[A 1985 Camaro IROC-Z squeals its tires, bursting onscreen to the sounds of Judas Priest’s “Breakin’ The Law”.]

BOSS TODD IS FUCKIN’ BACK, BITCHES!

LOOK WHAT I STOLE FROM THAT FUCKIN’ WOP’S GARAGE! God DAMN, this is gonna be AWESOME. First I take this show from him, now I’m getting his rides! Everything’s comin’ up BOSS TODD. One month ’til season opener, three months of bullshit, and then I’m gonna make my TRIUMPHANT NFL COMEBACK. I feel it in my bones. I feel it in my hog. Anyways, I’m gonna try another burnout in this shit. LET’S GO!

THE CHRYSLER TURBINE

Model Year: 1963

Total units produced: 50

Vehicle type: 2-door, 2+2 seater touring coupe

Engine: A831 turbine engine; 130 HP, 425 ft-lbs of torque

Drivetrain: Front engine, RWD

Transmission: 3-speed TorqueFlite automatic

Gross weight: 3952 lbs.

0-60 time: 12 seconds

Top speed: 120 MPH

Vehicle cost: N/A

What makes this car interesting?

Imagine a car that could run on almost ANYTHING. Gas, diesel, kerosene, propane, ethanol, lighter fluid, moonshine, vegetable oil… now, imagine that car had looks for days and quiet, serene comfort to spare. Now here’s the thing: that’s not your imagination. It really existed. And this government fucked it all up.

The Chrysler Corporation has long been the weird baby brother of the Big Three American automakers, including Ford and General Motors; as they consistently faced stiff competition from the two larger manufacturers, Chrysler ended up taking many risks over the years in order to cling to its market share. A few worked, such as acquiring AMC and the Jeep brand, or when Lee Iacocca launched the K-car design in the early ’80s… and many others did not, such as the merger with Daimler and just about every model the company produced from 1970 through 1980.

The turbine car falls somewhere in the middle of success and failure. It’s true that the product never entered into commercial production, but the R&D that went into developing the Turbine Car was based on some entirely reasonable premises.

Chrysler’s fascination with turbine engines started in the 1930s, when it was working on developing some engine prototypes for the US military, but didn’t kick into high gear until well after the end of World War II. In the mid-’50s, the turbine represented a world of potential to go toe-to-toe with their US competitors; if done right, the turbine engine meant less weight, fewer moving parts, and far less necessary maintenance, providing a clear cost savings for company and customer alike. Alas…

Before the Turbine Car, there were a few other models that were tested with a retrofitted turbine, including the Plymouth Fury and Dodge Dart; however, the Turbine was the first model developed with the explicit intention of being powered by a turbine engine.

Seriously, look at it. The body was designed by Ghia, the famous Italian firm that paved the way for beautiful aerodynamic stylings in many other manufacturers such as Ford and VW. The interior was stitched with the finest leather, and it even had power windows – a real luxury in this time. The fourth-gen A831 turbine had 80% fewer parts than a traditional combustion engine, and also didn’t need antifreeze, a cooling system, radiator, crankshafts, or connecting rods. They were also much quieter than typical engines due to having so few internal parts as well – a nice bonus on long commutes. That engine was so bombproof it could even run on things like furnace oil or perfume. The President of Mexico even took a test drive in it where the engine ran on tequila, with complete success. Chrysler carried out an extensive testing program, with 203 drivers in 133 American cities driving 50 test vehicles for two years, ending in January 1966 – and after a few early mechanical issues, drove over a million miles with mostly no issues at all.

From a pure design perspective, the Turbine was one of the boldest and most forward-thinking automotive concepts of the entire 20th century. But it wasn’t to be. Chrysler almost went bankrupt in the late ’70s, and as part of the federal bailout agreement that saved the company, they were forced to permanently scrap the costly turbine program.

What makes this car stupid?

