Jay Leno wrote forewords for Chrysler's Turbine Car and Preston Tucker and His Battle to Build the Car of Tomorrow. He is a stand-up comedian, a television host, and a writer. He contributes a column to Popular Mechanics, which showcases his collection of more than 200 vehicles and advice about automotive topics. He lives in Beverly Hills, California.
Offering a behind-the-scenes look into the world of automotive research and development in the 1960s, this engaging narrative traces the birth of Chrysler’s alternative “jet” car and reveals the story behind its sudden and mysterious demise. Relying on extensive research and firsthand accounts from surviving members of the turbine car program—including the metallurgist who created the exotic metals for the engine and the test driver who drove it at Chrysler's proving grounds—this chronicle documents the bold development of an automobile with a jet turbine engine. In addition to running well on virtually any flammable liquid—including kerosene, vodka, heating oil, and Chanel N°5 perfume—the pioneering engines had one fifth the number of moving parts and required less maintenance than conventional engines. Despite the fleet’s amazing performance over millions of miles by test drivers, Chrysler pulled the plug on the project and crushed almost all of the cars. The reasons behind the surprising end to the jet car fleet are finally explained here.
In the wake of World War II, the U.S. automobile industry was fully unprepared to meet the growing demands of the public, for whom they had not made any cars for years. In stepped Preston Tucker, a salesman extraordinaire who announced the building of a revolutionary new car: the Tucker ‘48, the first car in almost a decade to be built fresh from the ground up. Tucker’s car, which would include ingenious advances in design and engineering that other car companies could not match, captured the interest of the public, and automakers in Detroit took notice. Here, author Steve Lehto tackles Tucker’s amazing story, relying on a huge trove of documents that has been used by no other writer to date. It is the first comprehensive, authoritative account of Tucker’s magnificent car and his battles with the government. And in this book, Lehto finally answers the question automobile aficionados have wondered about for decades: exactly how and why the production of such an innovative car was killed.
