[desertjd]

Went to the Palm Springs Air Museum this weekend and saw some awesome WWII planes and exhibits.
They also had some vintage autos including a rare 1948 Tucker. Since they only made a few of these babies (51 Total), it was cool to actually see. No barriers either, I went right up and touched the chrome and did a Vulcan mind meld with this beauty.

Jim

 

[Sharky]

That thing was so far ahead of its time....

 

[I<3myW8]

Origianl suicide doors?

And 3 pipes?


Awesome.

 

[NoneRock]

Rear engine...

that ride is worth an absolute fortune. :bow:

 

[wst]

I so want one of those and it would so make sense (my last name being tucker) I have a model of a tucker sitting on my shelf next to my model passat.

 

[ryan8186]

That is gorgeous

 

[desertjd]

I<3myW8 wrote:

And 3 pipes?

Actually there's six pipes. Three on each side, one per cylinder. This thing is cool. The transmission was unique too. I'm sure some vehicle historian here can give more technical details than I about what was good and bad on this car.

 

[wst]

I beleive the maker made gun turrets used on WWII vehicles. He also designed a military vehicle, but it was shot down because they thought it was too fast. This vehicle was way ahead of its time. They considered using seatbelts on it but eventually scrapped the idea because they thought it would appear unsafe. It did have a padded dashboard and steering wheel making it much safer than most cars out at the time. I also remember that it was also quite quick compared to other cars at the time, and the trademark feature being the center headlight that turned the way you steered the car. Preduction was eventually halted because of fraud (mail fraud I beleive), otherwise it would have set a new standard for other cars to live up to.

That was a general outline of a paper I wrote a few years back . I left out a lot, but that was all I could remember. I have a whole book on the tucker, but I can't seem to find it now.

 

[Postman]

It had a Lycoming engine if I recall?

A friend of the family was going to start a franchise. He met Tucker and got to drive one from Illinois (I think) to Los Angeles. He swears he was hitting 140, but that may be an old mans imagination. He still likes to tell the story though!

 

[Scuba2001]

What a great car for its time, and these pictures show that its in pristine condition. Very nice IMO. I remember watching a show/documentary on Tucker's life and his accomplishments. If you look at his designs, some are still in todays cars and trucks, over 50 years later.

Steve

 

[CB]

Y'all can have the Tucker, I'll take the B-17 in the background...

 

[Johnny B5.5]

sweet car

 

[Cycles]

Very... and as mentioned, WAY ahead of it's time.