers figured out how to bond weatherstrips to the glass for a good seal.
There are websites that list what adapters for automatics to early engines are available. My understanding is the LA engine family has many of the A engine block dimensions, so a TF 904 or 727 for LA should bolt to the earlier engines. I am open to correction if I am wrong.
No, the newer torqueflite won’t bolt in. There was a New Yorker club coupe, but this is the Newport hardtop.
One half of the bellhousing is casted with the block…51 was a 241 c.i.d. Saw a lot of 4 door sedans growing up in the 60’s………..
No, Chrysler didn’t use the 241 engine. That was dodge. This is the 331.
This would be a great cruiser.
Here’s the deal,if you open the front door,and stab yourself in the chest,it’s a coupe,or 2 door sedan,hardtops have no pillers around the windows.
It’s listed on Ebay under “Salvage Parts Cars” category, which makes you wonder what is seriously wrong with this beautiful Chrysler.
A lot of car for the money .
If the engine is rebuilt or overhauled to perfect standards, the engine alone is worth $3500
What a great old beauty, if I had the funds and a dry place to keep it I’d be all in. I sure like these early fifties Mopars. When you go to a car show there’s always lots of Chevies and fords but not to many of these early fifties Chryslers. I feel these are under appreciated and are slowly becoming quite rare. I sure this gets saved and restored after all it is a hemi car.
I would opt out and spend 16-25 k for a fully restored to better than new before becoming buried just to get this one into driveable ooo- ahhh condition.
School buddy used to wait till six for we country pumpkins to walk to town and 6 or 8 of us, sometimes 2 or 2 in trunk as well and at$ $2,00 a carload drive in
movie theater on Friday nights.
Mayors kid got it twice a month in summer.
Later kid bought a used 52 Desoto which was fine car.
I remember going on Sunday drives to grandparents in ours 3 kids, mom and dad, and a cat named Dinkey,
70 mile trip meant a safari. Lunches, puke bags and Pepsi and coke, all packed by 6: am and took two long crowded fighting sibings hours to get there.
Good days.
YES tanks they were, solid as one, easy to work on, and hammers dent puller and lead repaired any dents we got from running into another tank.