The Homebuilt 1901 Olds
In the September, 1960, Mechanix Illustrated magazine ran a large article about building a replica of this famous first Oldsmobile. It's distinctive curved dash and front to back springs makes this one horseless carriage that almost all recognize. It has been a desire of many home builders to construct one of their own.
This article in MI inspired many to attempt a difficult job. Difficult for two major reasons. The first being the plans done for publication in a magazine. The final drawings are many times drawn by staff artists who have little or no practical shop experience. Hence, a lot of details are sketchy or non-existent. From an engineering standpoint, many areas leave much to be desired design wise.
In any case, we are reproducing these famous plans for all our readers to enjoy and learn from. The best advice I can offer is to study these and try to apply the body style to a more producible car such as designed by Jimmy Woods.
The plans are reproduced in PDF format and read the best after printing out. Some of the dimensions are hard to read. We apologize, we did the best we could.
To view MI plans click on: ( 1901 Olds Plans )