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This is a twisted, collectivist view point, and not in reality. He was not allowed to compete, by our government. He met the terms of the building he got from the government (big mistake), by making 50 cars the first year,. and the plant was taken from him breech of contract. Ever wonder why none of his kids ever told the story from the Tucker view point? I am sure their story would be very popular. It is called "gag orders" son. Damn progressive bot channels.
You are correct about DeLorean! As a DeLorean owner for 19yrs and in the DMC community for 34 yrs they did DeLorean bad also. It went as high as the Reagans with the whole war on drugs thing. They needed a high roller name and John was it. There are two incredible documentaries that are on netflix about this. Not saying he was a honest man but John did get involved with some shady shit but the Cocaine thing was a fraud. They even threatened that if he didn't go through with it that they would cut off his daughters head and send it home in a shopping bag. I'm actually friends with Katherine DeLorean! Though in the beginning the car did have flaws but as it kept being built it got a lot better! I use my 82 DeLorean as a daily driver! Great car and way better than what people gave it credit for. A lot of people don't know the real story of John and his company but he really did have good intentions. He had so many plans to build so many different things from his factory and Dunmurray Northern Ireland.
I grew up in Detroit and my dad was an engineer for GM. The Tucker always reminded me of a blown up Studebaker. My dad would bring new items home from the tech centre at times. My wagon had corvette emblems all around it and even had seat belts before they were in cars....lol. I had a home made scooter and it had wings like a 57 chevy made out of experimental fibre glass for the corvette.
Jeff Bridges played Tucker in one of the best docu movies ever made. I read as much as can be about Tucker, and he was far ahead of the Ford and the rest.
I can never think of a Tucker 48, without thinking of my second wedding, and our best men's wedding, 2 uears later. Jis grandfather worked at Preston's plant, and obtained one of the bodies and parts, as a thank you from the family. He and his kids built it in their garage, and it's been passed down to the eldest heir, ever since. When my wife and I got married, he drove us to the chirch, and the reception, in it. No prior notice, just fired it up, and showed up at the house. We'd taken it to local cruise nights a few times, and yes, I'd driven it, with the rebuilt Cord transaxle as well. Two years later, his wedding came up, and his wife wanted to be driven to the church in it. My wife was her matron of honor, and i was asked to drive the bridal party there, and the couple to the reception. I almost declined. One mistake, and that's one hell of a repair bill, after all. Not to mention finding parts, would border on impossible. Decided to in the end, because he was of the mondset that, it's just glass, metal, rubbet, and paint. Drive it, as it was meant to be driven. It was also a chance to have our daughter experience a piece of history, as it was her first ride in it. Spmething you don't pass up, with a tomboy, who is also a budding gearhead. Taught her how to operate the trans and shifter, ues, Cords operate differently than most manials, when she turned 16. Didn't use it for hers when she got married in 2019, but it was there as well. Had a couole classics there, including our 70 Challenger R/T, Hemi, 4 speed car, Alpine White, which we loaned to them, fir the day, and my wife's 66 Charger R/T, 383 Auto. Son in law rode my 26 Indian Chief to the church, and we surprised them with it. Same bike her mom and I rode on our first date, and the first one I topk her out on, when I first met her, age.4. Thanks for making this, and taking my mind off being in the ICU, post amputation, due to a serious infection.
@@breathedeep2060 I'm adjusting. In rehab at this point. Figure I'll be home in a couple weeks. Another month after that, staples and sutures will be out, than go get fit for the socket and prosthetic. PT from there. Found out Tuesday that the samples taken at the knee, original cut point, came back clean, no infection. Did the femur cut and length reduction that morning as well. Not going to be easy, but I'll be fine. Keeping busy by thinking about ideas that will make the foot brake on our bikes work with the new leg, and LMAO looking at funny amputee t shirts. Wife brought my sketch and dwsign kits by, and have been sketching pictures the staff bring in, their kids, pets, wedding photos, for them, to hang at home. Even worked in the design for a couple tattoos, and an airbrushing job, for one of the OT girls dad's old Sportster, that I can paint, after I'm home. 1st Gulf War vet. Passed on last year, her tribute to him.
@@kevinfox500 I’m sure it’s quite the adjustment! Glad to hear there’s no infection and you’ll be getting a prosthetic. It sounds like to me you’ll have the bike brake figured out in no time. That’s so cool you can do that! All the artwork you’re doing for the hospital staff will be conversation pieces for them for years to come. That’s really amazing you’re doing that! Good luck with the PT. I’m sure your going to do great and will be back to your routine sooner rather than later. I’m sorry to hear about you going through this but I’m rooting for you!! You’ve got this!!
