The Atomic Power Automobile

[monsoon]

These days some are worried about any nations getting a nuclear reactor. But 60 years ago they were planning to power automobiles with them. Here is a story about the Ford Nucleon which was a vehicle powered by it's own nuclear reactor in the trunk. Imagine the results of an automobile accident. Remember nuclear power is our friend.

William Ford alongside a 3/8 scale Nucleon model

[dimebag1980]

Nuclear power aside, that's one ugly car.

But geez, like you said, "imagine the results of an automobile accident."

And "full-service recharging stations" (quote from the article referenced above) is hilarious, since these days you're hard-pressed to even find a full-service GAS station. Of course the article is speaking in the times that the car was conceptualized, but still... can you imagine gas station attendants, or the average guy, replacing nuclear reactors like we do oil filters? Yikes.

[runawayjim]

Nuclear power aside, that's one ugly car.

But geez, like you said, "imagine the results of an automobile accident."

And "full-service recharging stations" (quote from the article referenced above) is hilarious, since these days you're hard-pressed to even find a full-service GAS station. Of course the article is speaking in the times that the car was conceptualized, but still... can you imagine gas station attendants, or the average guy, replacing nuclear reactors like we do oil filters? Yikes.

it's that old fashion futuristic look...

go to jersey... they're 100% full service stations as far as i know. there's also a town in CT, hamden, that was mostly full service stations.

imagine tweaking the engine of that... i bet you could get some real power out of it.

[somad]

And "full-service recharging stations" (quote from the article referenced above) is hilarious, since these days you're hard-pressed to even find a full-service GAS station.

Funny... around here there are quite a few of them. One of the "cheap" gas stations is actually 100% full service...

I really wanna know what these people were smoking...

[dimebag1980]

it's that old fashion futuristic look...

go to jersey... they're 100% full service stations as far as i know. there's also a town in CT, hamden, that was mostly full service stations.

imagine tweaking the engine of that... i bet you could get some real power out of it.

There was a full-service station just down the block from my office until it blew up a couple years ago. They never rebuilt, and I don't know of any others around here.

Anyway, I've seen other cars designed in that "futuristic" style from back then, and some were decent-looking. Most I didn't like though... especially this one!

[monsoon]

One of the more fascinating cars that was produced during this time was the Chrysler Gas Turbine vehicle. They actually built about 50 of these beauties and let people sign up to drive them for free for 3 months. It was a very competant vehicle. The advantages of a gas turbine (basically a jet engine where the thrust is run over a second turbine connected to a drive shaft) is that it will run on any fuel, even cheap kerosene, and the engine has very few moving parts. It was quiet except for a muffled whine and very responsive due to the available torque.

Chrysler in the long run abandoned the program and sadly ended up crushing most of the vehicles. The group under Chrysler that worked on this project got sold off but the the technology was later used for the engine found in today's M-1 Abrams Tank. (and a few other vehicles)

You can read more about the Gas Turbine car here. It was one of the more interesting notes in automobile history.

1963 Chrysler Gas Turbine car

1977 Chrysler Gas Turbin car

[MR-2]

I support expanding nuclear power, and upgrading our old reactors, but I'm not sure it would work well in cars. Don't you need a certian mass of plutonium to get fission to work in the first place? Can that even fit on an automobile? Trains, maybe. Cars? The ugliness of that design suggests not.

[monsoon]

Plutonium or uranium Isotope would work. They routinely put small atomic generators in satellites and spacecraft. For example the Lunar Landing Module had a very small nuclear generator and the one from Apollo 13 is sitting at the bottom of the Pacific ocean. It was a really small vehicle.