Underneath all the space-age glitz and glamor of the Turbine are some real, notable problems with the actual driving experience. At 130 HP, the turbine engine had roughly the same horsepower as many typical family cars of its era, but the acceleration from a dead stop was absolutely abysmal. Seriously, a 12-second 0-60 time? Woof. This is due to two main problems – one is that the custom body panels designed by Ghia were quite heavy and thus affected start-stop at some level. For a car designed with weight reduction as a primary factor, that’s bad. The other, more importantly, is the fact that the turbine engine needed to spool up to almost 40,000 RPM in order to reach its ideal power band – and that took much more time than on a conventional combustion engine. (There was a reducer in place on the output shaft to make this tolerable on the driveshaft and axle.) This also resulted in some brutal throttle lag. It was typically about 1.5 seconds from initial push of the gas pedal to the car sufficiently speeding up to make a manoeuvre – and while that’s bad, it’s still a shit ton better than the nine seconds of lag that happened on some pre-production models.

Next, starting these things was a real pain in the ass. If you wanted a simple turn the key, engage the gear shift, and go, this was not the car for you. The start sequence mandated that the turbine had to spool up to speed first before the car could safely be driven, and engineers installed a shutoff switch if the driver hit the gas too early on startup before the turbine was good to go. As the average consumer is an absolute moron, this was likely an enraging experience for many test drivers who failed to properly understand the careful instructions given to them in person and in the user manual. And if an engine blew up… well, we actually have no idea how expensive they were to produce. Chrysler never released the figures, even after shuttering the program, but it’s believed that each turbine engine would have cost at the very minimum somewhere around $10K in 1963 dollars to build due to the incredibly precise nature of the materials and metallurgy required for construction. Add on top the custom, handmade, Italian bodywork… it would’ve been equivalent to paying hundreds of thousands for a vehicle today. For a company hoping to build 100,000 a year, the economics simply didn’t scale.

Third, the gas mileage was… disappointing, at least from a modern perspective. Even running on diesel (which was considered to be the most optimal fuel for the turbine), the car is believed to have only averaged around 14.5 MPG in city driving and 18-19 on the highway – falling short of the lofty ambitions that Chrysler had for the turbine in its initial designs.

Fourth, leaded gas – the most common fuel source in the US – absolutely fucked these engines up hard due to the deposits left in the turbine from all of the additives to the fuel. For many consumers, having to find other fuel sources – even things as readily accessible as diesel or furnace oil – was still a bridge too far to consider permanently owning one of these vehicles.

Fifth, it was absolutely possible to redline these things and burn out the turbine prematurely. Now keep in mind of course that “redline” here is 60,000 RPM. Every Turbine Car had a pyrometer installed to measure the turbine temperature and warn the driver if they were getting too aggressive with the throttle – and while Chrysler didn’t have to replace a ton of engines, it still happened a few times regardless.

Lastly – and this may be the real reason that the turbine project was killed for good – was that it had basically no way of meeting the stricter emissions standards that the EPA and state DOTs began enforcing in the late 1960s. All of the production models were eventually destroyed, save for nine – two are still owned by Chrysler, six are in museums, and one is owned by my ASSHOLE show forerunner Jay Leno. And now by me, I guess!

CAN YOU GET PUSSY IN THIS CAR? 

WOULD YOU FUCK JANE JETSON IN THE AEROCAR? You’re kidding yourself if you say you wouldn’t. George was a wimpy little bitch. He can stay on the ground in this dumbass thing while I’m ripping through the clouds in the fourteen-mile-high club. Pussy.

How can BOSS TODD fix this thing? 

Well listen, I tell you what. Some Russians actually beat me to it.

Every wonder what happens when you stuff a MiG engine in a BMW? Look no further. These guys are geniuses. THIS is what I would do to the Turbine Car if fucking Jay won’t stop hounding me about it soon. Probably. I should probably ditch this shit in the woods for now and let it cool off for a little.

BOSS TODD out, bitches. See you in hell.

[The Camaro burns out again, with “Breakin’ The Law” blaring once more.]

***

Information for this article taken from here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. Banner image by The Maestro.