Too cool , I'm jealous I always wanted to ride or drive a tucker. I bet your glad you drove her to the wedding? Not too many people alive that have ridden in, much less driven a tucker. Teach your daughter all she wants to learn. We need young men and women who don't want to drive a battery around.
Yeah. Everyone knows the "Big Three" would meet in a big room carved into a mountain side just outside of Detroit. Their mission was to crush any and all competition. Their victims included buggy whip makers, street car companies, flying car inventors, cars that run on water, 200mpg carburetors, atomic cars, French cars sold in the US, that er..., person who came up with the Dale, and a host of others.
@johnreitz5676 Go back and read your US Auto history a little better, There could have been a true big four member but George Romney wasn't interested in merging with Studebaker-Packard!!!.GM and Ford got into a real nasty price war and the real victims were Studebaker Packard, Nash, Hudson, Willys, and the new kid on the block Kaiser!!!.Even Chrysler was feeling it beacuse of this developing price war between GM and Ford!!!.I would also suggest that you take a good look at the state of the Auto business after world War 11 beacuse even the big three had several things to deal with!.
......There were numerous strikes and even steel shortages, Ford had to be reorganized from Henry Ford to Hank the duce or else Ford motor company might never have survived!!!!. Chrysler fell into a styling and design funk of ultra conservative design that cost them dearly!!!.It wasn't til Virgil Exner came along that Chrysler really snapped outta it!.
I also highly recommend watching the movie about Tucker. Preston Tucker did what many dream of doing. The "Big Three" hate competition. So its no wonder they tried to do Tucker in. Tuckers also have the engine in the rear like a 911. The are faster than any other American car of the time. I didn't know about the Tucker race cars. Mr. John Delorean was also set up by evil corporate forces who wanted him to fail. Thanks.
Why didn't they investigate Henry Ford who received the highest award Germany could give, during WWII. His factory in Germany was never bombed although every one around his was demolished. A real American hero.
The Ford plants were bombed in near Paris, also in Antwerp and the Cologne was bombed 4 times in 1944. GM plants were also bombed. You may want to get your history straight.
Amerucan Henry Ford built Hitler's Nazi massive war machine !! Thank's Henry Ford. Many Allied troops likely crushed by Ford-built heavy German military trucks on the battlefield.
Yep The big Three knew they would lose a lot of money to Tucker's Company. It makes you wonder where car manufacturing would have headed in the 50's and 60's. The guy got the shit end of the stick for sure.
Awesome video. The first time I heard of Preston Tucker was when the movie *"Tucker, The Man and His Dream",* starring Jeff Bridges as Preston Tucker, premiered in 1988. While I found the movie entertaining, what really made me interested was the car and his dream of starting a car company. I consider it unforgivable that it never happened. Would the car have changed the way cars in general are produced? Maybe, maybe not. But it would've at least offered car buyers something new and different to consider. Even those who couldn't care less about safety should've been offered something safe to drive.
If the Tucker Torpedo had been produced in numbers, the auto industry would have learned its lesson about putting American drivers in a rear-engine, rear-drive car a decade earlier.
Tucker was a mechanic and visionary, he was too much of a threat. This is what what happens when your blue collar and don't have the engineering and business sense or experience. Tucker is a hero to all blue collar men and women.
I thought there was 51 cars. Most people forget about the original prototype. I have seen the original prototype at the Auburn Indiana auction several times! And to this day I consider it to be the first one and 50 more came after it!
Although, i partially agree regarding to 50 /51 numbers of build vehicles in total.. unfortunately in reality prototypes are 2 types : actual 1/1 functional model or just ideas, (sketches pictures, clay model, etc), that will never reach into factory production phase.. Most functional prototypes are totally different thing from production version, some might not even have motors or transmission at all even 'they appear to look the same' because when prototype is presented for the first time at highway safety authorities to be homologated for public roads many features might get cancelled or not reach at all in production versions, that is why prototypes although are made by same company they do not count as production vehicles and are usually kept as company property / show-room or auto-museums in any rare case very few prototypes are get sold thru auctions to highest bidder end-up in private collectors since most prototypes are not allowed for road use at all, so are usually just sitting engineered creations hidden or exposed, collecting dust.. for quick example "Tucker Carioca" the Tucker concept that suppose to be made in Brazil was presented way-ahead in news-paper, in reality never reach a physical prototype state only crayon sketches & pictures on drawing board-sadly just a cool fantasy..
