Chrysler's Turbine Car: The Rise and Fall of Detroit's Coolest Creation

Most people today have probably never heard of the futuristic experimental automobile that author Steve Lehto profiles in his outstanding book, "Chrysler's Turbine Car."In the mid-1960s, Chrysler Corporation, then the third largest American automaker, broke all the rules of a notoriously conservative industry by developing a practical, reliable automobile powered by a 130-horsepower gas turbine engine--a "jet engine." Even more startling, Chrysler loaned a hand-built batch of these cars to normal, ordinary drivers for their daily use, free of charge. From October 1963 until January 1966, 203 carefully selected drivers in 48 states each got one of 50 Ghia Turbine Cars to drive for three months. Collectively, this "civilian test team" put more than a million miles on the fleet. I was of high-school age then, living in a suburb of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and I still vividly recall seeing and hearing a brilliant metallic bronze Turbine Car whooshing around my neighborhood. I never found out who the lucky driver was, but the sight, sound and smell of the stunning Italian-designed coupe made a strong impression on me.That's why my interest in "Chrysler's Turbine Car" was high even before I cracked open the cover. I'm pleased to say the book far exceeded my expectations. About half of it--90+ pages--is about the "user program," by which Chrysler engineers found out what would happen in the real world with their state-of-the-art vehicle in the hands of the general public. It was a bold, audacious program that proved the feasibility of turbine-powered cars for everyday driving. It also showed that turbine engines were far more reliable than piston engines, and had several other important advantages. Also--a fact few people appreciated at the time--they could burn almost anything, including leaded and unleaded gasoline, diesel fuel, kerosene, jet fuel, heating oil, alcohol, tequila and perfume (Chanel No, 5, reportedly)."Chrysler's Turbine Car" is authoritative, detailed, comprehensive, exhaustively documented and exceptionally well-written. It's a fast read, filled with technical facts and enlightening anecdotes, and I regretted that it ended after only 188 pages (not including endnotes, a bibliography and an index). Mr. Lehto sandwiches the tale of the user program in between the fascinating history of Chrysler's turbine engine development (Ghia Turbine Cars used fourth-generation engines) and the disheartening story of the demise of Detroit's only successful effort to create a viable turbine-powered car. The revolutionary powerplant could not survive in an era of Federal air quality and mileage standards, OPEC oil embargoes, skyrocketing fuel prices, Chrysler's management and quality problems, burgeoning imports and a whole litany of other ills--most of them not the fault of the engine itself. The experiment that Chrysler had pursued for over 20 years soon faded into automotive oblivion, leaving a legacy of little more than a few cars in museums--and lingering smiles on the faces of those few drivers fortunate enough to have experienced "the future" in the mid-1960s.

Steve Lehto the author, wrote about the Chrysler Turbine Car, that had hopes of changing the way vehicles were made!Unfortunately, a limited number of Cars were made, using this technology, because the engine cost was just too expensive. Jay Leno owns a Turbine Car too. In fact Steve's brother is helping rebuild the engine, so Jay can get it going on the road again...Jay Leno graciously wrote the forward to the book.I bought it for my nephew Daniel, who's an engineer by education, is working on developing gardening equipment based on this technology.I'm anxious to see what happens...Steve Lehto has a popular YouTube Channel called Lehtos Law, that I watch nearly every day. Surprisingly, it's on 2x a day and there's also a channel called Lehto's Vault, that I watch around 6pm CST.Check them out, they are about current stories in the news...nothing political or religious!I absolutely love it.Steve has written over 15 books and is a well respected and successful Lemon Law attorney in Michigan. He's gone up against major manufacturers, and dealerships to help win cases for his clients! Check out this wonderful book, as well as Lehto's Law on YouTube. I'm betting that you too will enjoy it as much as I am.george😎🤿🦈🦑🇺🇸TEXAS

Interesting and well written account of the turbine saga a beacon of opportunity at the time which failed to deliver. The author is rightly sympathetic to the men behind the concept and the only criticism could be that the shortcomings of the car in practical use by average drivers was underplayed. some of the detail regarding each car and their loan drivers becomes a little repetitive. But it has a depth of study and detail from the business and engineering aspect to more than cancel this out. Well worth the trouble.

