1933 Stutz DV-32 Monte Carlo by Weymann 🇺🇸

Harry C. Stutz was determined to be in the Automobile industry. From tinkering with his own designs as a young man in his native Ohio, he drifted to Indianapolis, Indiana in 1903. There he gained valuable experience working for different component manufacturers. He eventually designed his own transaxle, a transmission incorporated into a rear axle, and set-up shop manufacturing them. 

In 1911, just weeks after opening his manufacturing concern, he built a race car to compete in the inaugural Indianapolis 500. His car placed 11th. While that may not sound impressive, it was. This was all that was needed to catapult him into producing his own cars. From that time forward, Stutz would be synonymous with performance and high quality engineering. 

In 1916, stock speculator Alan A. Ryan gained controlling interest in Stutz. Harry Stutz departed his namesake company in 1919. This would mark the beginning of the long downward spiral that would eventually doom Stutz.  

The Stutz Vertical Eight, inline-eight cylinder engine debuted in 1926. This engine would be the basis for all engines to follow since the company could not afford to create any more from scratch. Stutz chief engineer Charles “Pop” Greuter kept improving and refining this engine. In its ultimate form, introduced in 1932, it had double overhead camshafts with four valves per cylinder on hemispherical combustion chambers. This was a very sophisticated design for the time. 

The naming conventions for the engines and models reflected that Stutz could not compete in the multi-cylinder race that was raging in the late 1920’s into the early 1930’s. While companies came out with 12 and 16 cylinder engines, Stutz touted the number of valves, hoping the car buying public would not make a distinction.  The inline eight with two-valves per cylinder was now called the SV-16 for Single-valve 16, while the four-valve engine would become known as the DV-32 for Dual-valve 32. 

With these new engines came new more refined body styles.  From a short chassis speedster called the DV-32 Super Bearcat all the way up to the top of the line European influenced Monte Carlo, which came in both SV-16 and DV-32 versions, Stutz was trying to grab whatever they could of the luxury car market. It didn’t work. 

Stutz produced about 1,922 cars total in the 1930s, most of those in model year 1930. Production effectively ended in 1934, but the company didn’t announce it until the final two cars rolled out of the factory in 1935. They finally admitted their insolvency in 1937 and filed for bankruptcy.