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Decades-old Mystery Solved: Bill Crabtree's 3/8ths scale 1955 Lincoln from Alex Tremulis' Advanced Styling Studio

3/7/2017

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The mystery model as it sat in Marty Martino's garage.
Recently a question came up on a public FaceBook page, RETRO AUTOMOTIVE PROTOTYPES & Concept Designs, about the origins of a 3/8ths scale styling model believed to have come from one of the major automobile manufacturers. Photographs accompanied the query of the model as it sat in master builder Marty Martino's garage. Martino is well-known in automobile concept circles as the man who recreated the 1956 GM Club de Mer show car, restored the 1955 Chevrolet Biscayne Motorama concept car, recreated the 1955 Ford Futura, and is currently recreating the 1956 Ghia/Chrysler Norseman, the one that's still in the hold of the sunken Andrea Doria ocean liner.
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Just a few of Marty Martino's many automotive accomplishments.
BACKGROUND
In the 1990's, the model was discovered by noted automobilia collector Sam Sandifer in a yard sale in Wixom, Michigan, with absolutely no other concrete information about its history. It was thought it may possibly have come from Ford and the Wixom location may have indicated a possible Lincoln connection.
With little to go on except the photos of the model itself, Steve Tremulis sought to find an answer as to whether or not it really was a Ford-originated model, but found so much more in his quest that this story deserves to be told.

Clues as to the model's origins came from several unique design elements in the model itself, with two design structures of particular interest: The Chevron-shaped taillights were integrated with the rear bumper, and the canopy was a pillarless design. Hopefully, those two features would provide all the necessary identifying marks to pinpoint who the original designer may have been. Below is a more recent photo that better represents the mystery model.
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A copy of the mystery model recently restored by Marty Martino
ALEX TREMULIS ARCHIVES
Alex Tremulis was one of the most influential automotive stylists and was head of Ford's Advanced Styling Studio for several years in the mid-1950's. He kept a large archive of his work throughout his life, including many of the design concepts that were developed at Ford. Part of his responsibilities was to train new employees and art students in the many aspects of automobile design. It was thought that a new designer learning the trade could exercise his imagination unhindered and if he was to mess up, it would be better to do it in the Advanced Styling Studio rather than in production where mistakes could be very costly.  In all, Tremulis mentored over 140 future designers and he maintained a significant file of many of their incredible design studies. If the mystery car came from Ford during Tremulis' tenure, there was a good chance it would be found in his files.
THE SEARCH FOR A SKETCH
In 1955, Alex Tremulis prepared a speech to be given to Henry Ford (II) during his tour of the Advanced Styling Studio. Along with the script of the speech, he had maintained the photographs of dozens of concept renderings that accompanied his tour. Also included were numerous photos of the students who came through the studio. The complete tour and photos can be found HERE.  One particular photo contained a drawing that incorporated both the Chevron taillights and the pillarless greenhouse. The top center drawing had all the hallmarks of the mystery car! To add even more possibility that it was the original sketch for the mystery car is that it is directly above a drawing done by a young Jim Powers of his 1955 Palomar concept. The Palomar also had a pillarless canopy and was also chosen to be modeled in 3/8ths scale, so the sketch was displayed in the right place and in very good company.
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3/8ths scale renderings from various designers as they appeared in Ford's Advanced Styling Studio in 1955.
A closer examination of the mystery car model compared to the sketch shows that the greenhouse had changed from a rather complex contour for the C pillar to a simple support member. This would be a typical change that most concepts go through as they develop: The sketch would have been critiqued by Alex Tremulis and other stylists and their suggestions for improvements to the design would be incorporated into the next iteration under Tremulis' direction. So where did the model's new greenhouse come from? Well, they didn't have to look very far. It looks like it came directly from another one of Alex Tremulis' 3/8ths scale design studies called the Madame X! 
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Alex Tremulis' Madame X 3/8ths Scale Model
Examining the side trim of the sketch as compared to the model, it was clear that it too underwent improvements in its features. Gone was the trim-within-trim arrow and spear. Instead, a simple cove was incorporated down the side of the car. A quick photoshop of adding the Madame X's pillarless roof to the sketch and cleaning up the side trim results in a near perfect match for the mystery car in question!
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With cleaner side trim and Madame X's greenhouse, the sketch is a near-identical match to the mystery model
THE MODEL IN VINTAGE PHOTOS
But how could the model in Tremulis' studio escape the camera with all the photos taken at the time? Well, it didn't. It's been there the entire time waiting to be discovered, just not as a featured model. Several other 3/8ths scale model concepts took top billing in the Advanced Styling Studio, namely the futuristic "La Tosca" and its companion, the proposed 200 mile per hour 1956 Thunderbird "Mexico". Both concepts wore the Thunderbird badge, Ford's most sporty vehicle in direct competition with GM's Corvette. La Tosca even made it to the cover of Car Life in 1955 and was also featured in LIFE magazine. Shown below are two photos of the La Tosca and the Mexico models in what looks like candid shots taken during the formal photoshoot by LIFE magazine.
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Alex Tremulis' La Tosca and Mexico 3/8ths scale models apparently getting prepared for a LIFE Magazine photoshoot
Sometimes it's not the main feature that's important, but it's what's happening on the sidelines that makes the headlines. And that's exactly what these photos show. In the background is the model and its mystery that would eventually be solved 62 years later. Magnified and contrast-enhanced, they clearly show the model in question, and even more detail with the two-tone paint used for the cove and body!
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The mystery model found in the background of the photos featuring La Tosca and Mexico 3/8ths scale models
PictureLincoln sketch with the model's front end treatment
THE LINCOLN CONNECTION
Further research suggests there may well have been a connection of the model to John Najjar's Lincoln studio. The sketch at left bears a striking resemblance to the model and is badged "LINCOLN" across its front trim. This sketch was also displayed in Tremulis' Advanced Styling Studio. It is well known that La Tosca was ordered over to Lincoln shortly after Tremulis' antics with the radio controlled model. As told, Tremulis would sometimes drive La Tosca across Oakwood Blvd to the training grounds. On one such occasion, its batteries were running low and held up traffic, including an unamused Ford executive, Earle MacPherson. It was just a short while later that Tremulis would be relieved of the model. So it wouldn't be too much of a stretch if the mystery model joined La Tosca in its departure from Advanced Styling and travelled over to the Lincoln studio (but probably not under its own power). In any case, the Lincoln sketch incorporating the mystery model's front end treatment indicates that the model was at some point associated with Lincoln.

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As further support for the Lincoln association, both the sketch and the model appear to have incorporated side trim styling cues from the production 1953 Lincoln 2-door hardtop. As styling exercises for his students in the Advanced Styling Studio, oftentimes Tremulis would supply a main theme for inspiration. It's very possible this assignment could have originated with the question "What could the Lincoln of the future look like?"

DESIGNER REVEALED
So who was the original designer of the drawing in Tremulis' studio? Thankfully, the original photos are 8x10 glossies from which the signature or the artist can be identified. The original 3/8ths scale rendering was signed by Wm. Crabtree and photographed in December, 1955. But Crabtree is not a marquee name when it comes to notable Ford concept cars of the 1950's... Yet.
So who was William Crabtree? It turns out that he had a lifelong love of automobiles and dreamed of becoming a car designer. So in 1953, just out of high school, he entered a Motor Trend contest to design the car of the future where the winners would receive a scholarship to the highly esteemed Art Center in Pasadena, California. Crabtree's entry was chosen as one of the winners and he was awarded a four year scholarship. His accomplishment was noted in Long Beach's Independent-Telegram as well as the September 1953 Motor Trend as shown below. 

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The Independent Press-Telegram in Long Beach covered his winning in their August 30, 1953 edition. As they described: "The car of the future will be maneuverable so that it can be parked easily, and functional so that it can travel fast in heavy traffic. It will be highly specialized, and it is likely to be somewhat smaller than present day cars. So believes an enthusiastic 18-year-old, William King Crabtree - "Bill" to his friends - who has been interested in cars all of his life, and has sketched cars much of his life. Bill, 933 Terraine Ave., was one of the five winners of a national contest sponsored by Motor Trends magazine for new car designs. His award is a four-year $2000 scholarship to the Los Angeles Art Center, starting with the term beginning Sept. 28. Guess what he will do at the Art Center? "Design cars, mostly." says Bill. When Bill read about the contest in the spring, he already had most of the work done because he had been accumulating drawings for a couple of years. "I bundled off a portfolio of 25 or 30 sketches and 10 finished drawings, and got In just under the wire," says the lanky 6-foot 1-inch youth who works at a service station at 3565 Pacific Coast Hwy. His prize-winning drawing of a coupe done in two-tone gold and black, appears under the heading "From Dream to Drawing Board to . . . " in the current issue of Motor Trend.

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As Motor Trend described: William King Crabtree, Long Beach, designed and engineered for the future with these principles in mind: the safety, needs and comfort of the public. Born in Oklahoma 18 years ago, William Crabtree is approaching automotive design with ideas well ahead of his years. He believes in simplicity of style, maximum safety and design that is practical, attractive, comfortable -- yet low in cost. His coupe looks nearly 'sonic' in concept, but it utilizes all the desires of the designer, who feels that this car could be developed in the next 10 years. "The rear-engined car would be the size of present cars in the low price class. Controls are centrally located. As the door retracts into the rear fender, the window panel is raised. Air scoops are more than decoration; scoops on the sides cool the engine and the brakes; an air- scoop-on the car's roof provides fresh air for the air-conditioning system. The fact that this car, and variations of it, are designed to seat either two or four people at the most is an indication of the trend to specialization in our cars of the future." In Bill's model, the seats would lie separate and adjustable, similar to bus seats. Each seat also would have a safety belt. He planned the car for commercial use, and thinks it would make an excellent police car. How fast would it go? "I don't know," admits Bill. "I'm a designer, not an engineer."

Motor Trend gave out several scholarships in their contest and one other winner is of particular interest with ties to Bill Crabtree. It turns out that  the other future designer was also hired by Alex Tremulis into Ford's Advanced Styling Studio as none other than McKinley Thompson, the auto industry's first African-American car designer. Thompson's story is also fascinating and was previously featured HERE.

So Crabtree and Thompson must have been classmates at Art Center as they learned the tools of their new trade. A search of photos from the Art Center archives brings up this gem, where indeed Bill Crabtree is at the far right of the photo beside his classmate McKinley Thompson, along with the great Art Center instructor and master at clay modeling, Joe Thompson (center).
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Thanks to Art Center College of Design's Archives
Bill Crabtree and McKinley Thompson were to make such a positive impression on Tremulis that they both were offered styling jobs within Ford before their full scholarships at Art Center would conclude. Tremulis' main criteria for hiring potential designers and mentoring his students was not only talent, but if they showed a passion for design, a trait both Crabtree and Thompson clearly possessed.  But life inside Ford would prove somewhat difficult for Crabtree as his other passion in life was to possibly become a minister. The fast lifestyle of the stylists often included smoking and drinking, sometimes too much, and that did not sit well with the budding automobile designer. After nearly two years at Ford, Crabtree decided it would be best for him to return to California where he would build his career and family.

Picture Bill Crabtree, 1953
After he left Ford, he tried going back to Art Center. When that didn't work out, Bill went to UCLA for 3 1/2 years hoping to be a doctor. About this time he got married the first time at age 25.  Bill then worked at North American on the Apollo command module program.  After his first marriage ended, he remarried in 1973 and eventually went to work at Douglas Aircraft (which later became McDonnell Douglas and later Boeing).  He worked for them for over 35 years, after which Bill worked for Flight Safety, Inc (FS took over the Flight Training Center for Boeing) from which he retired at 67. Bill Crabtree passed away in 2004 at the age of 69.

So now the new search begins for how Bill Crabtree's career within Ford progressed and which other designs and projects he may have contributed to. And once again, just as it was 62 years ago, Bill Crabtree's automotive styling talent and contributions to design are just beginning to get recognized!



A special thanks to Sam Sandifer, Marty Martino and especially to Sue Crabtree for sharing her husband's life story.  And, of course, to Bill Crabtree for creating such beautiful artwork reflecting his passion for automobiles and the fascinating mystery that surrounds all great design.

Thanks to the archives of Art Center College of Design, Ford Motor Company, and the Alex Tremulis Archives.


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Designer Spotlight: The First African American Automobile Designer, McKinley Thompson, is hired into Ford by Alex Tremulis in 1956

1/19/2015

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 In honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, it’s important to recognize those who have made pioneering efforts before us.  Such it is with McKinley Thompson, the first African American to work as a designer in the automotive industry, and the man who first hired him into his lifelong career at Ford, Alex Tremulis.

