Hello, all. I'm a motoring writer in England and have been tasked with writing an article about a 1955 Dodge "Royal Lancer" for a magazine. I use inverted commas because it's a four-door sedan. As soon as I started writing, I consulted a couple of reference books which indicated that the Lancer designation was only used for hardtops, and any sedan would just be a Royal (or Coronet or Custom Royal). But the car I'm writing about has Lancer badges on its wings, and a previous owner has even had "Royal Lancer" embossed on the number plates. To be doubly sure, I bought a '55 Dodge brochure and, sure enough, the Lancer name is only applied to the hardtops. Just to confuse matters, about five years ago the same magazine featured a '55 Custom Royal sedan which also referred to (and badged as) a Lancer.

Is there a detail which I've overlooked, or have both the cars referred to been incorrectly restored with Lancer badges? I'm attaching a picture of the car concerned. Please can someone confirm for me, is this car a Lancer or isn't it?

 

I don’t know how I can help you but I wonder if costume
has an impact on the model because in my searching on YouTube this is what I came up with every time
a hard top

 

Thanks, but by costume do you just mean trim level? That would be the defining factor between the Coronet, Royal and Custom Royal, but any one of those could carry the Lancer appelation as well, provided it was a hardtop.

 

From what I’ve seen I believe it is the Hardtop or convertible only, that said I don’t know if they had lower levels of trim/models in the hardtop or the convertible, I didn’t see anything. I noticed the car for your story doesn’t have a fair amount of the chrome that the one in the video does, coming up with a few badges is one thing but coming up with all the details a car would have is another. I would be skeptical, your car being authentic..

 

AS far as i know... It was just a trim level, badging, and both have V-8 engines.... And then that moved on to How many doors it had.... And to add to that, if it was a wagon all the trim was different...
I feel you really need to have a vehicle order form to maybe really find out what could go with what....

Just my 2 cents.. Great Question....

 

I agree original documentation would help a great deal.