Remembering Chrysler's "Jet Powered" Cars

A Detroit area attorney's fascination with a piece of automotive history has lead to an interesting new book.

"In 1963, Chrysler built a fleet of jet powered cars," says author Steven Lehto. "The cars ran very well. They proved that the idea was viable. Then a couple of years later, they quietly rounded them up and destroyed almost all of them."

Lehto documenting the rise, fall and everlasting interest in these unique vehicles in a new book entitled, "Chrysler's Turbine Car: The rise and fall of Detroit's Coolest Creation."

Lehto telling WWJ AutoBeat Reporter Jeff Gilbert that Chrysler built about 70 of the turbine cars in the mid-sixties, including a fleet of about fifty five that were given to customers to test out, and give their feedback.

(Hear Jeff Gilbert's interview with Steven Lehto.)

"The people reported back almost unanimously that the cars were great," Lehto said. "They were reliable. They were a lot of fun to drive. Of course, everywhere they went they caused a commotion because they sounded funny and they looked cool."

The cars also ran on alternative fuels. That would be important today, but was only of passing interest in the era of 20 cent a gallon gasoline.

Lehto said Chrysler had to make a decision whether to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to gear up for full production of turbine powered cars, or just scrap the program. They chose to scrap the program.

"That was the first time that Chrysler ran into financial trouble was in the early 70's. Also, the EPA had just clamped down on tailpipe emissions."

Chrysler hadn't even looked into controlling the emissions of the vehicles, Lehto says, and--with financial problems--they didn't want to start an expensive new program.

Lehto says other carmakers tried jet powered vehicles, but nobody actually put them into production.

There are nine remaining Chrysler Turbine Cars. One of which is owned by comedian Jay Leno. Lehto says it's street legal, and Leno let him take the vehicle for a spin.

"He drive it around. He told me the first weekend he got it, he and his wife took it out for dinner. They tossed the keys to the valet and said 'We'll be back in a little while to pick it up."