The thing is, they aren't mutually exclusive. Listening to the story the first time, I can clearly see Tucker had issues, mostly due to lack of experience in how that business is run. However what I ALSO see is some backroom dealing and chicanery on the part of the Big Three to stifle Tucker and keep him off rhythm and keep him from getting off the ground. Knowing that if Tucker was able to do that, he would have smoked them. The fact that most of Tucker's innovations are in use today, means the Big three certainly wanted what Tucker had, just not Tucker himself. That's more than enough motivation to try and ruin the man to get his patents, and taking advantage of his lack of experience and off kilter rhythm to help facilitate that take down is opportunity that they probably considered as "too good to pass up".
He was a man ahead of his time. Aerodynamics and safety, with speed. Scared the big 3 car companies. Like now Toyota is doing it to the big 3 again and breaking them down. Killing the American car . Destroying the economy.
Absolutely, the big three colluded with the government to bankrupt his company. Do you know that his car had a windshield made of shatterproof glass, disc brakes, seat belts, four-wheel independent suspension, fuel injection, the location of all instruments within reach of the steering wheel, seat belts and a padded dashboard, etc. all those things that are now mandatory by law or competition. And this was in 1948.
I have had the rare privilege to have actually turned a wrench on a Tucker. For the sake of the owner's privacy, I won't give any details. It wasn't running during that time, and I always dream of actually riding in one someday!
@@brandonwhitmire8600 Honestly, I don't care what you believe. I feel no need to provide personal information to some internet troll. I'm not trying to impress anyone; I just wanted to share a story with other Tucker fans.
Much like how that Argentinian company hand makes replica Bugattis , that 3 million dollar price tag means that handmade Tucker replicas could sell for seven figures more than covering costs
At least one mid-engine copy with Cadillac Northstar running gear mounted behind the back seat was built in the late eighties or early nineties. There was a magazine article about it.
@classiccardocumentaries You're welcome I'm just a little tuber. I think I got less than 200 subs. I'm working on It But I do have 1 video that has 19000 Views. That's a good one.
He really didn't have the keen business acumen required.. then the rear-mounted engine begets tail-happy handling..who would have had driver experience?
Having seen the movie and watched this, I have to conclude that Tucker didn't come within a country mile of upsetting the Big 3. He was a first class chancer who sold a car which wasn't even close to being ready, was a disaster from a reliability standpoint, and didn't make sense from a car builders perspective nor from a customer perspective. Sure it's great to have a dream and a vision, but some dreams are just plain dumb.
Tucker failed because although he had an advanced design with the 48, he overstretched himself such as wasting money on unnecessary modifications such as converting the rear mounted air-cooled engine to water cooled which was an unnecessary expense. If he had stuck with more conventional underpinnings that worked for his first project he probably would have succeeded.
The Jeff Bridges movie "TUCKER" inspired my young Life! At 61 and Sober, I plan to be doing something BIG:I will be IMPORTING as Herbal Based Anti-Alcohol product to North America; Grown in the South Pacific. Its called KAVA-KAVA , you boil the roots and make Tea- it actually tastes AWEFUL (Try using it in a SMOOTHIE instead?). BUT it KILLS cravings for alcohol & drugs , gives you an EXTREMELY RESTFUL SLEEP!
I have gone to auto museums and seen other cars from that era. They looked like dull, clunky cars prior to to 1942 when America was involved in World War 2. Tucker's design was years ahead of other cars. I saw one of his cars in a San Diego museum and it looked more than ten years ahead of its time. It is a shame that he was not allowed time to bring his ideas to reality.
... very sad - this *Genius Man + Gentleman; for instance near same has been in Germany too = in the 50-years - 'One of best car Manufacturers *Borgward Auto, - was - Destroyed financially by Mercedes Benz through 'Deutsche Bank help. End of - initially Bankruptcie = positive Money Result 110% of Value...... Thanks - for interest, God bless USA, Greetings from Germany
why didnt one of the big 3 or independents buy and produce this car? Graham-Paige bought Cord 810/812 I think the big 3 would have been more concerned abut Kaiser-Frazer Corporation ? dont know just asking good movie and video thank you
Toppled the big three? GM and Chrysler were no 1 and no.2. Ford wasn't that big, it was bigger than the independents but smaller than Chrysler. The 49 Ford is what pushed Ford forward in the sales department. I doubt Tucker would have been any different than any of the other independents at the time, Hudson, Nash, Studebaker, Kaiser-Frazer, Packard and Willys. All of them introduced some pretty amazing and important cars at the same time as Tucker. None of them are hear today (Wll, AMC was a combination of the whole group excluding Studebaker and Packard and is now part of Chrysler)
Yeah, he got screwed!!! Politicians were bought and paid for by the big 3. If you are in the Hershey PA area, make sure you stop at the Antique Automobile Museum on RT39, they have an awesome Tucker display.