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The Airflows would greatly influence both Thompson and Tremulis throughout their careers.
Their paths were destined to cross from the very start of their respective careers in car design as each of them were impacted by the looks of the 1934 DeSoto Airflow, a revolutionary streamlined car unlike any others at the time.  Thompson first saw a silver-painted Airflow during a cloudy autumn day.  The sky opened up just enough for a bolt of sunshine to light up the silver car.  He was thunderstruck with the apparition and knew his calling at that very moment.  Tremulis’ infatuation with the same model came from working directly for John Tjaarda at LeBaron who was responsible for the well-received design of the 1936 Lincoln Zephyr, an improved design over the Airflow.  Little did Thompson and Tremulis know at the time that their mutual admiration for the same car would put them on a collision path twenty years later.

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In the mean time, Thompson honed his drawing skills first by becoming a professional draftsman, then after the war an engineering design layout coordinator until 1953.  That’s when fate would step in and show the path he was meant to take.  Motor Trend magazine sponsored a nationwide contest to design the car of the future as it may appear ten years down the road.  Thompson couldn’t resist entering his ideas for a series of cars motivated by the new powerful gas turbine engines.  Of all the entries, Thompson’s won first place and a full term scholarship to the renowned Art Center College of Design in Pasadena.  Truly a dream come true for an autoholic as Thompson.  He would be the first African American at that prestigious design school.

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McKinley Thompson's entry into Motor Trend's design competition, a turbine-powered sedan. His additional entries included a race car as well. Illustration thanks to Robert Tate, Motorcities.
Meanwhile, Tremulis’ career in automotive design took him to Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg where he prototyped new concepts on a very tight budget during Cord’s final year.  Then to Crosley, American Bantam, Custom Motors, and his most famous stint as Chief Stylist for Preston Tucker’s revolutionary new car for 1948.  After Tucker came Kaiser-Frazer then on to Ford in 1952, a company that even he recognized was too big for him to bring it down as all his other automotive affiliations had gone under.  Tremulis quickly was promoted through the ranks to become head of the Advanced Styling Studio under George Walker.  There he led the group to develop concepts for flying cars, nuclear powerplants, and generally pushing the envelope past what most would consider conventional automobile design. 

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McKinley Thompson, second from right, refining his skills with instructor Joe Thompson on his right at Art Center, c.1955
Back at Art Center, Thompson recalled he was mentored by the outstanding faculty of Strother MacMinn, Joe Thompson and Geroge Jergenson.  Under their guidance, Thompson learned the tools of the trade and became a very talented designer, exactly how Motor Trend’s award was intended to be used and the high quality results Art Center was known to produce from its students.

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Alex Tremulis and design students examining how low a car can go, c.1955
Back at Ford, it would be Tremulis who would bring in design students from the various institutions like Arts and Crafts (now CCS), Cleveland, and of course, Art Center and see how they fit in to the corporate life of designing cars for a living.  Not that Tremulis was corporate by any means.  By then known for his playful antics, he even went so far as to have the students paint the ceiling in his studio blue with clouds to remind everyone that the sky was the limit to their imagination. 

But it would be McKinley Thompson’s talent and desire that would capture Tremulis’ imagination, and before his graduation from Art Center, Tremulis made Thompson an offer to join him in his Advanced Styling group in April of 1956. 

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Probably McKinley Thompson's turbine-powered car on the left now incorporating Ford body styling, side-by-side with Alex Tremulis' 200 mile per hour Thunderbird Mexico on the right, c.1956.
To Tremulis, it didn’t matter your age, sex, or the color of your skin.  To him it was all about passion for design and talent for communicating those ideas.  Thompson had both.  But it is not insignificant just how daring and heroic both men would be for their actions.  Keep in mind the turmoil in the country at that time.  In December 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for not giving up her seat to a white person on a municipal bus, and the ensuing year-long Montgomery Bus Boycott had begun.  Add to that, in January 1956, Martin Luther King Jr’s house was fire bombed in retaliation to King’s non-violent civil protests over civil rights.  That’s the environment in which Alex Tremulis hired McKinley Thompson into Ford. 
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Rosa Parks with Martin Luther King Jr.
By all accounts, Thompson had a remarkable career at Ford.  In Tremulis' Advanced Stying Studio, he contributed to many wild concepts, including Tremulis' controversial Gyron, as well as flying cars and nuclear-powered automobiles and trucks.  He assisted in the design iterations for the Mustang, the Allegro, and many other concept cars, including the Shelby Bordinat Cobra and its coupe version, the Cougar II.  He teamed up again with Bordinat in the 1980's to revive the Cobra as the Kelly Python of which 12 were made.

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McKinley Thompson's Ducted Fan Flying Car, 1957
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Thompson's Nuclear-powered Multi-Trailered Truck, 1957
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Ford Gyron
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Shelby Bordinat Cobra Roadster
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1963 Ford Cougar II
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1963 Ford Allegro Concept
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1980's Mustang-based Kelly Python, 12 made
In 1962 he won Ford’s highest award for community service, the Citizen of the Year Award.  Detroit's Mayor Cavanaugh would present Thompson with the Town Crier's Bell in recognition for his giving of his time and talents toward the betterment of the city of Detroit.  In 1976, after a series of promotions, he went on to manage the work of over 50 modelers and designers as Ford's Manager of Appearance Development and Feasibility Design Modeling.  In the 1970's he followed his dreams by building his own car, the Warrior, designed to help third-world countries build and maintain their own all-terrain multi-purpose vehicle.  McKinley Thompson retired from Ford in 1984 after an illustrious career.
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McKinley Thompson accepts the Town Crier's Bell Award from Detroit's Mayor Jerome Cavanaugh, 1962
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McKinley Thompson with his Warrior All-Terrain Prototype
Both Thompson and Tremulis kept in touch with each other throughout their lives.  They both shared the same passion for human-powered vehicles.  Tremulis passed away in 1991 at 77 years old, Thompson in 2006 at 83 years.  Both are missed for their many contributions to the automobile and for their fearless pioneering in design concepts. 

As for his Orca?  It's hard not to notice how black and white can unite to form one harmonious union...


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Chrissie Tremulis in McKinley Thompson's human-powered Orca, c.1986
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To my dear friend, Alex Tremulis, who was most instrumental in launching my career and who will always be my inspiration. With gratitude and affection, "Tom" 6-12-57
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Special thanks to Robert Tate at Motorcities, Ford Motor Company, the McKinley Thompson Biography webpage, the Art Center College of Design Archives, and the Alex Tremulis Archives.

For more information on McKinley Thompson's inspirational career, please visit:


http://accad.osu.edu/~rstone/mckinleythompson/bio.html


http://blog.thehenryford.org/2014/02/the-warrior/


http://www.motorcities.org/Story/McKinley+Thompson+The+First+African+American+Automotive+Designer+br+By+Robert+Tate-292.html
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The Lost Sketches of the Tucker Carioca (Maybe)...  Were they drawn by Loewy, Sakhnoffsky or ???

9/29/2014

5 Comments

 
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Preston Tucker's dream of entering into the automotive manufacturing world didn't end with his acquittal of fraud charges in January 1950.  Far from it.  As early as 1952 he had enough of an idea for a new roadster that he got in touch with one of the foremost designers of the day, the Count Alexis de Sakhnoffsky.  Tucker's vision was to produce a car that would be fun to drive and could be made inexpensively.  His concepts were worked out until a vision for what the car would look like was made clear.  The final design from Sakhnoffsky would be a rear-engined roadster that was to be built in Brazil and he called it the Carioca.  Those plans never came together as Preston Tucker became ill in Brazil and was diagnosed shortly after with lung cancer.  He died in December 1956 and so ended his dream.

But whatever happened to the sketches that would have preceeded the Carioca design that was made public on the cover of CAR LIFE in 1955?  Just recently, those sketches may have surfaced in an on-line auction.  Oddly enough, these drawings may still be misidentified as a Studebaker concept drawn up by noted designer Raymond Loewy.
 
Here's how the undated and unsigned sketches and photographs in question came to light:

AutoPuzzles.com is a popular website where car enthusiasts post rare and almost-unknown photos of cars for viewers to solve what they are looking at.  In June, member Wendax from Germany posted the following picture to quiz viewers:
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After three months of unsuccessful attempts to identify the car in question, eventually it was solved to Wendax's satisfaction that the vehicle was a Studebaker proposal designed by Raymond Loewy.

Along with the answer, Wendax posted a number of additional sketches and photos of clay models that appear to be related to the puzzle photograph. 

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The puzzle caught the sharp eye of a true Tucker aficionado, Stephen Backus, as being potentially related to the Tucker Carioca rather than a Studebaker proposal.  He then posted the sketches to a Tucker '48 Automobile FaceBook page for comments.

Further information from Wendax revealed that the sketches were part of an on-line auction where the original seller identified them as coming from Raymond Loewy as a Studebaker proposal.  No further information came with them.

So could these actually be early proposals for the Carioca design by the Count Alexis de Sakhnoffsky?  Maybe so, maybe not, but it's worthy of further research.  As the Count recalled in a 1955 article for CAR LIFE:

"The pointed tail of the eventual design had been advised by the racing car designer Harry Miller, with whom Preston had worked earlier in his career and whom Preston deeply respected. In fact, one of Miller's sketches was turned over to me for inspiration. To further the fun car notion, there was to be an unusual, curved rear-seat design, reminiscent of that of a motorboat."

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Two of the sketches clearly have a curved rear seat, just as described by Sakhnoffsky.

Further comparisons to drawings known to belong to Sakhnoffsky also show remarkable similarities.  Compare the side view of Sakhnoffsky's Carioca on top to the auction sketch and clay model below:

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They seem to have the same general shape and wheelbase layout, at 100 inches.  For comparison, the 1974 VW Beetle has a wheelbase just 4.3 inches shorter. 

Could it be that these were identified as coming from Loewy by the cove on the side of the car in the sketch?  Shown below is the side view of the auction sketch along with the side view of the 1953 Studebaker Starliner.  Both have a similar swipe (highlighted in blue on the sketch) that may explain a hasty identification as a Studebaker:
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But perhaps the most significant comparison comes from the sketch of the 3/4 front view, with Sakhnoffsky's Carioca on top:
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Certainly the lower sketch appears to be that of the Carioca, with a bit more overhang of the rear engine behind the rear axle. 
The big question is: Were the sketches drawn by Sakhnoffsky as part of Tucker's Carioca project or were they done later by someone else who was inspired by the 1955 Tucker Carioca magazine article?  Or conceivably, could they have been done earlier and inspired both Tucker and Sakhnoffsky?

Saknoffsky gives a further clue when he described the design process with Preston Tucker:

"Although I did not agree entirely with Preston's conception of how the car should look, I prepared a number of roughs that embodied his ideas, and from these he selected the design herewith [the 1955 CAR LIFE cover car]. Close scrutiny of the concept will reveal some flaws, of course, but it is reasonable to assume that many of the inherent problems would have been solved eventually. Unfortunately, the project progressed no farther than the rough-sketch stage, which was a profound disappointment to me, for the idea of a strictly fun car is always present in the auto designer's mind. And I think this would have been a fun car to build."
Although he says the project only made it to rough sketches, it appears that the photos of the rough clay model reflect the auction sketches.  It certainly could be that the Count didn't consider the clay significant enough to warrant mention, as that was not the final design that he presented in 1955. 

With no known provenance to the sketches, they raise a lot more questions than they answer:

Why did the auction seller think they were Loewy's Studebaker proposals?

Could the sketches really have been done by Loewy, inspired by the Tucker Carioca?

Can the handwriting be analyzed with respect to Loewy, Sakhnoffsky and Tucker?

Can the vellum paper be dated, watermarks, or otherwise?

Can the chain of ownership be traced in either direction to determine authorship?


The answers to these and many other questions would go a long way to determining the authenticity and provenance of this collection.  If you think you have any information that may lead to identifying these sketches, please contact us!

If authentic and actually done by Sakhnoffsky, they could be one of the more interesting discoveries relating to Preston Tucker's dream of re-building his reputation with a truly unique car, and they may provide a look into the specific design changes that ended up as the Tucker Carioca. 


As intended, the Carioca proves to be almost as much fun today as it was to be 60 years ago...

