[Healeys] Early BN4 Demister Vents

Rich C richchrysler at quickclic.net
Tue Sep 21 18:49:43 MDT 2010


We have been doing research and can positively state a rather interesting
detail.....that the earliest Longbridge built 6 cylinder cars (2 port BN4's)
didn't use the demister vent slotted metal escutcheons (cover plates mounted
with 3 pins) on the first cars at least until some time after B.326. Roger
Moment researched B.153 and I have B.326 here and neither originally had the 3
holes in the shrouds or in the under support metal for mounting the metal
escutcheons.
It's interesting the very labour intensive feature they did; sewing an
additional larger reinforcement piece of vinyl, sewn, tacked and glued under
the dash to keep the slotted vinyl edges fastened down and intact. No wonder
the procedure was soon dropped in production in favour of the metal escutcheon
vents.
This sends us on a further search to find evidence of how long this practice
continued  until the metal escutcheons were used. We know they were installed
on B.1050 built 9 January, 1957.
Can anybody else come up with evidence of the sewn demister slots, or early
BN4 cars before Body 1050 (BN4 chassis 32036) showing the metal demister
escutcheons in place, along with body number and build date if possible?

Rich Chrysler


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