1955 Kaiser Manhattan 2-Door

Has the saggy Bloodhound eyes like a Buick

Man i love those 50s-60s designs from all over the world. Modern car designs suck balls.

What a gorgeous car, even now! I wish they had shown more of the interior, though. Still, I want one (gotta win the lottery first)!

beautiful car, but did you say it was an orphan car?

Kaiser Carabela!

Tired eyes look , like a Buick at first glance.

They made this car unchanged until 1962 in Argentina and it was called the Kaiser Carabela and 1962 was the last year for that body style.

Didn't it use a Paxton supercharger?

tired eyes, looks like a Buick...

Kaiser's son Edgar said of the demise of Kaiser Motors in the U.S., "Slap a Buick nameplate on them and they'd sell loke hotcakes." Independent car makers were always in a difficult position and it was actually surprising that they lasted as long as they did. The ghosts of Kaiser, Frazier, Hudson, Nash, Packard and Studebaker must haunt Elon Musk who has yet to turn a profit on the Tesla.

Paxton Supercharger...

I.K.A. — (Industrias Kaiser Argentina)‼️

I was told by a Kaiser owner, that Kaiser developed the engine that became the 283 cu. in. Chevy small block. Either that, or it was the 215 cu. in. aluminum V8 that was used in the F-85 Olds compact and with less headbolts in the small Buicks. Anyone confirm this?

Oh, I briefly had a '47 Kaiser, in 1956.

I’m drooling! Is that car purple or is it just the light?

Car looks like a half-breed, the center hood ornament looks like it came off a Desoto, and the headlights from a Buick.

love the design wow very nice

There was a guy, probably 40 years ago, on Kimberly road in Davenport Iowa that must have had 10 Kaisers sitting on his property. I once heard a story that his wife had them all towed away, and he had them all towed back. Kaiser was a very unique car!

Sweet

Not many people know that Kaiser was working on their own 288 cu in V8 but did not have the resources to make it. When Kaiser went under the designer went to work for American Motors who soon came out with a 287 cu in V8 of their own. This motor is very similar to the one Kaiser had on the drawing board.

Brasil.✌✌✌✌💎

Also produced in Argentina, sold as Kaiser Carabela, mostly to afluent people and, believe it or not for funeral homes, a must for them back in the earlys 60's, sadly it was not a good seller,

If this is a all numbers matching car, with only 44 ever made. This car is worth 250.000 bottom basement price....

There are few '55 Kaiser Manhattans in US because they were all sent to Argentina, while Kaiser was moving to Argentina.
Later, in 1958 through 1961 it was produced under the name of "Kaiser Carabela", but only in four door sedan style.
It was equiped with the same engine (Kaiser 6L 226, 115 HP) with standard 3 speed transmision.
Available in several color combinations, black where common with leather upholstery in the interior.
Also, it was a cheaper "Taxi" version.

My dad and my "uncle" (dad's best friend) BOTH had Kaisers AND Fraziers. EVERY time they would see one, they would try to buy it. At one time "we" collectively had over TWENTY of them. This all happened between 1959 and 1962. My dad had a Frazier Vagabond, while my uncle had a Kaiser Traveler. Great days - FUN memories.
Thank you for sharing...

Amazing color on that car. Kind of a metallic grape soda.

Those were the days when cars had STYLE. Today most of them are how the Model T was described, "cheesebox on a raft."

They didn’t make a 55. They simply sold the leftover 54s. Maybe the 44 built he references are the number of 55s.

wow!! what an absolutely GORGEOUS car!!!

Hello, great video!!! In Argentina they were produced for many years more. The Kaiser Carabella. Cheers!!!

¡ cuánto nos maravillaban en aquellis lejanos años a mi y a compañeros del colegio cuando sentíamos rugir a esta máquina y corriamos al alambrado que daba a la calle para ver pasar a la bestia frente nuestro echando una infernal polvareda de tierra!

Yes, the McCulloch superchargers are common, the one on this car is badged Kaiser and those are quite rare. I found one at a scrap dealer who thought it was a siren. I knew better and made him some profit. My wife at the time chastised me for not buying it at the ridiculously low price on the tag. I got great deals from this dealer later..great yet fair.

If I was looking for a new car in 55 I would have bought one. Nice looking car.

sweet

No matter how much lipstick you put on a pig it's still a pig.

