Topic: Whaddyacallit #224 - Solved! Imp (the other one, not the Hillman)

[Ray B.]

Ever seen this ?
I know very little about it myself, especially not the make.

Please, respond below and let us know the make of the car posted here. Please give any element of proof you have with your answer.
If you haven't registered yet, you need to do so in order to reply with your answer.
Also, please be sure to check out our other puzzles, and, please post a puzzle of your own if you'd like - the more, the merrier.

[DynaMike]

I'm afraid some pictures are missing...

[Ray B.]

I know. HE is doing it again...

[Otto Puzzell]

I know. HE is doing it again...

I can't see anything in your settings that would prevent attachments. I guess Ultra will have to look into it.

Meanwhile, I can attach the pics for you if you e-mail them to me.

[Ray B.]

I know. HE is doing it again...

I can't see anything in your settings that would prevent attachments. I guess Ultra will have to look into it.

Meanwhile, I can attach the pics for you if you e-mail them to me.

Thanks, Otto. I managed to attach this one, but I may do it if He doesn't let me attach the others. It's especially bad since yesterday, but there is nothing new to it, as you can see in several topics discussing this problem, as in this one:
http://www.autopuzzles.com/forum/index.php?topic=1797.0 (starting on page 2) and this one:
http://www.autopuzzles.com/forum/index.php?topic=5052.0

Usually, when I try to attach a file, it ends with tis error message: 
Database Error: Lost connection to MySQL server during query
File: /home/content/K/a/r/KarnUtz/html/forum/Sources/Post.php
Line: 1150.
In this event I can usually try again and then it works.
But often (like today), there is no way to establish the connection and it's just that NOTHING happens (except us all going nuts).
This only concerns the attachments. No trouble with ordinary posting. I can post the whole phone book if I choose, it goes straight through.

It's true that if this isn't fixed sooner or later, some of us are going to lose hope and interest (disguised threat). I truely hope tha Ultra can get Him to come to His senses.

[ImpishGrin]

True, I had to try some 30 times to post my 5 posts from Paris :/

[DynaMike]

Imp, made in USA (Glendale, Ca) in the late fourties. 7 hp 1-cylinder engine, 30 mph top-speed, plastic boy, 220 kgs.

[Otto Puzzell]

Quite heavy, that plastic boy. 

[DynaMike]

Oops, I missed a letter... 

[Ray B.]

Imp, made in USA (Glendale, Ca) in the late fourties. 7 hp 1-cylinder engine, 30 mph top-speed, plastic boy, 220 kgs.

Very good job, Dynamike, especially as this one (as my last four puzzles) didn't come from the internet.

However, as I have found the picture without a name and very little details, I need you (as asked) to give some proof of your identification (captioned picture for instance) which I am sure you must have. Thanks.

[DynaMike]

I found this very picture in a German book about microcars: 'Kleinwagen International - Mobile, Kleinwagen und Fahrmaschinen der 40er, 50er Jahre von über 250 Herstellern aus aller Welt' by Walter Zeichner (Bleicher Verlag, 1990). I'm sorry I cannot make a scan of it... Hugo90 has got the same book (cf. comments at http://www.autopuzzles.com/forum/index.php?topic=4555.0 ), maybe he could conform and make a scan ?

[Ray B.]

Let's say I am waiting for a confirmation by another puzzler, with a scanned captioned picture at best, or without it. As I don't have the name myself, it seems more serious: it's not that I doubt anyone's honesty (what would be the point of making up an answer for the sake of one point). But as you can see with your "Town Shopper" answer, a mistake can always happen.

[hugo90]

Sorry, I wasn't paying attention.  I've been looking and I don't seem to have that book.  I have several other microcar books, but don't find that Imp in them.  I have seen that picture somewhere, probably in the magazine of the Vintage Microcar Club.

[DynaMike]

Thanks, Hugo! No worries, soon I'm going to make a picture of it and post it here. But Ill have to wait till a friend of mine can lend me his camera (I don't have one) .

[hugo90]

AACK, I found the book.  I was using it to hold a box closed that I had glued.  Good heavy book.

Yes, the picture is in this volume, the Imp from Glendale, CA.  7ps, 60km/h. 

[Ray B.]

Thanks a lot, hugo.
With a double identification by Autopuzzlers, we can assume this is done.

[Otto Puzzell]

Also not an Intermeccanica IMP. More's the pity.

I'd still like to know more about plastic boy. Is that him lifting the front of the vehicle, or is he in the trunk?

[Paul Jaray]

However, as I have found the picture without a name and very little details, I need you (as asked) to give some proof of your identification (captioned picture for instance) which I am sure you must have. Thanks.

Here you are some details:

international Motor Products

The IMP was the brainchild of R. Stanley Griffin, a motion picture cameramen for Warner Brothers. The first IMP was built in 1948, and had a two-seat fiberglass body. During the four-year run of the IMP, each car shared basic features. Except for the body and its tubular steel chassis, Griffin purchased the rest of the parts from other suppliers. Griffin's primary concern with the IMP was the body, and not the mechanicals; his goal was to create a body that could be produced in one piece, including the dashboard. The IMP was intended for short trips to the grocery store, and had a small parcel compartment under the hood, and a rear-munted one-cylinder engine. A slightly redesigned Imp appeared in 1949, the biggest difference being the rectangular frame. Only one 1948 and six of the second series were built. Griffin sold his company and the rights to a new design in February 1951; his design became the Skorpion, a fiberglass body for Crosleys.

[Allan L]

Where's its grin

[Wendax]

The puzzle car is the 1948 Imp, the first one built.

[Ray B.]

Puzzle picture was gone, uploaded again.