A Girard Pierce Arrow Car

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

A Girard Pierce-Arrow

Pressed Steel

Battery Lit Car

(Circa 1930's)

Dimensions:

14 1/2" (L) x 5 1/2" (W) x 5" (H)

368 mm x 140 mm x 128mm

Weight:

3 pounds 5.9 ounces

1.528 kg

     Yesterday, I received a beautiful 1930's Girard Pierce-Arrow car.  It's made of pressed steel, has a wind-up mechanism to allow it to move, and has a battery-operated switch to power the 3 small lightbulbs.

     I had purchase a similar one before which was missing many parts, and even though I had a nice seller on E-Bay send me photos of a complete car, I bid on 1 that was complete. It's much easier to show a handy person a real one when it comes to making parts for the one missing parts.

    For today, I'll talk both about the new arrival, and looking at a complete and incomplete car in terms of restoration. I'd also like to mention that in most old or new books or old catalogues, there usually is only 1 photo of the toy. As such, it's hard to know what's missing in a toy, or if the toy was repainted.

 The Underside of the Girard Pierce-Arrow Car

Not only does the car move, but it has a bell that clanks.

This is done by 2 prongs on the rear axle that hit a small metal spring that then hits the bell.

 The Battery Compartment.

The car takes size D batteries.I had to go to 3 places before I found the size D.I think this size of battery is eventually going to be discontinued.I asked an electrician friend of mine what would then happen if one one couldn't find size D batteries anymore.He said that you could resize the battery compartment in order to accommodate the smaller-sized batteries., which in this case happen to be size C.

This certainly was a very sophisticated and costly toy for the time that is was then made. I'm sure my father and most of my reader's parents never had such toys!

Thanks for the visit, and have a great morning, afternoon, or evening, wherever you may be reading this blog.