To learn more about Preston Tucker and the design history of the iconic Tucker automobile, just click the photos below linked to the articles:
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Click here to visit the Gyronaut's Facebook page to keep up-to-date on all things related to Alex Tremulis, the Gyronaut X-1, and the people who shaped automotive history...




Copyright 2014  Steve Tremulis

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Alex Tremulis' Induction into The Automotive Hall of Fame: A Circle of Life with Deep Historical Connections

7/31/2014

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Induction into the Automotive Hall of Fame is reserved for those who have made a significant impact on the automobile. This is the single greatest honor in the automotive business. Inductee contributions are chronicled among the great men and women who have had a positive influence on the industry.

For Alex Tremulis, induction into the Automotive Hall of Fame completes a full circle of a long and storied career.  First, the induction ceremony was held in the same building and same auditorium where the great Harley Earl directed the continuing efforts of his famous “Art and Colour” styling studio, one of the most advanced styling teams in automotive history, and the same general area where a young Alex Tremulis first took art classes at GM's training school in 1933 and then refined his techniques while designing for Earl’s Oldsmobile Division in 1937. 
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GM's Argonaut Building, the home of Harley Earl's Art and Colour from 1937 to 1955, and where Alex Tremulis first worked in Harley Earl's Oldsmobile styling studio. GM would later donate the building to the College for Creative Studies.
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Today, the A. Alfred Taubman Center for Design Education houses the College for Creative Studies, the same school where Alex Tremulis taught automotive design in the 1960's and the site for the 2014 Hall of Fame induction ceremony.
Tremulis' start was somewhat less auspicious than the remainder of his career:  The fancy drafting pencil sharpener was like none that he had been familiar with and he had to ask for assistance to use it.  It turns out that a simple cap covered the hole for the business end of the pencil.  Not the best way to make a first impression, but his tenure within Harley Earl’s organization would be short-lived anyway.  He spent three months in GM's school and then returned to Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg where he would soon become the Chief Stylist at the age of 22, after Gordon Buehrig (Hall of Fame Inductee, 1989) left the company.  Following the close of A-C-D, Alex would again return to General Motors, this time as a designer for the Oldsmobile Division in the Argonaut Building, but again, that relationship would end rather abruptly.

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Alex tells the story of his brief stay with Oldsmobile: 

"When Auburn-Cord folded I went to the Oldsmobile Division of General Motors. One of the first things they wanted me to do was to buy a new Oldsmobile at special  employee rates. I think they offered the car to us for $600. I still couldn’t afford a new car so I kept on driving the same old 1935 Ford Roadster, the first  car I owned. 
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I really liked that Ford, especially after I put on the twin intake manifolds that came off of one of the 10 Ford Indianapolis race cars in 1935. At that time I had the only Ford on the street with dual intake  carburetors. And because I couldn’t afford a Duesenberg, I had two exhaust pipes coming out the side. I had a lot of fun with that car. But unfortunately I did a dumb thing, which was a  stupid mistake on my part: 

We had a big styling department picnic for the Oldsmobile Division. All of the stylists had just bought their new $600 1938 Oldsmobiles. All of them had 6 cylinders except the boss’s car which had eight cylinders. On the way to the picnic, the boss went by all the six’s, and then I made the mistake of going out after him, and passing him. I guess he was pretty embarrassed.

The next day I was called into my  supervisor’s office where I was told what I had done had been in very poor taste.  And that I should not have embarrassed the entire styling section with an old 1935 Ford.  They even accused me of cheating because my car was practically a race car.  I was told I had to give up the car. This I refused to do.  In a matter of a month I was laid off."



Picture2002 Student Show at CCS: Aston Martin by Rudolf Gonzalez
By 1955, Harley Earl’s design team had left the Argonaut Building, but the buliding's future lease on life would yet again have a deep connection to Tremulis.  In 2007, General Motors donated the building to the College for Creative Studies, a design school that had its roots in the early 1900's.  They restored and upgraded the Argonaut Building in 2008.  Back in the 1950’s,  CCS was known as the Detroit Society for Arts and Crafts.  As it turns out, while Tremulis was a studio head for Advanced Design at Ford, he recruited students from the top automotive design schools to bring into Ford’s automotive styling groups.  Ford’s freshmen designers would begin their careers in his studio and learn the tricks of the trade prior to being assigned to other areas where they showed the most potential. 

By the mid-1960’s, Tremulis had left Ford, yet maintained his teaching at the school under the direction of a much-loved Homer LaGassey.  There he would often bring in guest speakers such as Art Arfons, as shown below, who talked of Tremulis’ advanced streamlining ideas as they applied to his record-setting Green Monster.  Other future Hall of Famers would be in several of Tremulis’ classes.  As he would often say, he was most proud of the successes that his many students enjoyed throughout their own storied careers. 

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c.1965, Detroit Society of Arts and Crafts, Alex Tremulis (far left) brings in Art Arfons (immediate right of illustration) to lecture on the aerodynamics of land speed record vehicles. On the left of Tremulis' Green Monster rendering a young Jerry Palmer is soon to graduate and head off to his own illustrious career in automotive design.
So it was with great reverence that Jack Telnack, one of Tremulis’ former students and Automotive Hall of Fame member (2008), would introduce many of Tremulis’ irreverent antics to the induction ceremony’s audience.  Upon graduation from Art Center College of Design, Telnack would rise quickly through the ranks at Ford to become the Vice President for Global Design and is supremely qualified to talk of Tremulis' impact on automotive styling and design history.

For such a long career spanning over half a century, it's important to gain insight into what kept him inspired through the tough times, of which he had many.  Two photographs were etched in Alex's memory from a very early age, and these images helped keep the designer focused throughout his life.
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Both photographs hung on the office wall of Alex's father, a physician, where the young future designer would often accompany his Dad.  The streamlined image of Tommy Milton's twin-engine Duesenberg racer setting a land speed record on the Daytona beach in 1920 would work its way into many of Tremulis future designs, each one a bit lower and more streamlined than the last.  For Tremulis, it would form the basis for over half a century of automotive design incorporating the most advanced concepts in streamlining.  It would also be his first introduction to the Duesenberg marque that would be interlaced throughout his entire half-century of automotive design.

The second image of Ralph DePalma pushing his race car to the finish of the 1912 Indianapolis 500 taught the young Tremulis to be tenacious and to never give up.  DePalma had led the race for over 196 of the 200 laps and when his Mercedes finally gave out and he had to push his car over the finish line.  In those days, if you didn't complete the entire 500 miles, you didn't get paid.  As fate would have it, DePalma's feat was heroic, yet all for naught, as the rules stated the car had to finish under its own power, negating the laps logged while the car was broken down.  It only served to further the point that no matter what the outcome, you have to give your best effort and never give up, a lesson he would revisit many times throughout his career, especially as an early pioneer of streamlining and aerodynamics.

In still yet another twist of fate, perhaps it's serendipity, that Preston Tucker and Alex Tremulis are reunited in the Automotive Hall of Fame, as they'll be linked side-by-side alphabetically for what will probably be a very, very long time.

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Tremulis’ induction had such great historical significance with amazing coincidences: The ceremony was in the same building where he worked for Harley Earl, recruited the students from the Detroit Society of Arts and Crafts (now CCS) into Ford, taught automotive design for Homer LaGassey at the College for Creative Studies, and he was introduced by fellow Hall of Famer and former Tremulis student Jack Telnack.  It truly was a Circle of Life.  

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Add to all this, it was 32 years ago that the Automotive Hall of Fame awarded Tremulis the Distinguished Service Citation.  And just who would be among those congratulating Alex on his award?  It would be none other than fellow 2014 inductee, Keith Crane!!!

Finally, Alex's induction into the Hall of Fame concluded with a passage from one of his many literary works:
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“From the days when I got my first inspiration for drawing the lines of an automobile from my father, I was fascinated with that form of vehicular travel and the speed and excitement that went with it.  Even though as a boy I did not translate the thought into words, I knew that the very instant I picked up my pencil from a car sketch, that particular idea was already obsolete and I must go on to another and another, each new one discovering some combination of curves, lines and angles to achieve a result.

A lifetime of working within the exciting environs of the auto industry has brought me into contact with so many fine and great people I feel greatly rewarded, rich though I am not. 

There have been achievements aplenty to give me pleasure, but failures and set-backs in sufficient quantity to prevent me from being complacent.

I look back at my many auto models, prototypes, drawings and production cars with great fondness and pride and feel that each of them, in their particular way, was great. But my wildest feeling of excitement and raw pleasure comes from anticipating what that car, the car of tomorrow, will be..."

 

All the members of the Tremulis family, both in attendance and in absentia, give our sincere thanks to Bill Chapin and the nomination committee at the Automotive Hall of Fame, the entire crew of the College for Creative Studies for their magnificent and historic facilities, Jack Telnack for his wild recollections and insight into Alex Tremulis, and to all those who have shared and supported Alex's vision for a better tomorrow.


And heartfelt congratulations to fellow Hall of Fame inductees Keith Crane, Ferdinand Piech, Dave Power, and to Distinguished Service Citation recipients Ken Gross and Frank Venegas Jr., and also Industry Leader of the Year James Lentz.  What great company with which to be inducted...

To learn more about Alex Tremulis' involvement with Preston Tucker and the iconic Tucker automobile, just click the photos below linked to the articles:

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Click here to visit the Gyronaut's Facebook page to keep up-to-date on all things related to Alex Tremulis, the Gyronaut X-1, and the people who shaped automotive history...
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Deconstructing the Indomitable Tin Goose: Separating Fact from Fiction

6/28/2014

6 Comments

 
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Over the past few decades, an entire new generation of automobile enthusiasts have been introduced to Preston Tucker's "Car of Tomorrow", yet many rely upon rumors and innuendo as to why and how the company failed.  The controversy continues as no "smoking gun" has yet been found that definitively points to the US Government conspiring with the "Big Three" to put Preston Tucker out of business for creating a car that was too good.
So although there is room for various opinions on the demise of the corporation, the facts surrounding the design for the car are a bit less controversial, yet no less fascinating.  So here's a look at the evolution of the Tucker Tin Goose prototype and how each of its design elements evolved into the car that is instantly recognizable as the Tucker '48. 

DESIGNER TIMELINE
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A quick review of the timeline for each of the designers who worked for Tucker.  Shortly after the Lippincott team arrived at the Tucker plant on March 11, Tremulis was sent on "vacation" for several weeks.  This likely coincided with his completion of much of the initial bodywork on the Tin Goose as well as completion of the Clay #1 around April 4.  He would return just prior to the Lippincott team's abrupt departure on May 3, 1947 and finish the Tin Goose's design details that were introduced on June 19, 1947.
The transformation from Tremulis' layout into the Tin Goose with no clay (direct to metal) had started in January 1947 and was well-underway, if not nearly complete by April, as far as the body's sheet metal was concerned.  Phil Egan, a designer on the Lippincott team, recalled their first discussions with Preston Tucker: "Preston Tucker gave us this charge: to style the car based upon the essentials of his mechanical concepts and upon Alex Tremulis' body layout.  At no point in the meeting was there any mention of our changing the fundamentals of wheelbase, wheel tread, interior dimensions or even basic body shape.  It was a classic case of pure styling.  The primary dimensions were inviolate, as were the the tapering roof, and of course, the Cyclops eye front and center (we were to have fun with that feature).  Outside of these requirements, there were no constraints.  We were expected to go all out in our efforts."
The following paragraphs were discussed in Part 1 (click HERE to learn more about how the Torpedo design morphed into the Tucker '48), but it's worth repeating as it is relevant to the analysis of the design changes that went into building the Tin Goose:

On March 11 the Lippincott team arrived at the Tucker plant, led by Hal Bergstrom and accompanied by additional designers Budd Steinhilber, Tucker Madawick, Read Viemeister and Phil Egan.  Here's how Phil Egan described Alex Tremulis' plant tour and his reaction to seeing the "Tin Goose" for the first time: 

“Here we saw embryonic shapes in raw sheet metal coalescing into the frame and part of the body of an automobile. A nearby drop hammer pounded sheet metal from flat to contoured with ear-splitting vibrations, and the junctions of formed sheet and frame were fused under the bright sparks of welding torches.  Elsewhere, men at work stations devoted themselves to the mechanical details of torching, cutting, bending, and drilling the parts of a prototype automobile.  Alex [Tremulis} gave us a cursory introduction to all of this and then led us to the design area.

Since he had accepted the position of chief stylist in January, Alex had brought the design of the Tucker automobile from the nebulous to the three-dimensional.  He had developed a firm layout of the car which he showed us in a 1/8 size drawing, with every outside and inside dimension carefully indicated.”


