Solid Block of Ise

When I was a little boy I read a lot of the classic french/belgian comics. Lucky Luke, Tintin, Asterix and Spirou. I was especially fond of Spirou, and in later years I learned that it was the Franquin-helmed albums that most appealed to me. One of the more exciting things about Franquins Spirou was the car that Spirou and Fantasio drove around in. It was called “Turbot-1″ (pronounced as “Turbo 1″ with a silent t at the end) and what made it particularly unique was it’s powerplant - unlike most normal cars it was powered by a gas-turbine, essentially a jet-engine. This was the cause for the cars name and it’s impressive top-speed, it had absolutely no problems at all achieving up to 200 mph. Franquins comics mostly took place in the ’50s and early ’60s so for this time it was most impressive. The vehicle also had this extremely cool styling with typically ’50s design cues such as white-wall tires and chrome hubcaps. The Turbot-car was a constant in the Franquin-comics, and even though it was later superceded by the Turbot-2, it was always my favourite.

(The image showing Turbot-1 is borrowed from this page, where all of Spirous more or less exotic cars can be seen.)

A few days ago I took a walk down memory lane and re-read all of the old Spirou-albums published. While perusing them I started thinking about gas-turbines. Why do we never see gas-turbines in ordinary cars, and did the corporations ever do any development on such a vehicle? Is it even possible to power a car using a turbine, and what would the advantages/disadvantages prove to be, compared to a conventional engine? My experience with turbines is limited to seeing them in various flying machines such as airplanes and helicopters, but cars?

After lots of googling and a lucky find on Wikipedia I had read up on the subject. Fact of the matter was that the Chrysler Corporation spent a lot of money and time on a fairly succesful project involving turbine-powered cars that started at the end of the 1940s. The project was however cancelled during the ’70s without much ado. The reasons for killing it was primarily political and financial, but the project none the less had proven that it was somewhat possible to build turbine-powered cars.

Chrysler was very ambitious with this project, and it culminated in a public prototype where the company built 55 turbine-powered cars. Five of these vehicles was retained for internal testing purposes, but the other fifty cars were distributed to a very exclusive selection of drivers. This was the first time in history that anyone beside the engineers had access to a prototype for an extended period of time, and Chryslers intent with this was to gain broader experience and input with this new type of propulsion. This would in turn be used for the evaluation of the project. Chrysler was very selective about those fifty drivers, and an extensive application process was used to determine them.

When the project ended 46 of the vehicles were destroyed in order to avoid import-tolls on them - the bodies had been built by Ghia in Italy, and thus were considered imported vehicles. It was also done to put a definite end to the prototype project. Nine of the vehicles were however kept and most were donated to car-museums after having made the turbine inoperable (by removing a vital part). All nine of these are still in existence, and four are in running condition after Chrysler gave the missing part to the current owners. One of the nine has been lovingly restored by its owner, is in perfect running condition and regularly tours exhibitions and car-shows around the USA. Anyone who drives it has to sign a logbook.

The styling of these prototypes was extremely futuristic and incorporated a turbine motif. Among the more unique aspects was the wide range of fuels that the engine ran on. It would happily run on pretty much anything that burned - diesel, kerosene, regular gasoline or even jet-fuel made no difference. Unlike earlier turbines the engine didn’t need adjusting for each fuel-type either, all you did was gas and go!

The feedback from the drivers was interesting. Among the positive things mentioned was the extremely smooth ride, since a gas-turbine has almost no vibration. Among the negative aspects was the engines thirst for fuel, especially when idling or driving in a city. Many drivers also complained on the noise, a gas-turbine sounds like a jet-engine with a high-pitched whining much like a vacuum-cleaner rather than the smooth rumbling of a conventional engine such as the V8’s that most american production-cars were equipped with back then.

Chrysler wasn’t the only company though who experimented with turbines. British Rover also experimented with turbines, although on a much smaller scale during the 1950s. Rover JET1 was the product of their project, and even though it also proved possible to use turbines in cars it suffered from the same drawbacks as Chryslers later project - high fuel-consumption and various mechanical issues.

Apart from these two interesting historical projects I also found a bunch of Swedes currently building a custom turbine-powered Dodge Charger. Their homepage is however very sparse on details, but there’s some pictures and two interesting movies to enjoy.

Below is two pictures of Chryslers turbine-powered prototype built in 1964. This was the 55-vehicle prototype program. Personally I think this is an extremely cool car and it’s visual styling reminds me a lot of the mid-60s Thunderbird with it’s elegant and thin body. There’s plenty more pictures of the Chrysler turbine-car (especially the one that’s been restored) over on Allpar and I highly recommend a visit there if you’re the least bit interested in it. Make sure to check out the really neat interior with it’s dominating turbine-motif.

(These images have been borrowed from Allpars page about the Chrysler turbine-car, which also has plenty more detailed information about the same.)

UPDATE (080221): I recently discovered that General Motors also built three concept-cars called the Firebird (I, II and III respectively) in the 1950’s. These were not intended for production, but rather as a proof-of-concept. There’s more info about them on Wikipedia, complete with photos of their futuristic styling.

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(This is a translation and slight update/rewrite of my earlier Swedish-language posting from almost a year ago. I feel that there’s a lot of writings in my previous three years that might be enjoyable to people who don’t understand the language. Postings that I’m a little extra proud of, and thus I’ve started translating a few of them for your questionable enjoyment.)

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This work is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 2.5 Sweden License.