Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1917-02-10
DEVELOPMENT OF
SUPER SIX IDEA
Hudson Distributor, L. IL
Hagerling, Tells of the Years
Biggest Achievement

The greatest achievement of the
Hudson Motor Car company" said
l.. II. Hagerling, lis the development
of the Hudson Super-SiX. By that in
vention u new principle has been in
troduced into motor engineering.
when that car was announced a
year ago we did not know then, nor
have we found yet, the limitation of
its possibilities. So startling were the
claims made for the car last jan
uary that we could scarcely accept
them as other than the expression of
an intense desire to sell a new ar
ticle. But we have proved since then
by winning all worth while stock car
hillclimb records, that what had been
said for it was modest indeed.
THE achievement of the Super
Six is not only of far reaching intiu-
ence in the design of motor cars, but
its effect upon the business of the
Hudson Motor Car company is also
tremendous. The factory delivered to
users in eleven months an excess of
$4,000 Hudson Super-Sixes. 1t more
than doubled the volume of the Hud-
son business and made them the larg-
est producers of fine cars. selling over
sf,100 in the world.
1T is natural that this condition
should have been brought about be-
cause of the performance records
made by the Hudson Super-SiX. It has
established new records for speed and
endurance of stock cars in every test
entered. These tests were made un-
der the supervision of the American
Automobile association.
"Mathematically the principle of the
Hudson Super-SiX gave q tremendous
engineering promise. It's possibilities
could not be fully believed even by
the factory engineers. But it was
proved out in the laboratory, and
from that moment every test made
with the Hudson Super-SiX revealed
as much new assurance of the car as
it did to the public. We have no
knowledge yet of the limitations of
endurance of the Hudson. Super-SiX
In the first tests, when a fully equip
ped car with driver and passengers
was sent for 100 miles at .74.67 miles
per hour, they proved endurance far
beyond that which any similarly
equipped car had ever shown.
Then the factory wanted to know
Six before it would break down, so
they entered the 24-hour test. The car
kept on going and was in such fresh
condition that at the end of the %
hours, it was still in apparently as
good condition as when it started. 1t
had beaten the best previous record
by 52 per cent Formerly no machine
could endure the stamina of the best
drivers. In this case Ralph Mulford,
who had participated in making the
best previous American 24-hour re-
cord, drove the Hudson Super-SiX all
the way. He sat at the wheel twenty
four hours, but he did not exhaust
the car.
Then they went after the trans
continental record and beat the best
previous time by IA hours So minutes
The car was doing so well when it fin
ished at New York that it was sent
back across the continent. 1t was the
first car to ever attempt the round
trip against time.
"The round trip was made in % days
81 hours, which is only 2 la days lon
ger than the best one-way record at
tanned by an eight cylinder car only
shortly before the Hudson made its
run.
I'm every locality the Hudson Super
Six, in the hands of private owners,
holds the local record for speed, hill
climbing, or whatever other tests the
people in that locality put their cars
to. From this it will be seen that we
are proud of the achievement of the
Hudson Motor Car company in the
year 1916. I believe we can point
with pardonable pride to the fact that
no manufacturer stands on a founda-
tion of greater promise for the year
1917. They have proved the things
that make the Hudson Super-Six the
wanted car, and reduction has been
brought up to a point where fine cars
can be built with painstaking care in
larger quantities than any similarly
fine car that was ever produced in the
history of the industry"