So, even though Alex Tremulis had said to Phil Egan that he felt the Tin Goose's body was 95% complete before the Lippincott arrival, it's probable he meant that it was 95% complete towards the design as it stood at that time.  It's also entirely possible that it was also 95% complete during its refinement period while the Lippincott team was in-house, even through all its layers of modifications, right up until its introduction.  Much like shoveling snow off a driveway in a snowstorm, it never really is finished. 

After the Lippincott team's styling contributions were completed on May 3, and before the Tin Goose introduction on June 19, Egan further clarified Tremulis' role: "Alex Tremulis was primarily responsible for guiding the fabrication of the Tin Goose to conclusion.  He was privy to Preston Tucker's decisions regarding those portions of the no. 1 and no. 2 clay models that would be shown to the public.  The logistics were mind-boggling. Alex had to coordinate his collegues in sheet metal forming, body engineering, engine and drivetrain design, interior furnishings, instrumentation/controls and painting to produce the final product to the satisfaction of the boss.  It had to be beautiful, it had to be convincing and it had to run."  - Phil Egan, Design and Destiny: The Making of the Tucker Automobile, 1989

J. Gordon Lippincott had stated that once the clay models were completed (May 3, 1947) it was left to Tucker and Tremulis to assemble the prototype and the cars themselves.  Lippincott's involvement was over.  Phil Egan and J. Gordon Lippincott both were in agreement that "Tremulis deserves most of the credit for the car design, but that the front and back of the car reflect the Lippincott team's work."  Lippincott continued, "it's hard to pinpoint responsibility when many designers have a hand in a project."

In any case, It's very clear that the Tucker '48 represents the best design elements from each of the designers that contributed to its creation, and each of them, George Lawson, Alex Tremulis, Budd Steinhilber, Hal Bergstrom, Read Viemeister, Tucker Madawick, Phil Egan and Audrey Moore got it right when the final design rolled out of the Tucker manufacturing plant.  The car would not have been the same without any one of their design inputs and should be celebrated as such.


So here's a look at the individual design elements that made the Tin Goose and their evolution from initial design to the Tin Goose to the production Tucker '48s...


REAR GRILLE
The rear grille of the Tucker '48 perhaps best exemplifies how each of the designers involved with the Tucker were able to contribute to the final design for the rear end of the car.  And it clearly happened in a 'round about way over many months of design variations. 


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The egg-crate grille was a carry-over from George Lawson's 1942 Buick design that he used for the first Tucker Torpedo design.  It would be Tremulis who would apply the same theme to the rear of the car.
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December 1946 - January, 1947:  Alex Tremulis first applied the egg-crate grille as two rows on his first proposals to Preston Tucker.  This rear end would soon be replaced by the one shown in the patent illustrations two months later.
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March 15, 1947:  Tremulis' rear end design had changed as of the patent filing.  The non-descript back end was now devoid of the egg-crate grille.
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May, 1947: The rear grille of the Lippincott Clay #2 reincorporated the egg-crate.  Tremulis' initial two rows of square holes were replaced with four rows of rectangular slots that mirrored the front grilles.  Tremulis would confirm that he felt this design on the rear of Clay #2 was excellent.
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June 18, 1947: The rear of the Tin Goose.  The grille was modified for three rows and the individual exhausts were moved from within the bumper to half-underneath the bumper.  The Tucker nameplate was added to the riser on the bumper so everyone would know they had just been passed by a Tucker.
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Tucker '48:  The stamped production Tucker's rear bumpers were horizontally flat again as on Clay #2, but remained faithful to the Tin Goose design, a perfect blend of Lawson, Tremulis, and the Lippincott team of Hal Bergstrom, Budd Steinhilber, Read Viemeister, Tucker Madawick, Phil Egan, and of course, Preston Tucker.
TAILLIGHTS
Such a simple part of the car, yet it carries with it some significant confusion.  As Alex Tremulis was quoted in The Indomitable Tin Goose, "They [Lippincott] worked on that model several months, and when they got through the only part of their design that was used was the two taillight castings.  They were undoubtedly the most expensive taillights in automotive history". 

Tremulis' sense of humor and possible shared frustration with slow progress may have been taken out of context by the author, Charles Pearson, as it has already been pointed out that the Lippincott team provided significant input towards the final design of the Tucker '48, however Tremulis was probably accurate about the cost of the taillights.  The Tin Goose's taillights are the only two castings (possibly machined?) in existence, and vendors were known to overcharge Tucker for products and services. 
Phil Egan described the taillights in Design and Destiny: "Our idea of a long bright metal form with a lens at the end, resting on top of each rear fender, became a cause celebre.  A number of Tucker personages put in their two cents on how it could be achieved.  It was really quite simple: use a chromium-plated die casting for the front part and acrylic plastic molded in clear red for the lens.  It would require die casting and injection molds costing probably eight thousand dollars at the time, a pittance compared to the tooling costs for an automobile.  However, we soon discovered a reluctance on the part of the company to undertake such a specialized custom artifact.  Due to time and financial constraints, almost all of the parts for the Tucker '48 were going to be bought outside and brought into the plant to be assembled.  Thus the solution was to seek an existing tail light design and plan on using it.  A pre-war Dodge design was eventually used".

But neither the taillights on the Tin Goose nor on any of the Tucker '48's appear to be off-the-shelf Dodge lights, so perhaps custom (and expensive) castings were made for both the Tin Goose and the subsequent cars. 
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1941:  The taillights for the 1941 Dodge Business Coupe and Luxury Liner are immediately recognizable as leading to the design on the Tucker '48's back end.  It doesn't appear as if the curvature on the stock Dodge taillight would match the contour of the Tucker's fender.





May 4, 1947:  The taillights on Clay #2 were modernized versions of the Dodge taillights, with a sleeker profile, squared-off edges, and a much cleaner look.


June 18, 1947:  These unique Tin Goose taillights reverted back to the 1941 Dodge design, with a more rounded look and a heavy chrome cap to hold the lens in place, but they don't appear to be from Dodge.  These are the only two known taillights of this design, so Tremulis' comments as to their cost may have been right on target.



Tucker '48:  The final taillight design was similar to the sleek Lippincott design on Clay #2, with the leading edge lens angle reversed, combined with the top cap similar to the 1941 Dodge. 

Even then, though, it wasn't over.  The first 25 cars had one casting and due to a rear fender shape change, the last 25 cars were finished with a different contour to the casting.  So, yes, the Tucker tail lights were probably the most expensive in automotive history!



REAR AIR INTAKE
Towards the end of Lippincott's involvement, Phil Egan detailed how the rear intakes evolved: "The two competing projects [Tremulis' Clay #1 and Lippincott's Clay #2] had become increasingly interdependent.  It simply wasn't possible for each to ignore the travails of the other.  Alex didn't ignore what we were doing and made many suggestions which helped us.  We, in turn, contributed a few ideas to him; certainly a just aid to a worthy compatriot.  A constrained delicate and very successful rear fender air intake on the #1 clay model was one of the results of this cooperative effort.  Ultimately, it was Alex's accomplishment, but Read [Viemeister] and Budd [Steinhilber] contributed ideas which helped carry it off."

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February 1947:  The intakes of Tremulis' design cover the top half of the rear fender and incorporate horizontal slats.  This is presumably where the intakes on Tremulis' Clay #1 started.
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April, May 1947: The intake contours on both the right and left side of Clay #2 are similar, except for the number of slats and thickness of the surround.
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June 1947:  The Tin Goose intakes were a collaboration of both Tremulis and the Lippincott team's efforts.  The Tin Goose's handmade fitting is evident in its fit to the fender, not quite following the contour of the fender's leading edge.  The production intake more closely follows the straighter leading edge of the fender.

Fun Factoid: The intake on the right side of the Tin Goose has 15 slats, while the intake on the left side only has 14.  Vintage photographs show that the Tin Goose left the factory with this overlooked detail.  The Tucker '48 has fewer still, numbering 13.



FRONT GRILLE AND BUMPER

The evolution of the front bumper and grilles resulted in the now-legendary steerhorn front bumper that identifies the car as a Tucker '48.  The creativity that Read Viemeister displayed in his initial proposal that included the bumper was key to finishing off the front end design that never was quite complete despite the efforts by Lawson and Tremulis before.  It wouldn't be until just before the Lippincott team left that the front bumper and grille design would all come together. 
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1942: George Lawson's design for the 1942 Buick incorporated the egg-crate grille and vertical bumper that he would carry over to his initial Tucker Torpedo designs.
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December 1946: The Tucker Torpedo in its final form with the horizontal bumper added. 
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February 1947: Tremulis' redesign of the Torpedo into the Tucker '48 maintained Lawson's design elements including the egg-crate grille and both the center vertical and horizontal bumpers
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March 1947: Just prior to the arrival of the Lippincott team, Read Viemeister drew up a Tucker proposal that the team seemed to keep coming back to.  The bumper was probably the very first incarnation of the Tucker '48's "Steer Horn" bumper.  This concept would prove pivotal in the front end design for the Tucker '48.
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April 1947: Clay #2 is getting close to the final design for the bumper, with just a few more details to be worked out.
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April 1947: Tremulis' Clay #1 mostly resembles the February advertising campaign, still retaining the Torpedo's overall feel, while Lippincott's Clay #2 is still morphing into what would become the Tucker '48's front grille.
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May 1947: The front end of Clay #2 has now incorporated Read Viemeister's steerhorn bumper as the backbone for the grillework. 
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June 1947: The Tin Goose's (top) front bumper and grille would remain virtually intact with the exception of a few missing slats in the centerpiece.  The catwalk area above the bumper has now eliminated all chrome pieces or further grilles, vents or turn indicators as on both clay models.  Tremulis did much of the lead solder filling and shaping on the deep drawn areas in the catwalk.

The Tucker '48 front end would add turn indicators to the areas just above the bumper, but remained true to the Tin Goose.



OVERALL SILHOUETTE

As was described in The Indomitable Tin Goose, the basic outline for the side silhouette of the car was dimensionally worked out by Tucker's planners in December 1946.  It would be these same dimensions that Tremulis would use for his first sketches and the ones that went into the build for the Tin Goose.  So it's no surprise that the passenger compartment for the Tucker '48 follows those same dimensions that harken back to George Lawson's Torpedo design.
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The windshield (and probably the firewall) was moved forward approximately 10 inches, but the roofline profile of the final design for the Tucker '48 (in blue) as of September 1947 matches the roofline for George Lawson's plaster model for the Torpedo.  Every design in-between matches, as well, including Tremulis' original sketches from January, Tremulis' advertisements for March, the March patent illustrations, the Lippincott Clay #2 (and presumably Tremulis' Clay #1), and finally, the Tin Goose. 

So, Charles Pearson's account for their work in December 1946 appears to be an accurate account, at least for the cabin: "The dimensions set up at this time were, with few exceptions, the ones that were used in the final body design.  There was no great attempt at styling, though the side silhouette was nearly identical with the finished design.  An extra four inches were allowed on wheelbase, because Tucker was still insisting on fenders that turned with the wheels, and the production man said there would be plenty of time to talk him out of that later." - Charles Pearson, The Indomitable Tin Goose, 1960

As a quick check, comparing Tremulis' very first renderings for Preston Tucker in December 1946 to the final tooling dimensions as of September 1947, the dimensions remained little changed throughout all the development of the Tin Goose and the production Tuckers, confirming Pearson's accounting of events.  It also serves to highlight Tremulis' innate ability to pull off some remarkable styling, moveable fenders or fixed, while remaining within the confines of fixed dimensions.  A closer look reveals that the doors, window locations, and fender contours for the final design were changed very little from his initial reactions to the car, further suggesting that those dimensions were frozen. 
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And that helps to explain the activity in the photographs (below) from within Tremulis' styling studio during the early build of the Tin Goose.  The full-scale drawing on the back wall of the studio supports the accurate dimensions for the initial building of the Tin Goose, going direct to metal, while the small 1:10 scale clay model provided the necessary dimensions for the design change to the fixed fenders with the flowing pontoon fenders.  Most likely, the other gentlemen in the photo with Tremulis (front right) are Tucker's expert metal shapers, Al McKenzie, Herman Rigling, William Stampfli and possibly Emil Deidt. 

It appears that a new full-sized drawing is being prepared of the flowing fendered design that became the Tin Goose.  This also would explain why there were several layers of metal on the Tin Goose, where they had changed from the initial drawings to the fixed fender design, to the small sheet metal changes provided by the two full-sized clay models during the Lippincott team's residency.  It's clear the metal body of the Tin Goose was evolving from the beginning and constantly changing throughout the first half of 1947, up until its introduction in June of 1947.

