The Oldsmobile Series 40 is a car from Oldsmobile, built from 1912 to 1913, as the assembly line was turning motoring into an industry. Under the bonnet: NNN cuin.
The story
The Series 40 Defender was a four-seat passenger car produced by General Motors for its Oldsmobile division in 1912 and 1913, and was manufactured at Lansing Car Assembly in Lansing, Michigan.
It continued to be the entry-level model for Oldsmobile, while Oakland Motor Car Company remained GM's entry level brand as Chevrolet didn't join GM until 1917. The Series 40 was the base model of three platforms sharing a platform with the Buick Model 10, with the mid-range Series 28 Autocrat, and the top level Series 23 Limited.
What is underneath
Power comes from NNN cuin. It weighs NNN -. The wheelbase is NNN in. These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.
Its place in the line
Its family tree is legible: it took over from the Model S; its successor was the Model 42; assembly was at Lansing, Michigan (Lansing Car Assembly), United States. Its contemporaries in the catalogue — the Bugatti Type 18, the Benz & Cie. Benz 10/30 PS, the Bugatti type 15 limousine — show what else the money bought that year. Nearby in the Oldsmobile catalogue sit the Oldsmobile 442 and the Oldsmobile 88.
What it costs now
MotorJury scores cars on the United States complaint and recall record, and the Oldsmobile Series 40 has none: too old, too rare, or never sold there. Its value today is a collector's question, decided by provenance and condition rather than by a class average.