My uncle Paul left the driveway in a beautiful white over black 53 Cadillac which in my 4 years of life had grown to love, and returned in a 53 Kaiser Manhattan. 4 year olds tend to say what’s on their mind so quickly I asked him, where’s the Cadillac? My Uncle responds this is my car now. My response was, why? Anyway this was in 1957. He sadly passed away in 1964, and when I turned 16 in 1969 my Aunt gave me the Kaiser. I had gotten a job at a gas station a few months earlier to which a hair cut was required. So here I am in 1969 where most of the guys had let their hair grow out a little. The streets are full of Mustangs, Camaros, Mopars and street rods, and I’m driving a 53 Kaiser with my nerdy hair cut. The car was such a fish looking eye sore that two of my friends parents told me not to park in their driveway. Here’s the happy ending. My Brother in Law felt so sorry for me that in 1970 he helped me get a 69 Mustang 428 CJ. It changed my life! Especially since now my passenger seat was filled with a cute blonde tennis playing school girl. 🙏

Beautiful cars, gotta respect the folks maintaining the survivors, but i'm the type to restore a rustbucket with sheet metal and elbow grease!

looks too good to drive....a treasure...breathtaking!

I would love to run that that thing at the Hillclimb in Newport Indiana

My first car was a 51 Kaiser. Then I found a 53 in much better shape, bought it, installed a 55 Chevy V8 and drove it 100
miles a day to work for three years. Then I found a rare 54 two-door (only 150 made) which was parked next to where my in-laws lived...with Utah plates on it. It had been abandonded by someone at the nearby military base when he was shipped overseas. It took me a lot of effort and legwork, but I was able to trace down his former commanding officer....a really kind and understading guy who signed some important papers for me, which if he had not done so, don't know if I could have ever gotten it registered.

This one, though a lot more work, I removed the flathead six cylinder Continental fork lift engine and installed a '57' Pontiac motor (347). I drove that car all over the western USA, made several trips to my first wife's native Missouri and really loved driving a 'sleeper'. Then one day a train crossing highway 101 in Oregon had stopped traffic....I stopped, but a car came up behind me, didn't realize the stopped traffic and plowed right into me. By pulling the left rear fender out, I managed to drive it 800 miles back to my home, but it was so badly out of alignement, ground off a new set of tires in the process.

It was then I decided if I were going to install Pontiac motors in my vehicles, might as well drive one....and still do...an 88 Fiero V6 5 speed. BHE

kaiser manhattan paso a llamarse kaiser caravela en argentina cuando la kaiser emigra de eeuu a argentina.!

kaiser manhattan was renamed kaiser caravela in argentina when the kaiser emigrated from the usa to argentina.!

Nice looking car. One of 44 made in '55. Can't be many left.

Guy wanted to buy it back, what a regret he must have had

Olds raised the price at the last moment and the kaisers balked.

An uncle of mine had a late 40s Kaiser. Too bad they didn't make it. Underfunded and poor management decisions. Another victim of the Big Three along with Studebaker, Packard, Hudson and Nash. All great marques. As a kid I rode in all of them except Nash.

Beautiful car with lots of very beautiful ornamentation, classy!

In 1953 the GM Hydromatic plant burned down. Kaiser, having recently purchased Willys, no longer needed the Willow Run plant so they sold it to GM. Wags at Kaiser said that Edgar Kaiser personally lit the match to the GM plant. I once owned a 1954 Kaiser Special which began life as a '53 Manhattan that Kaiser converted to a1954. A lot of changes but it still had the '53 dash and rear window.
Many years earlier, a junkyard in Moorpark, California had a good running 1951 Kaiser club coupe. When I got there, they had pulled the engine out of it for a fork lift or something and scrapped the rest. Heard it was a nice looking car. And the club coupe was, in my opinion, the best looking of the 1951-55 Kaisers.
PS - The last new car my father bought was a 1953 Olds Super 88 with stick shift. He said there was a shortage of Hydromatic transmissions. Some actually came with the Buick Dynaflo.

I just bought 1951 Kaiser everything's original inside 4 door. Very nice these cars are very rare

There was one of these on CL a couple of years back that needed restoration and was missing the supercharger. Would have been a good candidate for a swap of a ‘55 Olds V8 with a J2 setup.

According to "Last onslaught on Detroit" by Richard Langworth, the deal with Oldsmobile to by their V8 engine fell through when GM, at the last minute raised the price to the point that it was no longer economically feasible. Perhaps, GM execs realized the lighter Kaiser would have had a performance advantage over the Olds 88. And while an in house V8 was under development, the money was not there to get it into production. Instean, they chose to build the Henry J. The unfinished Kaiser V8 may have formed the basis for the first AMC V8.