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REAR FENDERS and SIDE WINDOWS
The rear fenders are best compared to Tremulis' drawings used for the March 1947 advertisements for the Tucker '48, since that is what has been described as the foundation for Clay #1.  So the most suitable scale side profile drawing comes back to the March 15 1947 patent filing for the Tucker '48.  Comparing Tremulis' rear fender to the patent filing shows a near-perfect match of contours and intake location.  Additionally, the side windows on the Tin Goose are in the exact locations as the patent drawing (in blue).  Tremulis had said that as of March 1947, a million dollars had already been spent on the tooling for the locked dimensions on the rear of the car, and this comparison confirms that the design had not changed from at least as early as February 1947 through the June introduction of the Tin Goose.    
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Both sides of the Lippincott Clay #2 show a markedly different profile to the rear fenders on the Tin Goose.   The leading edge was more of an arrowhead design than the fully curved contour of Tremulis' advertising and the patent application.  Similarly, the opera windows on both sides of the Lippincott Clay #2 show they were extended more rearward for improved visibility than the Tin Goose.   Phil Egan had mentioned that the left side of Clay #2 was only used as potential styling for a 1950's model.  It very well may be that the rear of the Tin Goose was already complete by this time which would explain why the extended windows were not implemented on either  the Tin Goose or the Tucker '48.  Tremulis wouldn't reintroduce the better visibility of the wrap-around rear window until much later in 1948, so it wasn't because there was a better design in the works.
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FRONT FENDERS
The shape of the front fenders, along with the Cyclops headlight, are some of the unique features that immediately identify the Tucker automobile.  The front fenders changed very little from the time Tremulis arrived on the scene to the final closing of the doors.  Their length and top profile were consistent from start to finish, with slight modifications to the lower contours, but remained faithful to Tremulis' vision.
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January 1947:  Alex Tremulis' first series with the moveable front fenders. 









February 1947: The fixed-fender design as used for advertising.







April 1947: Tremulis' Clay #1 in the foreground and the right side of Lippincott's Clay #2 both carry Tremulis' sweeping pontoons.






June 1947: The Tin Goose, now with all the side chrome eliminated.







March 1948: The Tucker '48 again with the pontoons closely mimicking Tremulis' contours of February 1947, just slightly more pointed than those on the Tin Goose.




So it's evident that Tucker's synergistic design process brought together elements in such a way that the final design as a whole is so much better than had any one of its contributors built the car in a vacuum without critique or reflection. Perhaps that is part of Preston Tucker's genius in bringing together such talented individuals: That regardless of opinion of authorship, they could combine talents to create one of the most revolutionary designs the automotive industry had yet to see...
REQUIRED READING
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To learn more about Alex Tremulis' involvement with Preston Tucker and the iconic Tucker automobile, just click the photo at left for Part 1...








Published in 1960, The Indomitable Tin Goose provides an insider's accounting for the events during much of the building of Tucker's "Car of Tomorrow".  The author, Charles Pearson, was Preston Tucker's public relations manager from mid-1946 until the end of 1947.  This would be the most active and productive timeframe for the design efforts to build the Tucker '48.  The details of Tucker's travails in obtaining the facilities and financing are particularly interesting. Written so that it's readable, despite containing so much historical information that could have been lifeless.
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Published in 1989 at the height of the popularity of the Francis Ford Coppola movie, Tucker: A Man and His Dream.  The author, Phil Egan, was a member of the Lippincott design team that spent two months at Tucker prior to the unveiling of the Tin Goose prototype. Alex Tremulis would later hire Egan directly to help with the many design details that would be needed to produce the 50 Tucker '48's that represent the entire production output from the factory.  Many of the great photographs from inside the Tucker walls were provided by Lippincott designer Budd Steinhilber, to document the progress made on the clay models used for styling ideas.
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A must watch.  Very entertaining and fast paced account of the rise and fall of the Tucker Corporation.  Nominated for three Academy Awards in Best Supporting Actor (Martin Landau), Best Art Direction (Dean Tavoularis), and Best Costume Design (Milena Canonero), Landau would take home the Oscar.  Alex Tremulis was portrayed by actor Elias Koteas, a near-perfect look-alike, for the automobile design veteran.  Although fictionalized, it provides a great backdrop to learn more about the Tucker cars and the people that produced them.
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Click here to visit the FaceBook page, and then "LIKE" the page for updates and other interesting articles. 
copyright 2014 Steve Tremulis
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Tucker Design History Files: Torpedo and Tucker '48...  and why Rob Ida Concepts' Tucker Torpedo is an Important Addition to Automotive Design

6/19/2014

3 Comments

 
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Preston Tucker's car of the future evolved from several earlier concepts that had promised the world "The First Completely New Car in 50 Years".  Only 51 examples of the Tucker '48 were built: The first prototype "Tin Goose" plus 50 additional pre-production units.  The design was revolutionary for its streamlined styling and many technical firsts, but the initial concept for the car was even far more exotic than the car the public was introduced to on June 19, 1947.  That initial Tucker concept, the one that only made it to the drawing boards and one known plaster model, is now being built full-sized in a New Jersey workshop where automotive dreams become reality. 
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At left, Rob Ida holds a copy of the "Torpedo on Wheels" magazine article from Alex Tremulis' personal archives of the Tucker concept. The car that Rob Ida is now building from scratch is the pre-Tremulis design for the Tucker Torpedo, the same one that inspired Joe Ida and his brothers to open a Tucker dealership and the same one that inspired Tremulis to approach Preston Tucker with his own ideas on the car's design that eventually became the Tucker '48.
It's by no coincidence that the Ida's Tucker builds are fully endorsed by Preston Tucker's descendents, after all, it was Rob Ida's Grandfather who had first signed up to be a Tucker dealer.  Back in 1947, It would be Joe Ida, along with brothers Frank and Dominic, who was first inspired by the Tucker "Torpedo" dream car through initial reports in newspapers and magazines.  The Ida's went through the process of buying a Tucker dealership and after having been officially open for only three days and taking 130 deposits on the Tucker '48, the Ida Brothers' Tucker dealership was forced to close its doors to new orders and the dream of supplying New Yorkers with the beautiful car were dashed.  No Tucker cars were ever delivered, however the Ida's made sure to return each of their customer's deposits on the car.  Everyone was disappointed.
Jump ahead 67 years and now it's Joe Ida's son and grandson, Bob and Rob, along with Preston Tucker's great-grandsons, Sean and Mike, who are building the Tucker from scratch.  The car that's currently being built is called the Tucker "Torpedo", designed well before the car that today embodies the automotive images we think of when we hear the name Tucker.  Indeed, this was an entirely different car than the Tucker '48, and one that only appeared in magazines and newsprint.  The Ida's Tucker Torpedo will finally bring Preston Tucker's original concept car to the public for the first time in almost 70 years. 
How Preston Tucker initially envisioned his car of the future and how it eventually became the Tucker '48 sheds light on how manufacturer's one-of-one show cars evolve into mass-produced automobiles for the buying public.  So it's worth a look at how the Tucker design progressed through the years and morphed from the Torpedo concept into the Tucker '48 automobile.
The timeline breaks down the development into two distinct periods.  George Lawson's initial design was called the "Torpedo" until his departure from the company around December of 1946.  At that time Alex Tremulis was brought in and oversaw the development of the "Tin Goose" prototype and the 50 pre-production "Tucker '48's".  Tremulis officially resigned on December 31, 1948, but stayed on with Tucker to help out until the very end and remained loyal to the vision throughout the remainder of his career and retirement.
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December 1946 was pivotal in the design of the Tucker as that was the month which marked George Lawson's departure and the arrival of Alex Tremulis, as well as the name change from "Torpedo" to "Tucker '48.
TUCKER TORPEDO

It all started during 1944 when George Lawson would be the first to illustrate what Preston Tucker's "Car of the Future" would look like.  Just as all designers are influenced by their prior work, so too was Lawson.  He relied upon his earlier work as a GM designer in the Buick division to form his initial drawings for the Tucker Torpedo.
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George Lawson's 1942 Buick concept that would form the basis for the initial Tucker Torpedo concept. Photo: Hemmings/Special Interest Autos
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Lawson's Tucker Torpedo illustration incorporating his 1942 Buick theme into the Tucker concept car. Photo: Hemmings/Special Interest Autos
He may have started with his 1942 Buick concept, but he was also able to blend in Preston Tucker's revolutionary concepts into an exciting new package.  The rear engine layout, aircraft-inspired streamlining, and headlights mounted on the moveable front fenders all contributed to the public's excitement over this all-new car.  Preston Tucker was mounting a public relations campaign in order to acquire a manufacturing plant in which to build his new car, so these images were invaluable in providing his vision of what would be produced in the facilities.  This was big news in the automotive world, especially as the "Big Three" had to rely on dated pre-war tooling for their post-war cars.   Tucker, on the other hand, started with a clean slate and had no pre-war body stampings to limit his creativity for an all-new car design.
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An early Tucker Torpedo brochure introducing the world to the revolutionary automobile. The public was thrilled with such promises for their post-war automobiles. Nothing like it had be seen before. Interest and support for Preston Tucker was growing, and safety with styling would be the Tucker's mantra.
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The drawing which Lawson used to make the plaster model. This sketch is shown below, immediately next to the model.
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Automobile designer George Lawson, Preston Tucker's first stylist for the Tucker automobile, working on the only known model for the Torpedo. Photo: Hemmings/Special Interest Autos
By the end of 1946, Preston Tucker had been making statements that his new car would be seen soon, yet he still only had drawings and a single 1:4 scale plaster model of the car.  So in order to provide photos of the new car, the plaster model was placed in realistic settings and the photos retouched to look like a full-sized automobile. 
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Front 3/4 view of the plaster model retouched to appear as a full-sized car.
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Convincing retouched photo of the plaster model in a realistic setting, used in Tucker advertising.
DECEMBER 1946, A PERFECT STORM

By December 1946, after almost two years, George Lawson and Preston Tucker had a falling out over unkept promises.  George Lawson sued Preston Tucker for $50,000 and presumably Tucker countered that he still had no car to show after almost two years' effort.  The matter was eventually settled out of court with Tucker reportedly paying Lawson a $10,000 settlement.
December 1946 would also be noteworthy with the publication in Science Illustrated magazine in which the new Tucker Torpedo would be described as having a "series of spectacular engineering innovations."  This would be the same image and description that would capture the hearts of Joe Ida and his brothers as well as Alex Tremulis.  The page below is from Alex Tremulis' personal archives that he had saved.  The article had made such an impression on the designer that he kept it for the rest of his life, after all it was this article that inspired him to pay Preston Tucker a visit that would shape automotive history.
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Just as Tremulis was planning to get an interview with Preston Tucker, Tucker's planners and metalworkers were desperate to start building the first car.  In September, Preston Tucker had promised a prototype car by Christmas.  In October, he again promised a prototype demonstrator would be ready by the first of the new year.  So by December, without Lawson to provide any guidance, the basics for what would become the Tin Goose were planned out in full scale by Tucker's production planners and mechanics. 

In 1960, Charles Pearson described his frustrations inside Tucker's design studio, and directed his anger squarely at Lawson: "Early in December [1946], during the lull in the housing fight, I was complaining to one of the top men planning production that I wished to hell we had something better than the lousy art work we were using, because it was getting tougher to sell every day.  It was too arty and stylized to start with and, worse, still, even a layman could see that it was a long way from the six-passenger sedan Tucker said he was going to build.

The production man said he was just as disgusted as I was, and if he had even an idea as to what the body and chassis were going to look like he could at least start figuring out how to build it.  That was what started the first actual work on the final body design, and the entire job was completed in less than a month."

"The dimensions set up at this time were, with few exceptions, the ones that were used in the final body design.  There was no great attempt at styling, though the side silhouette was nearly identical with the finished design.  An extra four inches were allowed on wheelbase, because Tucker was still insisting on fenders that turned with the wheels, and the production man said there would be plenty of time to talk him out of that later." - Charles Pearson, The Indomitable Tin Goose, 1960
ALEX TREMULIS ARRIVAL

The date of the first meeting Tremulis had with Preston Tucker was described by Charles Pearson in "The Indomitable Tin Goose" as being on Christmas Eve, 1946, but records show it may have actually taken place a few days later, with a call for an appointment on the 27th and a meeting on the 28th with Preston Tucker, Lee Treese (VP of Manufacturing), and Kenneth Lyman (VP of Engineering).  At that meeting Lawson's drawings were reportedly discussed.  But Tremulis had also described meeting Preston Tucker for the first time at the Drake Hotel on Christmas Eve and again at the offices at Tammen and Denison on New Year's Eve, so it's probable there were a series of meetings at various locations to discuss progress on Tremulis' new designs.

