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Take five minutes to learn about the revolutionary 1924 Chrysler B-70, a car with plenty of firsts besides being the first Chrysler car!
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hi there it's me Dave again and I'm here
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to talk about the
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1924-25 Chrysler now this was a car that
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was first built in late
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1923 it was first put on sale and shown
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to the public in January 1924 so you'd
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think that it was the 100th anniversary
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of Chrysler but Chrysler itself says
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you're wrong so let's talk about the car
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for a bit very briefly uh some model B70
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it's the model B because he had actually
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designed a Chrysler earlier that was
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going to be made by Willis in New Jersey
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in Elizabeth and that didn't come to
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fruition for various dull reasons so uh
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it ended up being made by Maxwell that
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was the model B 70 because 70 mower was
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its top speed and if you don't know cars
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of the early 20s then you won't be at
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all impressed but believe me it was
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impressive to get that fast uh you
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really had to have have something like a
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Packard Super Eight at that point a
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Dodge Brothers car you know the
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theoretical top speed would be like 35 M
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an hour good luck getting there the
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gracer it wasn't just that they claimed
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it had a 70 mph top speed it really did
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you could buy one off the line and see
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how much faster than 70 and uh it cost
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just $11.95
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$1,195 and of course that means nothing
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without context it was actually a lot
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lot of money at the
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time uh the cheapest cars you could get
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were about half that price uh the B70
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came with 68 brake horsepower that's
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almost double the Dodge Brothers
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car so now these weren't luxury cars I
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mean you can find them at shows now and
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then but on the inside you can see that
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it was uh very similar to a mainstream
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car it was a little bit above but not
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much above it was a midline car and it
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was always meant to be
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now the one thing is that very few
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luxury cars could match what it had
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Under the Skin we can start with
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four-wheel hydraulic brakes very rare at
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the time most cars in a low price range
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or mid-price range had two wheel
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mechanical brakes the ones that had
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four-wheel mechanical brakes were a
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little less common four-wheel hydraulic
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brakes extremely rare and the braking
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system on those probably didn't last
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very long or work in all conditions
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because Chrysler and Engineers under
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Carl Breer they took the Lockheed system
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that was used by other cars such as the
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cord and perfected it which meant
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replacing every single part of it well
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they had an air filter most cars then
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did not have air filter as hard as it is
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to believe now they had a replaceable
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element oil filter which worked off of a
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shunt system they didn't actually invent
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it but they made it work they had a
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temperature gauge and that was really a
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new thing uh most companies would would
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give you a decorative uh radiator cap
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and people would replace that with
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something called a moto meter which uh
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put in a thermostat on top of your
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radiator so that you could see it from
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uh the driver's seat Chrysler actually
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put a gauge into the dashboard so the
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new Chrysler was designed by mostly by
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three guys named zader Skelton and Breer
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came awfully close to being called the
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zeter and being produced without Walter
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Chrysler but that's a story for another
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day they were surprisingly reliable cars
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despite the high performance which was
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really a credit to Zer skeleton and
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Breer and uh it was pretty impressive
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how they tried to protect it and make it
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reliable and make it work every day and
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the body was still wrapped over wood
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which was typical of everybody but Dodge
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Brothers at the time because Dodge
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Brothers had just worked with Bud on
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making the first old steel
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body now Carl Carl bre remembered and
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here I've got a quote that I'm going to
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read people lik them because they could
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drive as fast as they dared yet the car
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would stay right with them and seem to
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ask for more this was something most
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cars of the time would not do and that's
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certainly true um now in 1925 they added
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rubber engine mounts to uh reduce engine
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vibration it was a straight six it
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wasn't that bad to begin with uh and
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they added adjustable front seats and
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this made the car even more popular CHR
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were in fact grew by Leaps and Bounds
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every year it was really pretty
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impressive until the depression and they
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ended up buying Dodge Brothers as most
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people know so again Chrysler is not
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celebrating its 100th birthday this year
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but they sure could and they'd have
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something really good to celebrate their
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first car was a doozy well it wasn't a
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doozy because it didn't cost so much in
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a doozy as a dusenberg but you get the
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idea anyway this is Dave signing out uh
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with a request that you visit our
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article and much much more at motels.com
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