The Tucker 48 was a car that when released was going to turn the automotive industry upside down, so claimed the companies founder Preston Tucker. In fact only 50 cars were ever made before the company folded under the pressure of bad publicity and the burden of heavy financial losses in bringing the car to market.
Tucker who spent most of his youth admiring cars then later building racing cars and selling cars, decided he needed to make a car that was not only better than what the other manufactures were making at the time but would really compete in sales, so he set about setting up the Tucker car company.
Tucker’s plan was to build a family car that would be safe and advanced, initially called the Tucker Torpedo (the 50 actual cars were just called the Tucker 48) his company set about designing his dream.
The car he planed was to have a rear engine for better traction and increased interior room, rear engine cars were pretty much unheard of at the time in the US as at the time of design the VW beetle was still not released. Other features focused on safety, items never used in cars before included disk brakes, a padded dashboard and steering wheel, a windscreen that popped out in a crash and a central headlight that followed the direction of the front wheels.
Various setbacks and delays gave tucker a lot of bad publicity, something he claims were caused by the press having a bias to the three large established automakers at the time. Whatever the case, designing a car from scratch would be no easy task and in the end development of the Tucker engine and transmission was dropped with the engine being replaced with a flat 6 helicopter engine.
With angry investors and the government about to knock on the door, Preston fast tracked production of the car despite a shortfall of much needed funds, but it was all a bit too late after only 50 cars were made, production stopped amid the controversy of fraud investigations. Some of the 50 cars were put together by a skeleton staff of loyal workers after around 1600 workers were retrenched. Today that loyalty continues to the Tucker 48 (often affectionately known as the Tucker Torpedo) as most of the remaining cars still exist in the hands of avid collectors and museums across the United States.
Preston Tucker was tried for fraud in relation to his failed car company but was later found not guilty. The Franklin helicopter engine company he purchased to power the Tucker survived the bankruptcy and was kept by the Tucker family until 1961 and still survives today under a new name and new owners.
A movie was made in 1988 about Preston Tucker starring Jeff Bridges, Titled “Tucker: The Man and His Dream” it was directed by Francis Ford Coppola who also owns a Tucker 48, several fiberglass replicas were also made for the movie.