In any case, it was late December when Tremulis finally got an appointment with Preston Tucker.  Tremulis had brought along his portfolio of futuristic concept cars.  He had a wealth of prior experience as chief stylist at Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg as well as his design and custom builds while at Briggs Manufacturing, American Bantam and Custom Motors of Beverly Hills.  By then, Tremulis was also an authority on streamlining, having designed many advanced jet aircraft and guided missiles for the US Army Air Force during World War II, often using the wind tunnel as a design aid.  Tremulis' design philosophy of marrying aircraft technology with automobile design was identical to Preston Tucker's vision for his car. 

Tremulis' timing was perfect.  Preston Tucker, now without a stylist for his car with the unwelcome departure of Lawson, found his car's future designer in Tremulis.  At the time, Tremulis was working at the industrial design firm of Tammen and Denison and the Tucker account would give him full authority to pursue his automotive design philosophy.  Part of Tremulis' pitch to Tucker was undoubtedly the same as his April 1946 pitch to Henry Ford II.
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Tremulis could immediately see numerous potential issues with the Lawson design and in his initial discussions with Preston Tucker he sought to re-design the car for mass market appeal and manufacturability.  

On January 5, he met again with Preston Tucker, but this time he was joined by Harold Karsten (a/k/a Abe Karatz), Fred Rockelman and Preston Tucker Jr.  This was to be a defining moment in automotive history.

TRANSITIONAL DESIGN

Tremulis had created a series of impressive renderings that fed off of Lawson's design, yet provided more practical design changes for post-war Americans.  Specifically, he designed a four-door sedan where the doors opened into the roofline to allow ingress without bumping your head.  On the bottom of the doors was a raised rocker panel so that the doors wouldn't hit the curb upon opening.  The desire to seat three Chicago Bears linemen in the front and rear mandated a more conventional roofline, lower in the middle and higher on the sides, so that three could sit abreast in either the front or the back seat without the end passengers bumping their heads on the side windows.  Each of the fenders sported streamlined sheet metal flowing back from the wheelwell that conveyed a unique blend of the pre-war pontoon fenders with the latest in flat-fendered side treatments. 
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Preston Tucker was impressed, to say the least.  From that point on, Tremulis would be the new Tucker's chief stylist in function if not in title, regardless whether or not he was still with Tammen and Denison or working directly for the Tucker Corporation.  If there was a three-month contract between Tucker and Tammen and Denison (as he reportedly described in courtroom testimony), or if Tremulis was directly hired on the spot (as he had previously described in magazine articles), he was functionally the chief stylist for Preston Tucker, regardless of who signed his pay stubs.

In any case, Tremulis had managed to retain the styling cues and relative dimensions of the Lawson design, yet provided a clear and realistic direction in which to proceed.  The moveable front fenders of the Lawson design were retained for the time being, but they would be entirely eliminated within the next few days.   Charles Pearson had described the side silhouette of Tremulis' design being very close to the dimensions Tucker's men had laid out and it appears very close to the Torpedo's silhouette as well. 

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In profile, both the Torpedo (top) and Tremulis' initial designs were dimensionally similar, a testament to Tucker's craftsmen who roughed out the initial dimensions to seat six. The same basic profile carried all the way through to Tremulis' final plan view for the Tucker '48 as of September, 1947.
THE END OF THE CYCLE FENDERS

As Alex Tremulis stated, his first task was to eliminate the moveable front fenders in favor of a more conventional design.  Time was of the essence and the engineering difficulties in sorting out the cycle fenders did not support Preston Tucker's desire to have a prototype built within 60 days.  So Tremulis re-designed the car with conventional fixed fenders, and made the center headlight turn with the wheels.  He also eliminated the flowing pontoons from his first design series as he felt they were already dated.  And Tremulis wasn't alone in his desire to remove his earlier pontoons.  As Charles Pearson described them:

"I liked all except the front fenders which I thought stunk, and said so.  My popularity couldn't have dropped faster with a sudden attack of smallpox.  Tucker scowled at me for a week, though much later he admitted that at least he agreed with my logic." - Charles Pearson, The Indomitable Tin Goose, 1960.

Preston Tucker liked the first fenders and felt first impressions were usually correct, so the unique pontoons stayed.  A great decision, as these characteristic fenders would forever be identified with the Tucker '48. 


Tremulis' elegantly simple solution retained the safety factor of being able to see where you're turning, yet significantly shortened the timeline to completion of the first prototype.
 
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To support his argument for the design change, Tremulis used the safety aspect that resonated within Preston Tucker.  He brought up the potential instability problems of the land speed record car of Frank Lockhart's 1928 Stutz Black Hawk.  Like the Torpedo design, Lockhart's car incorporated front cycle fenders but Tremulis felt it was shown in wind tunnel tests that the car would not produce "weather cocking" at speed, in this case around 200 miles per hour.  Weather cocking is a term used to describe a vehicle's tendency to turn into a strong wind and helps to straighten out a vehicle if it starts to get sideways.  Without it, the stability of a car may be dangerously compromised.
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Frank Lockhart and the Stutz Black Hawk. Lockhart would be criticized for forging ahead with trying to break speed records in the car when the US Army wind tunnel tests had shown it exhibited no "weather cocking" at speed. Lockhart was fatally injured in a crash on the beach at Daytona just months after an earlier crash.
It's doubtful that the Tucker Torpedo would have exhibited similar handling characteristics to Lockhart's Stutz, especially at only highway speeds, but Tremulis' safety angle was convincing.  Undoubtedly, Charles Pearson and the production men would have given their full support to Tremulis' arguments for eliminating the cycle fenders. 

TUCKER '48 BODY DESIGN FINALIZED

By January 14 1947, Preston Tucker, Alex Tremulis and Tucker's Vice President of Manufacturing, Lee Treese, were off to source new glass to fit the prototype four-door sedan.  By then, the fixed-fenders of the car re-incorporated the flowing pontoons from Tremulis' first design renderings. 

So the transition from Lawson's Torpedo design to Tremulis' Tucker '48 design was exceptionally quick.  From the date of Tremulis' first reported interview with Preston Tucker to the time when Tremulis' fixed-fender design with flowing fenders first appeared, a maximum of 3 weeks had elapsed.  If the first meeting between Tremulis and Tucker was after Christmas Eve and you allow for some time for the first drawings of the final design to have been created, then it looks like the time span of 6 days from initial concept to final design (as has been reported elsewhere) is entirely possible and even more remarkable.  Whatever the actual date may have been, from that point on the building of the first prototype would be the focus of everyone involved for the next two months.

As Phil Egan would tell in his book "Design and Destiny: The Making of the Tucker Automobile": "Between the first of January and our [Lippincott Team] spring of 1947, Tremulis had managed a crash program calling for exhausting hours of work by a dedicated crew.  They brought an automobile design project from scratch to a recognizable body shape in metal without a clay model (there had been an embryonic 1/8 size clay model of little help).  For a production car undertaking this bordered on the ridiculous, but he had done it." 

Egan further clarified: "Up until the time of our arrival, all efforts had been directed at forging the metal marvel [Tin Goose]."

TIN GOOSE

Phil Egan also gave the credit to Alex Tremulis for the naming of Tucker's first hand-built car.  The prototype they were working on would be nicknamed the "Tin Goose" out of reverence to Bill Stout's Ford Trimotor airplane which shared the same nickname.  That revolutionary airplane was one of the first all-metal aircraft to be used in civilian transport and had a safety and reliability record that was second to none.  So much so that it was dubbed "The Safest Airliner Around".  A fitting nickname for Tucker's safety car with aircraft-inspired looks.
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Bill Stout's Tri-Motor airplane, nicknamed the "Tin Goose" gained a reputation for safety and reliability, qualities that Preston Tucker intended to emulate with the new Tucker automobile.
As the Tin Goose prototype was taking shape, Preston Tucker was satisfied that this new design could be shown to the public.  Six weeks later, on February 28, Tremulis was asked to produce the artwork for a series of advertisements that would be used throughout the nation.  The body of the car retained the flowing fenders. 
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One of several drawings produced by Alex Tremulis in February 1947 for advertising the new design of the Tucker '48.
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Various ads placed nationwide as early as March 2nd of 1947 for the new Tucker '48.
At this point in the development of the Tucker '48's styling, all of the design changes away from the earlier Torpedo were made by Alex Tremulis and Preston Tucker.  The Torpedo's original design was gone, the name was changed to the Tucker '48, the dimensions for the car were locked, and the Tin Goose build was well underway having its recognizable shape hammered out by Preston Tucker's master craftsmen.  Even with the design at this advanced stage, Preston Tucker sought out further input, leaving no stone unturned in his quest for the ultimate post-war design.

On March 4, 1947, the design firm of Lippincott and Margulies was hired on as consultants to provide some fresh ideas.  


On March 11 the Lippincott team arrived at the Tucker plant, led by Hal Bergstrom and accompanied by additional designers Budd Steinhilber, Tucker Madawick, Read Viemeister and Phil Egan.  Here's how Phil Egan described Alex Tremulis' plant tour and his reaction to seeing the "Tin Goose" for the first time: 

“Here we saw embryonic shapes in raw sheet metal coalescing into the frame and part of the body of an automobile. A nearby drop hammer pounded sheet metal from flat to contoured with ear-splitting vibrations, and the junctions of formed sheet and frame were fused under the bright sparks of welding torches.  Elsewhere, men at work stations devoted themselves to the mechanical details of torching, cutting, bending, and drilling the parts of a prototype automobile.  Alex [Tremulis} gave us a cursory introduction to all of this and then led us to the design area.

Since he had accepted the position of chief stylist in January, Alex had brought the design of the Tucker automobile from the nebulous to the three-dimensional.  He had developed a firm layout of the car which he showed us in a 1/8 size drawing, with every outside and inside dimension carefully indicated.” - Phil Egan, Design and Destiny: The Making of the Tucker Automobile, 1989


It was at this time as well that there would finally be enough clay available to build two full-size models, one for the current design and one for the soon-to-arrive Lippincott team.  Tremulis had begun work on what would become known as Clay #1 shortly before the Lippincott team's arrival.  As Phil Egan would attest: "A two-man crew worked on the beginnings of a full-size clay model of a car.  We could discern a shape in that brownish clay which was clearly the essence of the Tucker '48 I had seen in the newspaper advertisement.  I noticed that the details at front and rear were vague, without resolution".

