1951 Frazer Tail Light Lenses - New Production

[KWZ]

Is anyone currently selling NOS taillight lenses for the 51F?  I have one set of NOS lenses I paid $300 for many, many years ago from Fred Walker.  Sometimes I just set them on my dresser and stare at them. 

[Gordie]

Your $300.00 lenses are probably worth $500.00 today.  Better put them in your bank vault!

[KWZ]

Is there any headway on new lenses?  What is the critical number of pre-orders to justify making them, and at what price?

[joefrazer]

No movement on the lenses. The fellow who was going to do them could not guarantee the quantity/price we wanted so we're back to square one. That, and demand seems to have faded.

[jerussel]

I'm still interested.  I may have to try to make my own!

[Doc]

How about out of glass.....maybe a glass blower?  They don't have to be perfect, just functional. 

[kaiserfrazerlibrary]

In order to be properly functional they have to be duplicates of the original in terms of detail;  the little ridges, curvature, etc were engineered for the lights to function properly.  Getting the 1951 Frazer lights to work properly even required incorporating a Fresnel lens to get the proper brilliance. 

The problem is tooling cost for the mold.  If there was a way to pre-sell 300-500 sets, the cost per pair (l and r) might be in the realm of affordable.

[Fid]

A sad story about the previous owner of that gray '51 Frazer that my dad had for awhile; The car was converted to 12V and the person he purchased it from told us how once the brake light switch got stuck on it, causing the brake lights to stay on, unbeknownst to him. They were on all night and into the next day before he noticed a smell from his garage. He went out there and noticed the additional heat produced by the 12 volt bulbs had melted his tail light lenses!  Ouch!  He did find three NOS lenses (back in the 80s) and I believe they are the same for L and R.  That would be tough to do today.

[Logan]

Sounds like as good a reason as any not to convert to 12 volt!

[KWZ]

Sounds like as good a reason as any not to convert to 12 volt!

Amen to that.  Back to the lenses, has anyone done the calculations to determine how much they would cost if we manufactured, say, 100 pairs, or 200 pairs, 300 pairs, etc.?  I think most people would not have any problem paying $300 for a pair.  This whole thread highlights the problems K-F (and most independent make enthusiasts) deal with.  I just helped my Dad do a 100% bone stock restoration on a '55 Chevy 210 hardtop.  Every single piece of that car is reproduced in a very high quality and will show up on your doorstep in two days. 

[Gordie]

Their are thousands of '55 Chevys being restored and maybe a hundred Kaiser's and Frazer's of all kinds so the numbers are just not there to make expensive parts for our cars if there is a small chance of recouping the sellers investment.  You can buy many different parts for many old cars like Porsche, Ford Model T's and A's and V-8's because there is a big demand.  I doubt if you could sell five sets of '51 Frazer tail lights at $300.00 each.  No one wants to invest thousands of dollars and have little return.  Ford V-8's are very popular old cars to restore but I was recently talking to Bob Drake who makes many parts for them and he told me that if it was not for the street rodders he could not continue manufacturing new parts as there is not that much demand from restorers.  You can buy complete bodies and frames for many of the early Fords and now Bob Drake is even making a complete 1940 Ford coupe to satisfy the demand from people who want one.  The complete body, fenders, hood, deck lid and frame etc sells for $30,000 and you need to provide your own drive train, upholstery and trim parts.  That would put a completed car in the $80,000 range if you do most of the labor yourself.  Rarity does not make a car valuable and our Kaiser's and Frazer's although very popular with us just will not bring enough money to justify completely restoring one at todays restoration costs.  Buy a good one to start with!  Many of our cars have trim parts that are getting very hard to find.

[Doc]

$300 a pair would be "reasonable" but not $600 for a chunk of plastic. Yep, you can find ANYTHING for a Chevy.  But there should be somewhere in between as other repro lenses are out there at reasonable prices for Packards (not just the '56 Clipper that everyone uses for streetrods, but the two-years only Clippers, the '55-56 seniors), the one-year only 1958 Edsel, the one-year only '54 Hudson, Studebakers, Nashes, et. al.  I'd settle for a lens w/o bottom screw holes and I'd emblem seal it on the car. no big deal.
Trim parts indeed!  How about molding clips?  Hundreds, maybe thousands out there but ever try to find the 28 clips that hold the '51 Frazer hardtop external rear window moldings on?  The big name brands suppliers don't have them. I finally found a place up in Ohio that had some I could modify to use, but I had to cut and file all 28 of them down to fit.  
And going on FOUR years now trying to find a left front vent window frame for the '51 hardtop. The inside and outside door moldings in ANY condition forget about it based on a four year search for those as well.  Sad thing about the vent window frame is I'm fairly certain some exist but to date no one has come back and replied they have it or will go look for it.
I would NEVER again undertake to restore a '51 Frazer or any other rare model car based on what I've learned the hard way over the last four years. I'll even throw in the '55 Studebaker in that category.  Too hard to find parts.