model year by July. When the union contract ended in May 1964, the foundry was closed, however sufficient engines were built to complete the 1964 model run. Spotters can distinguish original second-series 1964 cars by their solid white steering wheels; cars built in South Bend were built with steering wheels that either matched the interior color or were two-toned with white as the upper and lower color. Also, cars without clocks had a blank plate in the instrument cluster which read "Studebaker Corporation" on South Bend cars and "Studebaker of Canada" on Hamilton cars. 1965 The Studebaker model lineup was changed little for 1965; without opening the hood, it is difficult to distinguish them from the 1964 models. With the end of engine production in South Bend, Studebaker's Hamilton plant no longer had a source of engines. The company was forced to search for an outside supplier. The small engineering staff quickly gathered and thoroughly tested engines from both General Motors and Ford. The Ford engines (basically the Falcon/Fairlane six-cylinder and V8) would not fit without expensive modifications to the cars, while the GM (Chevrolet designs built by the company's McKinnon Industries subsidiary) engines fit perfectly. The only hang-up was how to mate the new engines to the Borg-Warner transmissions that the company preferred to continue using. According to E.T. Reynolds, a Studebaker engineer, Checker Motors had started using Chevrolet engines in their taxicab and Marathon lines at about the same time that Studebaker began considering doing the same. Like Studebaker, Checker had long used Borg-Warner transmissions, and that company's engineers had created an adapter to mate them to the engines. Checker made its parts available to Studebaker, and the company began purchasing engines from General Motors' Canadian-subsidiary McKinnon Industries for the 1965 model year. The chosen powerplants were basically the same as found in the Chevrolet Chevy II. The Studebaker six was replaced by a six, and the well-known V8 replaced both Studebaker's 259 and 289 engines. For 1965, the Commander was offered in two- and four-door sedan form along with a Wagonaire. The Cruiser four-door sedan was still available, as was the Daytona Wagonaire. The Daytona convertible, hardtop and four-door sedan models were all discontinued, however. Aside from the Wagonaire, the only other 1965 Daytona was the vinyl-roofed two-door sports sedan, which drew its inspiration from the late-1964 Commander Special. All models continued the 1964 design with only