Further refinement of the Tucker ’48 details were carried out with design input from both the Lippincott Team and Tremulis, the significant details of which will be discussed later, but for now, the Tucker ’48 was complete enough to identify it as a distinctly different car than the one described as the Tucker Torpedo.
And that is why the build of the Tucker Torpedo by Rob Ida Concepts is such a significant addition to automotive art.  It will show the public for the first time in almost 70 years "The Car of the Future" as it would have looked had the Lawson design been built as originally promised.
LAWSON AND TUCKER INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

If there was any lingering doubt that these weren't two distinctly separate designs, one needs only to look at the intellectual property generated for the Tucker Torpedo and the Tucker '48.  What transpired with the patent filings brings to light how the two designs were viewed by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). 
On January 16, 1947, shortly after George Lawson left the Tucker Corporation, he filed a patent application for what he considered his design of the Tucker Torpedo.  The illustrations used for the patent application were the same photographs of the plaster model used in the early Tucker Torpedo advertising. 
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As part of the patent process, the inventor is required by law to disclose any and all prior art that they know of that may have relevance to their invention.  In this case, Lawson disclosed that US Patent Number 88,083 may relate to this design.  As it turns out, this patent was for the 1933 Pierce-Arrow Silver Arrow, a magnificent show car that was then considered to be a most daring design with radical streamlining. 
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In issuing a patent, the USPTO looks at all the prior art and makes a determination whether the applicant's design is significantly different than the prior art.  If so then a patent may be granted.  If the applicant's design is too similar to a prior design, the patent application will be rejected and the applicant must make significant changes in order to be awarded a patent.  In the case of Lawson's application, the examiner took the Pierce Arrow Silver Arrow reference under consideration and issued the patent to Lawson on June 1, 1948, about a year-and-a-half after it was first filed.  So in the eyes of the USPTO, the Lawson-designed Tucker Torpedo is not the same car, nor could it be confused with, the 1933 Pierce Arrow Silver Arrow.  Their conclusion seems reasonable, as the comparison between the two are rarely made, if ever.
It's interesting to note that Lawson didn't assign this patent to the Tucker Corporation, so presumably his stance was that he alone owned the Torpedo design and Tucker had no rights to it.  That viewpoint would certainly have been challenged by Tucker if Lawson performed the work as an employee of either Preston Tucker or the Tucker Corporation.  Since Lawson didn't file the application until several weeks after he left Tucker, it can be assumed he knew that his patent application may be a potential source of negotiation in the future litigation that ensued.  As it turned out, Tucker would not have needed Lawson's Torpedo patent for the production of the Tucker '48.
In any case, on March 15, 1947, Preston Tucker filed his own patent application for Tremulis' design that appeared in the Tucker '48 advertisements. 
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It's also important to note the references cited by the Tucker '48 patent.  The first is a patent issued to designer George Walker in 1943 for a Bonn ad featuring the car of the future.  It was considered by the USPTO and deemed not to have an impact with the issuance of the patent for the Tucker '48.
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Most important is the second reference to the issued design patent of George Lawson for the Tucker Torpedo.  In this case, the patent examiner reviewed the design in the Tucker Torpedo's issued patent and found that it wasn't the same as, nor could it be confused with, the design in the Tucker '48's application.  Preston Tucker was awarded the patent for the Tucker '48 on June 14, 1949, over a year after the USPTO granted a patent on Lawson's Torpedo.
So in the eyes of the USPTO (representing the People of the United States), the Tucker '48 is uniquely different than the Torpedo, just as the Torpedo is uniquely different than the 1933 Silver Arrow. 
And that's what brings us back to Rob Ida's build for the Lawson design of the Tucker Torpedo.  By all accounts a completely different car than the Tucker '48 and one that deserves its own recognition as such.  Without its images provided by George Lawson, Preston Tucker could never have secured Chicago's Dodge plant or captured the imaginations of the likes of Joe, Frank and Dominic Ida or Alex Tremulis.  With Rob Ida's Torpedo, the world will be a richer place with the embodiment of the American Dream as it was first envisioned by Preston Tucker. 
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Photo of Rob Ida by Marc Steiner/Agency New Jersey.
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Click on the photo for part 2, the making of the Tin Goose prototype and the various designers who contributed to its creation.

Copyright 2014, Steve Tremulis

Special thanks to Hemmings Motor News/Special Interest Autos for their historical archives and images, and to Larry Clark, Tucker historian, for his tireless research and dedication to the Tucker automobile and all those that helped create it. 

Some Tucker must-reads: 

The Indomitable Tin Goose, Charles Pearson, 1960

Epitaph for The Tin Goose, Alex Tremulis, Automobile Quarterly, 1965

Design and Destiny: The Making of the Tucker Automobile, Phil Egan, 1989



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Lost and Found: Alex Tremulis and Ab Jenkins' 1946 600MPH Land Speed Record Jet/Rocket Car, The "American Meteor"

5/29/2014

1 Comment

 
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It's that feeling you get when several pieces of a puzzle fit together and you finally get to see a full picture of what were fragments just moments before.  Such it was with the mystery of "The American Meteor".  In this case four different pieces now paint a picture of one of Alex Tremulis' most ambitious projects to put Ab Jenkins in the driver's seat of the most advanced rocket-boosted jet car in an attempt to claim the title as the "Fastest Man in the World".  There were four pieces that made up the mystery: 1) A newspaper article from 1946 about Jenkins, Tremulis and a jet car; 2) A story from Alex Tremulis about Jenkins and a jet car; 3) A magazine article from 1953 submitted by writer Karl Ludvigsen to the Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg newsletter in 1969; and 4) Two vintage photographs of seemingly unrelated vehicles that Ab Jenkins was somehow involved with posted on a land speed vehicle website.  Until now, all appeared to be unrelated bits of information.  But here's how they all described the same Tremulis-Jenkins land speed record project at least a decade before anyone else even thought to put a jet car on the Bonneville Salt Flats...
It's no surprise that Ab Jenkins, who held so many of the world's speed records for endurance runs, would be frustrated at never having held the absolute speed record for which he was so instrumental in helping others set at the Bonneville Salt Flats.  It would be Alex Tremulis who would be the one to see that his old friend from his days at Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg would get a shot at being the world's fastest.  The full story on how Tremulis and Jenkins teamed up at the 1946 Indianapolis 500 race can be found here.  The following is more focused on the jet car attempt that came out of these efforts, but the Novi-powered streamliner designed to break Rudi Caracciola's 268mph record from 1938 is intertwined with the jet car, so first a brief review.


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Alex Tremulis' 1946 design for the Novi streamliner for Ab Jenkins' record attempt.


TREMULIS-JENKINS NOVI-POWERED STREAMLINER

Here's how Alex Tremulis described his 1946 proposal for the Novi-powered streamliner: "Ab, in his greatest moment of frustration, asked: "Alex, What is wrong? I had my foot in the Mormon Meteor as deep as any man could go. One hour at 191 MPH and on one lap on the 10 mile circle when the oil and the grease in the axle got thin and warm I covered one lap at 196 MPH. All I needed was 4 more MPH, I would have settled for one lap at 200 MPH and forgotten about 200 MPH for one hour.  I told Ab it was a question of aerodynamics. 750 HP simply wasn't enough - but don't worry about the Mormon Meteor.  It is old and ancient, its streamlining belongs to the last generation.  I'll give you 200 miles in the hour and then put you through the measured mile and we'll knock off Rudi Caracciola's 268 MPH in the Mercedes on the Autobahn.  All I ask is that you let me streamline the vehicle with all four wheels fully enclosed. I had even incorporated the first adjustable aerodynamic wing to stabilize the C/G [center of gravity] on the 10 mile circle."



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The streamlined shape of the Novi-powered land speed record car would hang in Alex Tremulis' design studio at the Tucker Corporation where it would influence the streamlined design for the Tucker '48 automobile.  The second part of the project to get the absolute land speed record back in the United States would include a jet-powered car almost a year before the debut of the "Tin Goose" in June of 1947.  That project became public at the 1946 Indianapolis 500.

AMERICAN METEOR JET/ROCKET LSR CAR

Here's how Tremulis described the jet car concept to Jenkins:  "I told Ab if he wanted to be the fastest on earth that I would design a jet car for the record, designed around the 4000 lb thrust TG-180 gas turbine that we used on the P-80. When I first saw a print of the engine early in 1944 instead of designing an airplane around it I immediately laid out a land speed record jet car design. Ab wasn't enthusiastic at first. He really thought it best to do it with a wheel driven vehicle. He said: "How about two Curtiss Conquerers?" Not enough power. "Then how about two Allisons?" No Ab, the British will kill us with their two stage Rolls Royce supercharged job and Fred would come back to haunt us the rest of our lives if Rolls Royce ever knocked us off. It had to be an all-American project including the tires. Dunlop had the only 400 MPH capability. Our tires could be no larger O.D. than 36 inches for my design and knowing Dunlop they would probably go 48 inches or more for 600 MPH. Ab said he would look for a sponsor and not to worry about tires that Firestone could do anything in the world."



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c. 1940's:  Ab Jenkins' design for the twin Curtiss Conquerer Meteor is shown in this sketch by Rex A. Prunty, a drafting engineer for an aircraft manufacturer (according to a 1940 census).     
                                                                                                                                   Photo from SonicWind.com. 


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The news of Alex Tremulis and Ab Jenkins' jet-powered car first appeared in 1946, shortly after the Indianapolis 500 and the drawing for the Tremulis-Jenkins Novi streamliner.  It was at the invitation of Jenkins that Tremulis would meet up with Lew Welch and the crew that built the Novi-powered Indy cars for the big race.  They were unprepared for the event that Tremulis actually could secure a jet powerplant from the Army.

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With Tremulis still at the consulting firm of Tammen and Denison in July of 1946 (five months before Preston Tucker would hire him as Chief Stylist for the Tucker '48), the Army offered up the I-40 instead of the state-of-the-art TG-180. 

As Tremulis described it:  "Well, we had a press conference at Indy and the news clipping stated what we were going to do. I had sent a letter to General Le May as Lou Welch said if I could get a jet engine he would sponsor the car. As luck would have it good old Bim Wilson was his deputy. Naturally I couldn't get the TG-180 but the I-40, so what, it was only 4 more inches in diameter instead of the 36 inches I had designed for. The I-40 still had 4000 lbs thrust and who was I to look a gift horse in the mouth.  A couple of calls to Washington plus an agreement with the Air Force that they would work out the air entry duct system and my agreement that we would allow for 500 lbs of AF instrumentation in order to justify the loan of the engine to the taxpayers. It looked like we would have an engine. As the engine was still restricted we would be given a wooden mockup of the engine in which to build our car and upon delivery to Wendover Air Base the engine would be installed and prepared for the Bonneville record runs upon 30 days notice. I had moved too fast for Lou Welch. Frankly I always believed that he thought that I would never be able to get an engine from the Air Force and that it was just a good publicity stunt anyway. I was embarrassed no end - having grabbed the ball and running with it and then being forced to drop it."


The first images of the design for the American Meteor would finally be made 61 years ago thanks to A-C-D Club member Karl Ludvigsen, who in 1969 would post an article from 1953's Speed Age magazine about Ab Jenkins' attempt to recapture his glory by driving this jet-powered car to the absolute fastest speeds ever achieved.  Here's the full article as it appeared in the April and May 1969 Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg newsletter:
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SPONSORSHIP WAS NON-EXISTANT

The descriptions in the 1953 article duplicate the 1946 descriptions from the newspapers with the exception that the TG-180 powerplant had been replaced with either a J30 or J34 turbojet engine to drive the wheels.  Oddly enough, seven years after first discussed as being powered by the more powerful TG-180 (alternatively known as the J35), the direct-drive J30 or J34 engines seemed to be obsolete by 1953, so possibly these potential powerplants were leftovers from earlier descriptions.  After seven years, apparently there were still no sponsors willing to take on such an ambitious task, possibly not wanting to be associated with it if it were to harm the ageing national hero in any way.  It's interesting to note that the US Army stepped up to loan a jet engine for the American Meteor's record attempt, just as they had offered support to Frank Lockhart and his Stutz Black Hawk back in 1927 to help with wind tunnel testing in his quest the break the land speed record.  Patriotism ran high back in those days.

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Finally, to tie it all together, this image of Ab Jenkins with a model of the jet car was posted by Waldo Stakes on the website for the Sonic Wind Land Speed Project.  As Sonic WInd's site mentions: "The other photo is of a Jet car Ab was trying to find money to build in 1950. It was to be powered by a J-34 turbojet and was designed to go 450 m.p.h. Notice it has the driver sitting at the Cg and canards are located near the front. It is also a perfect streamline shape as well as having the biggest tailfin I have ever seen. I don’t know if Ab designed it himself or had a very competent aerodynamicist do it but it is a very modern design." 

LOCKHEED P-80 SHOOTING STAR PURSUIT JET

On closer examination of both the sketch and the model, it appears the design was based on the development for the fuselage of the XP-80 (Shooting Star) that was tested in the wind tunnel around 1943 or 1944.  The large tail on the model is a near copy of the tail on the XP-80A which was originally designed around the I-40 powerplant, slightly larger than the TG-180.  It suggests that the model was built during the period that the project had planned to use the P-80 as its base rather than the later jet designs that followed.  If so, the odds are very high that the model was built by Alex Tremulis himself, who by that time was a master at building scale models of concept cars and jet aircraft.  The photos shown below of the XP-80 in the wind tunnel and the P-80 Shooting Star give a good indication of what the basic shape of the jet car would have looked like at full scale.  The two entry ducts for the American Meteor look nearly identical to those developed for the P-80.  Also, what initially looks like an exaggerated tail design on both the sketch and the model now becomes clear that it was a wind tunnel-proven design for the P-80 jet.  Tremulis said in 1946 that the vehicle would be 30 feet long which is about 5 feet shorter than the P-80.  This would add to the appearance of an oversized tail, even if it was of the same height as the P-80's tail. 

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A PROJECT BEFORE ITS TIME

To put this project in perspective, this was a full decade and a half before the first serious jet-powered vehicles would be making any land speed record attempts at the Bonneville Salt Flats, and almost 20 years before the Art Arfons/Craig Breedlove speed duels.

