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Manufacturer's warranty?


busycoupe

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This forum is all about how to keep 60, 70 and 80 year old cars running. Most forum members drive their cars, or want to drive their cars; some as daily drivers.  This led me to wonder .... what were the original manufacturer' warranties?  Did they warranty their cars at all?  I worked in service stations in the early 70's and our bread and butter was was replacing 2 year old batteries, exhaust systems, tires, brakes, etc.  All of these were long out of warranty.  What were the warranties like in the 1940's?  

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pulling my original 1952 owners manual page 33 shows limited warranty less tires to the original purchaser for 90 days or 4000 miles whichever comes first....

 

of note...! 

 

at the forefront of the manual is a written letter insert to owners to take advantage of the dealership 1000 and 3000 miles services.  It did not state if this was a warranty service, or needed to be performed to keep warranty effective.

Edited by Plymouthy Adams
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Yes all my historic 40-50s  vehicles that I have owners manuals stated 90 days or 4000 miles which was ever first. Taillight warranties?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

i

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3 hours ago, allbizz49 said:

Good question, I was wondering about the warranty myself. I got one of those spam calls the other day and they said my warranty was about to expire, haha.  

I've gotten a few of those "Extend your Warranty" calls also.  It's funny...when they connect me with a representative, and I try to extend the warranty on my P15, they hang up on me!  Go figure.??

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3 minutes ago, Oldguy48 said:

I've gotten a few of those "Extend your Warranty" calls also.  It's funny...when they connect me with a representative, and I try to extend the warranty on my P15, they hang up on me!  Go figure.??

I've also tried for a 75 Dodge Dart, and that's also a no-go.....

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I got an offer for a guaranteed life insurance policy for LuLu Adams....LuLu was at the time my 7 year old Chinese Pug....who are these poeple?  My buddy would jerk these guys around and ask them to repeat what they said, they tire quickly....can I get an order of fries with that....?

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I have the original Owners (Glovebox)Manual that came with my car when new, it was still there in September 1971 when I bought the car, also have both a 1940 Oz Dodge Sales Brochure and 1940 Oz Plymouth Sales Brochure.....none of these mention any sort of warranty implied or stated........and the Owners Manual is in fact a US sourced North American D15 manual as it only has LHD cars, dashboards, controls etc pictured but occaisonally mentions RHD , for example, to pull out the throttle when starting a RHD car.......I'd have thought that considering that the Oz market was so small compared to North America that the fact you got 4 wheels, oops 5 with the spare AND tyres with your new car that you should be satisfied......."what?.......you want air in those tyres too???"......ungrateful Aussie...........lol........AFAIK up until the 1960's car warranties here in Oz were usually 3 months or 4000 miles or thereabouts..........I think a 12 month/10000 mile warranty started to come in in the 1970's.........andyd

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Our Chrysler Corp introduced a 5 year/50,000 mile warranty for, I believe, 1964. That was a pretty big deal. Maybe there were some 12 month warranties in the 50's from someone but 90 days seemed standard on a lot of things, including appliances and such.

 

I was leafing through some old classifieds ads from the "malaise" era and one of the things that struck me was how many 5-6 year old cars, and sometimes even 3-4 years old, were being advertised with "new paint" or "rebuilt engine". 

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I just went & checked thru the various manuals & books I have.....the 1936 Plymouth P1/P2 Owners Manual I have states a 90 day or 4000 mile warranty.........andyd  

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11 hours ago, Bryan G said:

Our Chrysler Corp introduced a 5 year/50,000 mile warranty for, I believe, 1964. That was a pretty big deal. Maybe there were some 12 month warranties in the 50's from someone but 90 days seemed standard on a lot of things, including appliances and such.

 

I was leafing through some old classifieds ads from the "malaise" era and one of the things that struck me was how many 5-6 year old cars, and sometimes even 3-4 years old, were being advertised with "new paint" or "rebuilt engine". 

I'm pretty sure that the 5yr/50,000mi warranties were on the powertrain only, not bumper to bumper.  Growing up in Massachusetts I remember most cars getting rust through in 2 or 3 years.  

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I believe that rust issue is almost still a large problem especially with the new chemical...electroplate has extended the mean time before rust through....but the rust is still in progress nonetheless....this is still the prime reason I will not live in the great white north...my son is working a late model SUV from the north....brake caliper bleeders all broken out...the lines corroded beyond safe use....awaiting new lines now as customer wants factory lines and order the line kit.  

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I remember the owner's manual in my 64 300 talking about the 7 step process to prevent rust and the warranty, but darned if I remember the time frame on rust, power train was 5/50000.  I remember that because it was the same as my then 2 year old Daytona.

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8 hours ago, busycoupe said:

I'm pretty sure that the 5yr/50,000mi warranties were on the powertrain only, not bumper to bumper.  Growing up in Massachusetts I remember most cars getting rust through in 2 or 3 years.  

We got a 63 Plymouth fairly late in the model year. Still had that car, and considered it as still pretty new with lots of life left in it, when I went to upstate NY for college in 1970. After all it was only 7 years old. Coming out of the airport terminal in Rochester I was astounded by the fact that “brand new” cars, only a couple of years old, had rust showing and there were no cars at all as old as our new car back in Arizona.

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