Re: {Chrysler 300} Turbine car on the DC National Mall

A few loyal Chrysler customers were given the Turbine cars to test drive for a few months. One lucky fellow was club member, George Berg, from Chicago area. He said he hated to give it back. George had bought a brand new black 300C convertible and we're happy to say it is still in the club with his son.

On Mon, Sep 12, 2022 at 5:15 PM Roberta Cottrell <randm291@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I think there may have been a Turbine Car displayed in the original Harrah’s Auto Collection in Sparks, Nevada back in the late 1960’s/early 1970’s. Unfortunately don’t have any pics to prove it!

Roberta Cottrell

Sent from my iPhone

On Sep 12, 2022, at 1:45 PM, Noel Hastalis <cpaviper@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I second Bob J's comment that the Lehto book is a very interesting read! Following up on Bob's mention re Frank Kleptz' passing, his operable Turbine Car along the spare Turbine powerplant that Frank owned were both purchased at auction by Ted Stahl for his Stahl Museum in suburban Detroit, where we admired this iconic car a year ago when we visited the Stahl Museum.

Our 300-E consultant, Bob Brown, has been the curator of this fabulous museum for years and helped facilitate our visit along with Meet Host John Begian. Those of us Club Members who visited it loved the many displayed classic cars along with incredibly rare musical organs, orchestrions, violanos and the like. We were mesmerized by the young organist that Ted Stahl hired in to play beautiful tune after tune for us on the unique Wurlitzer family organ at the Museum, that had been custom built for the Wurlitzer family's personal residence.

Back in the day, I had also seen one of the Turbine Cars cruising in our southside Chicago neighborhood a couple times, but never got closer than half a block from it.

Noel

On 09/12/2022 3:15 PM Bob Jasinski <rpjasin@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

All,

I have been enamored with The Chrysler Turbine car since I was 10 years old. I bought the definitive book on Turbine cars shortly after its release in 2010. The book is written by Steve Lehto, with a forward by Jay Leno, my copy is signed by Jay and he also signed my factory brochure of the car.

There are a number of myths about the turbine car, and the book does a good job of clarifying how many were built and how many are left. The belief that the cars were destroyed only for purpose of avoiding import taxes is really only partially true. Steve Lehto writes “A Chrysler VP told Look magazine our main objective is research, and we did not want turbines turning up on used car lots”. “If the cars were sold to the public, it may have turned out even worse for Chrysler from a public relations perspective. Without spare parts to keep the cars running, they would have soon been consigned to scrap yards anyway. Or worse, after the turbine engines failed, the owners would have to shoehorn something else under the hood to keep the car running. The final result might have seen “turbine” cars being driven around with piston engines under their hoods. Automotive manufacturers routinely consigned their prototype and test cars to the scrap heap, and the turbine cars were no different”. Also written “The reality was the import duties at that point would have been peanuts. They didn’t want the cars just hanging around, getting into people’s hands and messing up the image of the program, people getting them and putting V8s into them, that was the real reason, Bill Carry explained”

There were a total of 55 cars built. 45 cars were sent to a scrapyard south of Detroit, where they were crushed and incinerated, and one was destroyed at the Chelsea Proving Grounds. Nine were spared, Chrysler has two, five are in various museums, and two are privately owned. The five cars that went to museums had the fan assemblies from the gas generators removed from the engines to render the cars nonfunctional, for display only. The two privately owned cars are Jay’s which is having the engine worked on as I write this, and the car Frank Kleptz bought from a museum. Jay told me he helped Frank obtain a working engine from Chrysler. Frank has since passed, and as far as I know the car is still owned by his survivors. I remain grateful to Jay for taking me for a ride in his Turbine Car in December of 2015.

Bob J

From: chrysler-300-club-international@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <chrysler-300-club-international@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Vannice, M Albert
Sent: Monday, September 12, 2022 9:26 AM
To: mgoodknight@xxxxxxxx; dan300f@xxxxxxx
Cc: jkg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; nicksgaragesd@xxxxxxxxx; dave.dumais@xxxxxxxxx; chrysler-300-club-international <chrysler-300-club-international@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: {Chrysler 300} Turbine car on the DC National Mall

Hello Group,

The discussion about Chrysler's turbine car jogged my memory. In the spring of 1963 I was a junior in Chemical Engineering at Michigan State University and on the organizing committee for the College of Engineering Spring Exposition. I had been reading about Chrysler's turbine car so I wrote and asked them if they would provide a turbine car for exhibit at our weekend show. They said YES and the car was there. Since I was the correspondent, I got to ride in it. What a beautiful car! The engine sounded like a huge vacuum cleaner when starting and accelerating. I hated the decision to destroy most of them (for tax reasons).

Al

From: chrysler-300-club-international@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <chrysler-300-club-international@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> on behalf of mgoodknight@xxxxxxxx <mgoodknight@xxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, September 12, 2022 11:16 AM
To: dan300f@xxxxxxx <dan300f@xxxxxxx>
Cc: jkg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <jkg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; nicksgaragesd@xxxxxxxxx <nicksgaragesd@xxxxxxxxx>; dave.dumais@xxxxxxxxx <dave.dumais@xxxxxxxxx>; chrysler-300-club-international <chrysler-300-club-international@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: {Chrysler 300} Turbine car on the DC National Mall

In Fall of 1962 I was an entering Freshman at University of Florida with the goal of pursuing a career in Mechanical Engineering. My dormitory room was immediately across the street from where the Engineer's Fair filled a small field for the display of numerous technological developments. One of those was a sample of a new Xerox copy machine, but the most outstanding display for me was a brand new Chrysler Turbine car. I did not see it operate and I'm uncertain that it was ever started for demonstration during the display event. Needless to say I was MOST impressed by the beauty of it's styling and, of course, by the technological achievement.
About 3 years later I was hanging out at a Chevron service with several of my friends when much to my surprise a Turbine car passed slowly through the moderate right angle curve just in front of where we were standing, so we got an exceptional view of the car in motion and could here it accelerate out of the curve.
That was certainly a memorable event for me.
My third opportunity for a viewing came last September when with the 300 Club we visited the museum where one was displayed.

As I try more to recall the date of the Engineer's Fair I think it might have been in the winter or early spring of '63.

----------Marshall Goodknight

Please note: message attached

From: "'dan300f' via Chrysler 300 Club International" <chrysler-300-club-international@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: John Grady <jkg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Nick Taylor <nicksgaragesd@xxxxxxxxx>
Cc: Dave Dumais <dave.dumais@xxxxxxxxx>, Chrysler 300 Club International <chrysler-300-club-international@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: {Chrysler 300} Turbine car on the DC National Mall
Date: Sun, 11 Sep 2022 18:04:31 -0700

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