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It also becomes abundantly clear that Alex Tremulis' consultancy on Walt Arfons' JATO-powered Wingfoot Express II was no coincidence.  These would have been similar to the bottles that Tremulis and Jenkins had  intended to both boost their jet car up to speed as well as slow it down, all within the allotted 13 mile distance they had to work with at the Bonneville Salt Flats.  Tremulis already had design experience with these devices well before Walt Arfons' runs for the record, so he was a natural to provide his aerodynamic and rocket propulsion expertise for the Wingfoot Express II.




POTENTIAL INFLUENCE OF THE AMERICAN METEOR ON AUTOMOBILE DESIGN

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The American Meteor concept of an automobile design based on a jet figher fuselage surely was not overlooked by GM's Harley Earl.  In 1953, seven years following the Tremulis-Jenkins jet car, the highly influential XP-21 Firebird  was debuted to the public as one of the first cars inspired by the aircraft of the new jet age.  It also included a 370 hp (280 kW) Whirlfire Turbo Power gas turbine engine for which the car was to be a working test bed.

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The press swooned, "the first impression one gets of the Firebird is that it is a jet fighter on four wheels – an impression that prevails even while the car is standing still." The comparisons were welcomed as GM would identify future production models with elements from their jet-age dream car.  The fins would soon become standard issue on many production cars of the late 1950's.

CURRENT LAND SPEED RECORD PROJECTS

To think that Tremulis' designs are not relevant in today's quest for the absolute land speed record would be severely underestimating the project's foresight.  One needs to look no further than his original concept and compare it to any one of the latest efforts in land speed racing:  Craig Breedlove's Spirit of America and the  North American Eagle Project.   Breedlove's car is an all-new design while the NAE bases its car on the workings of a wingless F104A Starfighter aircraft of the 1960's.  Reducing the frontal area for maximum speed is critical in order to minimize the drag, so looking at the frontal views for each of these cars tells a compelling story:  The similarities of the 70 year old American Meteor to the current contenders are astounding and a testament to its advanced design.

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Craig Breedlove is currently attempting to bring the absolute speed record back to the United States with his concept for the next generation of the Spirit of America.  While still just a concept, the project will need more support in the form of sponsors who are willing to step up to the plate to help this project succeed. 

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As testament to the North American Eagle's potential, in October 2013, Jessi Combs piloted the NAE to a new average two-way speed record at over 393 miles per hour.  The future plans for the NAE include an assault on the absolute land speed record at over 763 miles per hour. 

The other top contenders for the absolute record either have backing from their respective governments, such as the British Bloodhound SSC, or are currently in front of their Parliament seeking support such as the Aussie Invader.  Will either of these two American efforts gain the required sponsorship to recapture the record for the United States or will they end up as the American Meteor as a promising project that could have been?

There also must be more to the story of the American Meteor and the efforts of Tremulis and Jenkins to get funding for their project.  Perhaps some other obscure pieces to this puzzle can now be fit into their proper place in history. 

As Alex Tremulis often said while recounting his many automotive projects: "Maybe the future has finally caught up with the past".

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The 1948 Tucker Roadster by Alex Tremulis

3/19/2014

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In early 1948, Preston Tucker introduced the world to his potential new sports car designed by Tucker's chief stylist, Alex Tremulis.  Later that year, Jaguar introduced their iconic XK120 sports car.  Could Tucker have been competitive in the European-style sports car market as well as the US sedan market with the Tucker '48?  Another "what if..." cut short.
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The road back to Bonneville...  Thanks to Rob Ida!

7/3/2013

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October, 1970:  The remains of the Gyronaut's canopy, tail and bodywork get inventoried to assess the extent of the crash damage.  Still with an eye on reclaiming the world record now held by Denis Manning and his Harley-Davidson streamliner, they decided to mildly repair the body in order to create a new Gyronaut by taking molds off the body pieces with the hopes of lengthening the chassis to fit two Triumph Trident engines.  The plans fell through, however, when Leppan needed to focus on running his dealership rather than running for the record.

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Fast forward 43 years to the night before its departure to be restored.  At this point, Bob Leppan had the chassis restored by Jim Lamb and Tony Kulka at Jefferson Motor Service, but the engines and body remained untouched since the early 1970's.  Both the canopy and the engine cover were gone and needed to be completely fabricated.

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All loaded up and secured in the Horseless Carriage trailer, the Gyronaut is about to embark on a cross-country trek from California to New Jersey to Detroit and finally to the Bonneville Salt Flats where it is planning to be run again for an historic exhibition to celebrate its return home.

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The Gyronaut never had it so good during its competition days.  Now it gets to relax in the comfort of an enclosed trailer for its journey back in time.  Typically towed on an open trailer exposed to wind, rain and road grit, the Gyronaut has earned its retirement from competition and deserves its travel protected from the elements.

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Upon arrival at Rob Ida's, the Gyronaut is immediately greeted by its proposed Bonneville tow vehicle, a 1948 Tucker recreation built by Rob Ida Concepts for the upcoming movie, Sin City II.  With little time before Speed Week 2013, there's no time to waste admiring the view.  The old fiberglass and missing pieces need the full attention of the crew tasked with turning the clock back almost half a century.

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If you're not familiar with some of the cars to come out of the shop at Rob Ida Concepts, then you've been missing some of the coolest rides ever created.  Here's just a few samples of the top quality work that goes on every day at the shop.  It's not work, it's passion...

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The distinctive profile of the Gyronaut starts to take shape with Sean Tucker shaping the foam into the contours of the Gyronaut's missing pieces.  The entire process took place under the protective cover of the next twin-turbo'd Tucker being created.  It was absolutely appropriate to have these two beautiful creations over and under during both of their simultaneous builds.

Sean, his brother Mike and Dad John Tucker, Jr. are also keeping the legend of Preston Tucker and his car alive over at Preston Tucker, LLC.  Check them out when you get the chance...

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The lengthy process of accurately recreating the missing parts is begun by building the foam profile of the Gyronaut from original drawings, blueprints and vintage photographs.  Sean Tucker, one of Preston Tucker's great-grandsons, traveled long distances to help with the project.  The complex curves of the Gyronaut's profile really is now taking shape.

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The Circle of Life:  67 years ago, Alex Tremulis helped Preston Tucker realize his dream car by styling the most radical car of the time.  Here, Preston Tucker's great-grandson, Sean Tucker, helps shape the missing canopy for Alex Tremulis' Gyronaut, now owned by Alex Tremulis' nephew, Steve Tremulis.  Add in another of Preston Tucker's great-grandsons (and Sean's twin), Mike, and you've got a story that will be told for generations to come.  And where else would all of this take place?  None other than under the guidance of Rob Ida at Rob Ida Concepts where his Granddad, Joe, and brothers Frank and Dominic signed up to be  a Tucker dealer in Yonkers.  That love for all-things-Tucker has carried on through the generations for all three families who now find themselves intertwined in the dreams their forefathers created and in the process making new stories for future generations, young and old, to enjoy time and again.  Goosebumps!!!

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With the fresh fiberglass laid up and curing, at last the Gyronaut is starting to look more like it did in the middle of the last century.  But there's still plenty of work to be done to bring the body back to its former glory.  Endless sanding, shaping and fitting is required to obtain a perfect fit for both the old and new body panels.

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The engine's air intakes are recreated on the sides of the engine cover.  These provide a cool 200MPH breeze over the air-cooled twin-Triumph Bonneville engines that lie beneath.

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The canopy gets fitted with the plexiglass windshield that used extremely complex curves to fight wind resistance.  One can only imagine the difficulty of wrapping the windshield to fit the various contours of the original flowing design.  For the first time in 43 years, the Gyronaut has its canopy back over the driver's seat. 

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After countless hours of prepping the vintage fiberglass to accept a new coat of Titian Red, Rob Ida suits up to spray the first coats onto the once-bare body parts. 

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Rob Ida mixing up a quick batch of Sebring Silver to add finishing touches to preserve the rear access panel that still bears the Gyronaut's original pinstriper's signature, "Wild Bill" of Detroit. 

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All the body pieces  now wear the colors of the record-breaking runs of 1966 when the Gyronaut captured the title as "World's Fastest Motorcycle".

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While the Gyronaut chassis awaits its reconditioned body parts, what better company to hang out with than a Porsche 550?

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Bob Ida, Rob's Dad, looks on as Rob prepares the bellypan for another coat of paint.  The teamwork of the father and son is evident in their attention to detail that most builders often miss. 

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John meticulously works on the edges of the engine cover to ensure a precise fit with both old and new fiberglass.  Every piece of the Gyronaut's body received the same attention to detail in making the parts fit to both the chassis and the adjacent body panels.

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Ryan fitting the nosecone to the bulkhead.  Both the nosecone and the canopy share just a two inch landing on the front bulkhead to conteract the force of a 250 MPH wind.  It's the Gyronaut's low coefficient of drag that keeps those forces to a minimum in order to achieve the highest speeds possible.

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Arty buffing out the freshly laid paint.  Hour upon hour of sanding out the finish with finer and finer sandpaper and then to several buffings brings out the most beautiful colors within the metallic Titian Red and Sebring Silver.  By the end, Arty knew every square inch of the Gyronaut's paint and had each one shined to perfection.

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Rob sanding the nosecone while ensuring that every bit of the Gyronaut's skin is consistently smooth and blemish free. 

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In the early 1970's the Gyronaut was entirely stripped of its 1970 colors and stored for the next 40 years.  The only paint that was original was the signature that Bill Betz had hand-lettered on the rear access panel.  That signature by "Wild Bill" was preserved by Rob Ida using the Sebring Silver to frame Wild Bill's handiwork.  Wild Bill is still at it, and he will once again recreate his pinstriping and lettering exactly as he had done it just before the Gyronaut set the record 47 years ago!

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Ryan, John and Arty assembling the Gyronaut for the umpteenth time while the Ida Tucker keeps an eye (or three) on their progress...

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The Tucker and the Gyronaut side-by-side for some quick photos before more polishing and fitting.  Rob's 356A and Triumph Bonneville complete a scene overflowing with awesomeness...

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As they will appear on the salt, except with a bit more distance between the two, both Alex Tremulis designs look as timeless today as when they were first created.  It's hard to believe that just 17 years separates these two advanced concepts...

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The Idas taking a moment to admire the view of their Tucker accompanying the Gyronaut for a quick photo op.  No one could take their eyes off the pairing.  Perfect from every angle...

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John, Rob, Arty, Bob and Ryan stand proud with their masterpiece.  Inside, Rob's Triumph Bonneville and two Tuckers wait their turn for a photo op with the streamliner.

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Bonnevilles everywhere you look.  Rob's Triumph Bonneville alongside the twin-engine streamliner powered by none other than two of the early Triumph Bonneville powerplants.  The Gyronaut would be last and fastest in Triumph's reign as World's Fastest Motorcycle, starting in 1956 with the Devil's Arrow/Texas Ceegar, and ending in 1970 with the Gyronaut. 

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On a side note:  Land speed racing history again being attempted by Triumph?  The latest attempt as a factory effort to set some speed records at Bonneville, this Castrol/Triumph streamliner may capture the glory as being the World's Fastest once again as the team from Triumph get ready for an assault in 2014.  Just imagine old and new together again with the Gyronaut's original sponsors, Castrol and Triumph, behind both efforts.  History repeats?  Best of luck to Triumph rider, Jason DiSalvo...

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Ryan applying the finishing touches just moments before being loaded into the trailer for a road trip to its next destination: Bob Leppan's, where he hasn't seen the Gyronaut wear these colors or have a roof over the rider's head since 1970!  But that'll have to wait for the next entry!


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So now we've got the Ida's, Tucker's and Tremulis' all striving to share these fantastic stories of family history and the cars and people that created their passions. They're making history as they're saving it.  And it will be these future generations who will be carrying the torches so that everyone can see, hear and feel exactly why these dream cars have such a huge impact on the soul.  To quote Bogart: I think this is the start of a beautiful friendship. 





Stay tuned for the latest info on FaceBook and follow our progress by "LIKING" the page...

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October 21, 1970:  Bob Leppan's 270MPH Crash

3/15/2013

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Here's a snippet from the upcoming documentary about the Triumph Gyronaut X-1, brought to you by Curt Wallin and John Greene, the producers/directors for the award-winning documentary "The Boys of Bonneville - Racing on a Ribbon of Salt".   They're at it again, this time bringing the Gyronaut back to life along with the great stories from the people who made it all happen.

Hang on for the ride of your life...
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