1942 Oldsmobile Model 98 Custom Cruiser Club Sedan 🇺🇸

Of the original 1,771 series 98 Club Sedans produced in 1942, only three are known to survive. This example came to The NB Center in April 2010 in largely original and untouched condition.

Collection curator, Keith Flickinger drives cars from the collection to help maintain them and because he loves to do it. He often drives cars by just picking a direction and going, without the aid of maps or GPS. This allows him to explore the most obscure back roads and corners of the countryside.  On one of these drives he was passing through a small town and spotted an old storefront that was piled high with junk. He thought he saw a headlight and fender peaking out from under the junk but it required a stop and peaking in the window to confirm that some old car was buried inside this apparently abandoned store.

Keith set about locating the building owner who connected him to the tenant. The tenant told him indeed there was some sort of Oldsmobile in there. Keith was able to get the tenant to show him the car and a deal was soon struck.

The Oldsmobile was found to be in very well preserved original condition with the exception of one repaint that wasn’t in the correct shades and the paint was peeling off the car.  The peeling paint revealed some areas of previous repair work. The decision was made to fix the previous repaired areas correctly and paint the car the correct colors of Condor Grey over New Ivory.

Since the chrome was off the car and it was getting new paint, the chrome was also done. The engine was stripped down, cleaned and fully serviced but not rebuilt. The interior was removed, cleaned and reinstalled. Every part of the interior was saved.

The end result is possibly the most original surviving example of a 1942 Oldsmobile that is prepared to stand the test of time.

Company
General Motors

Wheelbase
127in

Interior trim
Beige cloth

Brakes
front and rear drums

Make
Oldsmobile

Length
216in

Engine
inline 8 - 257cid

Tires
7.00x15

Model
B-44 Custom Cruiser - Model 98

Width
78.8in

Carburetor
1 carb. Carter 2-barrel

Original Price
$1,319

Body style
2-door Sedanette

Weight
4195lbs

Horsepower
110hp @ 3600rpm

Production
1,771

Model year
1942

Exterior paint
Condor Gray/New Ivory

Transmission
Hydra-Matic 4-speed automatic

In 1940, Oldsmobile revamped their entire product line and naming conventions. The new L-series 90 replaced the previous L-series 80. The new series 90 featured a longer wheelbase, now 124 inches and exclusive to the series inline eight-cylinder engine.

Oldsmobile would introduce names for each series: The entry-level series 60 Special, the mid-level G-series 70 Dynamic and the upper-level L-series 90 Custom Cruiser. These names would remain through the 1942 model year. To further confuse things, in 1941, Oldsmobile would change the series numbering again this time making the first digit the series number and the second digit the number of cylinders. The 1941 Custom Cruiser would be split into the series 96, six-cylinder and the 98, eight-cylinder.  

For the 1942 model year, the naming conventions evolved again. The letter in each series designation was dropped and the six-cylinder engine offering was dropped from the top of the line series. Now all Custom Cruisers were series 98.

As if all the naming changes were not enough confusion, in 1942 all Oldsmobiles were designated B-44 and carried the one year only badging. The B-44 was not related to any model designations but was intended to mark the companies 44th year in the automobile business.  It is probable this was more of a marketing gimmick than any real anniversary celebration, who makes a big deal of their 44th year in business?

Many Oldsmobile advertisements touted, “Better looking, Better lasting, Better Built than any Olds in 44 years.” Oldsmobile claimed the B-44 meant Better in 44. It is also likely the B-44 badging was an excuse to make the marketing connection to inevitable war-time production. Another advertising tag line of the year was “Power-Styled like the B-19.”  Hardly surprising that B-44 sounds like an airplane of the era. It is clear that Oldsmobile had war-time production and patriotic themes in mind when they wrote the 1942 advertising copy. The cars were described as featuring “Double Duty bumpers, Fuselage fenders, Dreadnaught Frame, Econo-Master engines of greater “fire power”.”

The cumbersome naming of the 1942 Oldsmobiles aside,  the series 98 Custom Cruiser was a well appointed automobile. The wheelbase was extended to 127 inches. The L-head inline eight-cylinder engine displaced 257 cubic inches and produced 110 horsepower at 3400 RPM.  The standard 3-speed manual transmission was shifted from the column but for an additional $90 purchasers could have the all-automatic 4-speed Hydra-Matic transmission.  A long list of options allowed buyers to customize the car to their liking including an “in-a-car” bed for $19.50.

Oldsmobile ended civilian automobile manufacturing on February 5th 1942 and quickly transformed into an arms manufacturer. Their factories turned out heavy guns and cannons along with thousands of shells for the same, each day for the duration of the war.

The truncated 1942 model year makes all cars from that year rare.  Oldsmobile produced a total of 67,999 of all 1942 models. That is a quarter of what they produced the previous year. Of that total, 6,659 series 98 cars were produced and just 1,771 club sedans.