1952 Austin Princess 4-litre Limousine [DM4]

1952 Austin Princess 4-litre Limousine [DM4] in Play It Cool, Movie, 1962

Class: Cars, Limousine — Model origin:

Background vehicle

Comments about this vehicle

Author	Message
s13a ◊ 2020-02-13 04:48
dsl ◊ 2020-04-21 21:51	Very rare first year only version with single rear lights, Oct 52 to Sept 53. Not sure how many were made before the Sept 53 slight facelift (which also had a tweaked grille) - if I'm understanding Glass's info on chassis numbers correctly only 164 Austin Princesses across the three models [DM4, DS3, and DM3] were made Oct 52 to Sept 53 (chassis 10141 to 10314). For reference, the initial grille looked like this - pictures of Oxford Diecast 1:43 model AP001A. LWO 1 was the first [DM4] built and shown at 1952 Earls Court show. The then Princess Elizabeth bought it and the 2nd one made for the royal fleet, and they both had very small non-round rear lights as shown, which were changed to single round for production as seen in the film. Oxford made one error on the model - there should not be a chrome P on the boot. There are two further question marks which I can't resolve (i) there is no quarterlight divider within the rearmost side window - some of these limos have one from the earliest examples to later VdPs, but most don't. So it may not be a dating feature, simply a tickbox option through its life. (ii) the model has front indicators - these were not fitted for the first year at least, but the model AP001A is a reissued batch described by Oxford as the "Light Variant", because the first batch AP001 did not have them. Maybe LWO 1 received them later in its life?? Pictures here show this initial grille and absence of front indicators, plus quarterlight divider within the rearmost side window for earliest and late examples alongside others without.

Author

Message

s13a

◊ 2020-02-13 04:48

dsl

◊ 2020-04-21 21:51

Very rare first year only version with single rear lights, Oct 52 to Sept 53. Not sure how many were made before the Sept 53 slight facelift (which also had a tweaked grille) - if I'm understanding Glass's info on chassis numbers correctly only 164 Austin Princesses across the three models [DM4, DS3, and DM3] were made Oct 52 to Sept 53 (chassis 10141 to 10314).

For reference, the initial grille looked like this

- pictures of Oxford Diecast 1:43 model AP001A. LWO 1 was the first [DM4] built and shown at 1952 Earls Court show. The then Princess Elizabeth bought it and the 2nd one made for the royal fleet, and they both had very small non-round rear lights as shown, which were changed to single round for production as seen in the film. Oxford made one error on the model - there should not be a chrome P on the boot.

There are two further question marks which I can't resolve (i) there is no quarterlight divider within the rearmost side window - some of these limos have one from the earliest examples to later VdPs, but most don't. So it may not be a dating feature, simply a tickbox option through its life. (ii) the model has front indicators - these were not fitted for the first year at least, but the model AP001A is a reissued batch described by Oxford as the "Light Variant", because the first batch AP001 did not have them. Maybe LWO 1 received them later in its life??

Pictures here show this initial grille and absence of front indicators, plus quarterlight divider within the rearmost side window for earliest and late examples alongside others without.

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1952 Austin Princess 4-litre Limousine [DM4]