swivel front seat

The Canadian Dodge pix are great.
I remember seeing them many years ago.
I'm not sure but I think I remember seeing a commercial on old B&W TV
about a Chrysler product that had swivel front seat available as an
option. The idea was when you opened the door the seat swiveled toward
the outside, thus making it easier to get in and out.
Am I remembering correctly ???
Anyone ever heard of such equipment ? I'm pretty sure it was a Chrysler
product.

Found this for a 1960 Chrysler.....

My 1976 Chevrolet Monte Carlo had swivel bucket seats.

Mike

--
Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass...

It's about learning to dance in the rain.

"S.rathbern" > wrote in message ...
> The Canadian Dodge pix are great.
> I remember seeing them many years ago.
> I'm not sure but I think I remember seeing a commercial on old B&W TV
> about a Chrysler product that had swivel front seat available as an
> option. The idea was when you opened the door the seat swiveled toward
> the outside, thus making it easier to get in and out.
> Am I remembering correctly ???
> Anyone ever heard of such equipment ? I'm pretty sure it was a Chrysler
> product.

The Chrysler Corporation introduced swivel front seats in 1959. They were
available as options on the lower priced cars and as standard equipment on
some of the luxury models. The feature never spread to the other
manufacturers or maybe Chrysler took out a patent that the others didn't
want to pay. The swivel seats remained available through 1961. Here are
some pictures including an advertisement for that specific feature. If you
want to see some Dodges, Imperials, DeSotos and Plymouths with the swivel
seats, just let me know and I'll post some of those for you too.

Max

"S.rathbern" > wrote in message
...
> The Canadian Dodge pix are great.
> I remember seeing them many years ago.
> I'm not sure but I think I remember seeing a commercial on old B&W TV
> about a Chrysler product that had swivel front seat available as an
> option. The idea was when you opened the door the seat swiveled toward
> the outside, thus making it easier to get in and out.
> Am I remembering correctly ???
> Anyone ever heard of such equipment ? I'm pretty sure it was a Chrysler
> product.

S.rathbern added these comments in the current discussion du
jour ...

> The Canadian Dodge pix are great.
> I remember seeing them many years ago.
> I'm not sure but I think I remember seeing a commercial on old
> B&W TV about a Chrysler product that had swivel front seat
> available as an option. The idea was when you opened the door
> the seat swiveled toward the outside, thus making it easier to
> get in and out. Am I remembering correctly ???
> Anyone ever heard of such equipment ? I'm pretty sure it was a
> Chrysler product.

The senior Chrysler products had swivel seats from 1959 to
sometime in 1961. I'm not sure, but I think they were cancelled
mid-year 1961. I don't know off-hand if Plymouths and Dodges had
these seats, but DeSoto, Chrysler, and Imperial did.

The first swivel seats had a lever under them for the driver or
passenger to pull when they wanted the seat to swivel out or back
in. Later, I think it was 1961, the seats were designed to
automatically swivel out or back in when the door was opened or
closed respectively.

It was a very complex mechanism for the times, with a large
spring to assist in moving the seat out with someone sitting on
it. Tolerances were always a problem. Sometimes, the seats
rattled while others jammed up and refused to rotate, a really
bad problem if they were out when the jam occurred. My
remembrence from seeing museum exhibits and reading various
Chrysler books was that they were cancelled because of excessive
warranty, high cost of production, and too high a price that
caused some customers to balk.

Then, I read another book on Chrysler's history printed circa
1995 or so, in which the author says that the real reason was a
****ed off senior executive. According to this story, the big
shot and his wife were driving to some poss party, his wife for
some reason had pulled her evening gown up high on her legs, and
they rode along. Then, when they got to the party, before she
could pull her dress back down, the valet parking guy opened the
door to help her out, the seat swiveled, the wind caught her
dress, and everybody saw her panties! That's such a wild story,
and one I've never heard before, that I think there may be some
bull**** content or some over dramatization here.

So, take you pick for the reasons swivel seats were cancelled.
They were obviously introduced at what Chrysler believed would be
a popular idea with customers and also enhanced the generally
very good reputation Chrysler had for engineering innovation.
Now, Chrysler products of the day had attrocious quality, and did
from the 1950s into the Iacocca era in the early 1980s when a
concerted effort was made to build at least reasonable quality
cars. But, since the days of Walter P. himself, Chrysler did have
a recognized rep for innovation, and had a long list of "firsts"
in the industry.

I never had the opportunity to sit in one of these cars, but I
sometimes see the seats in either cloth or leather, e.g., a 300F,
at car shows.

--
HP, aka Jerry