I've been a fam of the Chrysler Turbine Car project since 1969, when I wrote an assignment for a marketing class in college. It was the first time I got serious about research before writing something. The author spent MUCH MORE time researching the project. His knowledge of the history of the turbine engine, the Chrysler Corporation and its key employees involved in the Turbine project, the people who tested the cars is immense. I was not aware of this book until Jay Leno mentioned it on Jay Leno's Garage on TV/YouTube. I have a number of paper documents I got from Chrysler for that paper I wrote in 1970, and I used them to build a "correct" scale model of the car in the late 1970's (since stolen). The Ghia-bodied version of the Turbine cars (55 in number) was, for the most part, destroyed, despite fact that nearly everyone who had a chance to drive it said they be happy to buy it. VERY GOOD READ.

Fascinating history of an amazing vehicle made possible by American inginuity. Having been a car-nut for over 60 years, this was a fun and informative book for me. I was fortunate to see one of the remaining Chrysler Turbine Cars in person in the 1990s at the annual Iola, WI car meet/sale/show. The book contains stories about the families that were able to test-drive these futuristic vehicles for 3 months, too, along with technological details about the development. Highly recommend this book!

A must have for any car, Chrysler or Turbine car enthusiast.

Hoch interessantes Buch. Die Story des Turbine Car ist so wohl einmalig in der Autogeschichte.Lesenswert und für mich eine ideale Ergänzung zum www.

Very interesting history of the Chrysler Gas Turbine car of the 1960's

Me he tragado decenas de libros de historia del automóvil, y éste es uno de los peores ejemplares que nunca he visto.Para empezar, el editor se pierde en detalles completamente irrelevantes de la historia (se dedica a describir la ropa del ingeniero jefe, el color de sus ojos, la pose que tenía en no-sé-qué cartel)... Podríamos aceptarlo, pero luego pasa de puntillas sobre todos y cada uno de los aspectos técnicos de las turbinas y las complejidades de sus desarrollos. Es incapaz de hablar de ciertas aleaciones, o de muchas de las pruebas llevadas a cabo durante el desarrollo.Las descripciones visuales constantes te hacen tener que ir constantemente a buscar las páginas centrales, donde se encuentran las fotos, que no están intercaladas en el texto. Además, la estructura del texto deja mucho que desear, con grupos de cinco párrafos que se separan del siguiente grupo con una línea horizontal, sin un hilo de continuidad coherente.A fin de cuentas, el libro se centra en las historias personales, y no en el meollo de la cuestión del producto. Cuenta también las impresiones personales de los que pudieron tener uno de los coches de pruebas en sus hogares.¿Moraleja? Si esperas en este libro un simposio técnico sobre el desafío que fue crear un coche con turbina, rico en detalles técnicos y de desarrollo, estarás equivocado. Ahora bien, si quieres pasar un buen rato leyendo una suerte de novela sobre las personas que estuvieron detrás del proyecto, puede resultarte interesante.A fin de cuentas, no hay otro documento al respecto de este coche así que por eso le doy tres sobre cinco estrellas...

If you saw this car one's in a magazine and on TV. You would like to know more about the car. Now you can, with this excellent book with information about the development, history, user program, etc.Steve Letho did an excellent job with his research and writing this book. He interviewed people who were in the user experimental program, etc. Jay Leno did the foreword for this book and is one of private owner of such a 1964 Chrysler Turbine. I've bought this book on Amazon.co.uk after a saw a video on Jay Leno's a garage.Do you want to know more about this special car and the history about Chrysler's Turbine car, buy this book!