1931 Cadillac Model 452A Dual-Cowl Phaeton
edited by David Barth, 26 December 2008.
Courtesy "The Auto Collections" showroom at the Imperial Palace Hotel and Casino in Las, Vegas, Nevada, USA. Photos were
taken 5 November 2006.
The information presented below is from "Imperial Palace Auto Collection" by Ralph Engelstad, owner of the hotel/casino
and the automobiles until his death in 2002.
During the 1920's, the luxury automobile reached a peak with the advent of this model, the Cadillac Model 452A.
Conventional, straight-eight engines tended to run rough, and the discerning public wanted a smoother-running engine.
In 1925, Larry Fischer, the head of Cadillac, and his engine development manager, Owen Nacker, set out to create a
smoother-running V16 engine, the first one made in America, to power the ever-heavier, top-of-the-line cars.
In 1917, in Europe, Ettore Bugatti designed a V-16 aircraft engine. The U.S. was interested in the engine and sent
Howard Marmon to investigate. (Howard would introduce his own V16 engine in 1931.) Duesenberg was awarded the contract
to build the V-16 aircraft engine, but the WWI ended before more than eleven units were manufactured.
In 1925, when Larry Fischer contacted Nacker's friend, Marmon, Nacker was already in the design phase for a V-16 to
power an automobile. The specifications for the engine and car looked like this:
- Number of cylinders: 16
- Angle of Vee: 45 degrees
- Bore: 3.0 inches
- Stroke: 4.0 inches
- Displacement: 7.4 liters (452 cubic inches, there being 61 cubic inches in one liter)
- Valves per cylinder: 2, operated through pushrods and rockers
- Camshaft: single, located at the center of the Vee
- Power: 165 hp at 3400 rpm
- Wheelbase: 148 inches
- Automobile weight: 6,000 lbs
- Transmission: 3-speed manual
- Top speed: 90 mph
- Styling: By Harley Earl
- Year introduced: January 1930
- Location of manufacture: Fleetwood facilities in Detroit, Michigan, USA
- Number of units produced in first half of 1930: 2,000
- Number of units produced in second half of 1930: 887
- Number of units produced in 1931: 364
- Original price: $6,500 USD
- Number of Fleetwood-bodied phaetons built: 85
- V-16 production in this configuration: 1930 to 1937
- Less complex V-16 production run: 1937 to 1940
The model designation was based on the displacement, 452, as in traditional Cadillac nomenclature.
The primary purpose for the v-16 was not performance, but prestige.