Tucker was a sort of Huckster who hit it just at the right time after WW II when the US had all these massive wartime plants suddenly with nothing to build. Much like solar power companies today, there were a lot of people lining up to grab government money to start up car companies. There were dozens of new startups trying to cash in on the market, from small companies like Crosley to big ones like the Kaiser-Frazier started by Henry Kaiser who built liberty ships during the war. Most all of them failed or were bought up and even long established names like Packard, Studebaker and Hudson disappeared due to changing economic times. Tucker's main problem was price- his car cost 4k which was about the same as a Rolls Royce at a time when you could buy a new Cadillac for 3K and a family Chevrolet for 1300.00. The idea that the big 3 car companies were evil villains is ludicrous, they are business people looking for profit. If the Tucker had been a car that could have been produced at a good price, the big 3 would have been bidding against each other to buy up the company and take over the design. The plain fact is that the Tucker was too costly to produce and not well established enough to compete with old names like Bentley and Rolls Royce and it's facilities were designed to build hundreds of thousands per year, not the few hundred that rich people could afford.
It never, ever almost toppled the Big 3. It wasn’t even a blip to the Independents Nash, Hudson, Studebaker, Packard, Kaiser, and Frazer. It was a cool car, but far too expensive to build and never really got out of the prototype stage. Preston Tucker was a visionary, but not a great businessman.
The tucker never would have been a threat to the big three . Yes , it was unconventional , but there was nothing great or technologically advanced about it . Except maybe the goofy looking headlight in the middle that turned with the tires .
I knew about the Tucker car when l was much younger and l live in Australia but to go up against the big three American car companies a big asked and the Tucker 48 was a far better car and look at the big three now they are making vehicles that are not the best and the Japanese motor manufacturers and thr four best Japanese motor manufacturers Honda Mazda Suzuki and Toyota are making the best cars in the world becsude we have a Suzuki and a Toyota
I don't think the Tucker 48 was that good of a car. A hodgepodge of parts from different manufacturers, and unproven technology that still needed considerable development. Plus an engine configuration that, in hindsight, was somewhat of a technological dead end. Tucker may have gone on to become a limited producer of expensive niche cars. But I doubt if it would have been a serious competitor to established manufacturers.
Engine placement and lay out was a technological dead end? VW beetle had a rear engine. Cars like the Porsche 911 used a flat six and later liquid cooled like the Tucker.
@@captlazer5509 If the Tucker engineering concepts were so bad - why did GM use the SAME package, including the flat six rear engine and the pop-out windshield, on the Corvair ten years later? They profitably built a few million of those. They were deemed, "Way ahead of their time" as well. Great cars that were sunk by cost-cutting measures in the rear suspension that created safety risks on the first generation of them. When Ralph Nadar pointed it out in his book, UNSAFE AT ANY SPEED, they attacked him and tried to smear him with all of the corporate arrogance they could muster (while simultaineously redesigning the suspension to fix the problem.) Any doubts the big 3 went after Tucker? And yeah, he was over extended too. You just can't make this stuff up. . .
@@ricksand6477 I agree with you! I was pointing out the rear engine placement and engine type is not a dead end but in fact used many times. Including GM cars like you mentioned the Corvair. I have seen four Tuckers, one running at start up at a car show, one on the road near a car show and two on display. One of them being at the Henry Ford Museum. The interior was way ahead of its time, the engine had more than enough HP to get the job done. The Tucker 48 is a fantastic car my dad was considering buying in his youth but alas it was not to be. Yes, I also do believe the Tucker Corp was hamstrung by suppliers and those who didn't want the competition.
Great lawyer Tucker had huh. The charge was that Tucker did not try to make the cars, but took the investment money. That great lawyer could not use 50 cars as evidence? That lawyer was working for the other side.
The big three were worried about a superior motorcar, exposing the miserable designs they were pushing on Americans. They had to disgrace and discredit him, embarrassing behavior. I proudly never owned an American made car!
I think that this "welfare" bail-outs of the last 20+ years should prove to people that big car company lobbying has been plush for the industry........
