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.
