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History Tucker Stock Car

Discussion in 'The Hokey Ass Message Board' started by Ryan, Dec 31, 2008.

  1. SuperFleye
    Joined: Jul 17, 2005
    Posts: 2,053

    SuperFleye
    Alliance Vendor

    Hehe, I´m glad i didn't saw it and bought it :)

     
  2. I remember Carps photoshopping one years ago several versions, really stirred things up with those. Might have been over on the old Rodders Roundtable. Looked pretty good cleaned up. IMHO tuckers are interesting to look at but not what I consider a clean design. More than a bit gaudy much like Studebakers also were at that time.
     
  3. monsterflake
    Joined: May 13, 2003
    Posts: 3,763

    monsterflake
    Member

    somebody needs to dig that up, have you seen what kind of cars get saved around here? all some of these guys need are the shadow that the car cast on the ground....
     
  4. alchemy
    Joined: Sep 27, 2002
    Posts: 20,404

    alchemy
    Member

    Just to relate Tuckers to actual Hot Rods:

    Here's a couple scans of Preston Tucker Jr.'s correspondense, and later a classified ad in Hot Rod Magazine from 1948 - 1949 (I forget the actual issues, I scanned these a couple years ago).

    It seems Preston Jr. was building a hot rod '32 roadster. He was building up a hot flathead, and also wanted to know the correct way to get his Milan (now more commonly known as Kinmont) brakes on the '32 spindles. A year or so later he was selling the car. Was it sold because of Dad's business troubles? Where is it now?


    .
     

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  5. Tuckerfan
    Joined: Jan 3, 2009
    Posts: 7

    Tuckerfan
    Member

    Chick DeLorenzo, who owns Tucker 1051 was selling the fiberglass bodies. Newton's Tucker hotrod illustration can be seen here.

    Not going to be a lot to work with, I'm afraid, as here's a pic of the car before it went into the ground.

    [​IMG]

    There is, however, a wrecked Tucker stuck in a barn in Washington state. Sadly, nobody who knows where it is, is willing to say. There's also a few incomplete bodies out there. Again, however, the folks who know where these are, aren't talking.
     
  6. Tony
    Joined: Dec 3, 2002
    Posts: 7,350

    Tony
    Member

    What the hell was that car in in that pic?
    Sad to see the bit's and pieces just sitting like that..
    Pretty much the same thing as a treasured hotrod rotting away that no one can obtain...
    Although it really amazes me how someone could think the remains of a Tucker would be better off rotting away than be in the hands of someone how could possibly bring another back to life...with so few made it's such a waste.
     
  7. Motorsports One
    Joined: Jul 23, 2008
    Posts: 99

    Motorsports One
    Member

    Greg Fielden's Forty Years of Stock Car Racing brings some light to this topic.

    The details mentioned above regarding the race at Monroe County Fairgrounds are all correct, except for the date. The race was held on July 2 and the results don't include a Tucker.

    As far as the Canfield Motor Speedway race is concerned, the Tucker was in that race and didn't complete the first lap. The race was held on May 30, 1950 and here's a quote from Fielden's book. "Joe Merola was on hand with a new radically designed 1948 Tucker Torpedo, one of the most controversial and advanced automobiles ever to hit the market. The car conked out before Merola was able to complete a lap."
     
  8. Villlage Idiot
    Joined: Dec 30, 2005
    Posts: 407

    Villlage Idiot
    Member

    I was just thinking about how rare a production run of 52 or 48 (whatever the actual number) cars is. My parents were married in September 1948 and traveled by train to Niagara Falls on their honeymoon. My father who has since passed away told me when I was a kid that he saw a Tucker parked on a street in Buffalo during that trip. That was the one and only Tucker he ever saw. That doesn't say a lot for the old honeymoon when my old man's best memory of it was a car!! I've been around cars a long time and I've never seen a Tucker in person.
     
  9. SuperFleye
    Joined: Jul 17, 2005
    Posts: 2,053

    SuperFleye
    Alliance Vendor

    Are you sure about this, over the years there have been several stories about people finding lost tuckers, but in all of the cases it just turns out to be a studebaker or a shoebox ford with an accessory light mounted where the grille bullet used to be.

     
  10. bobj49f2
    Joined: Jun 1, 2008
    Posts: 1,926

    bobj49f2
    Member

    ........
     

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  11. cool
     
  12. bonesy
    Joined: Aug 14, 2005
    Posts: 2,999

    bonesy
    Member

    Did not race = the man still keeping Tucker down.
     
  13. WQ59B
    Joined: Dec 14, 2005
    Posts: 2,618

    WQ59B
    Member

    Just want to throw this out there. Nearly every source out there lists the Tucker weight as 4235, but this was the weight of the 'lead sled' Tin Goose prototype.

    For comparison: a '48 Roadmaster 4-dr sedan - at nearly the same dimensions- weighs 4160, with a cast-iron straight 8, an iron dynaflow with gallons of trans fluid and an enclosed driveshaft, whereas the Tucker has an aluminum flat 6 and a transaxle.

    'Production' Tuckers weigh around 3800 lbs, and this was confirmed to me by one of the regular Tucker Club members. I sure would like to see this get corrected in print at some point in the future...
     
  14. I'm about overdue for my "barn-find", and I'd like it to be a Tucker! Always been one of my dream cars[/quote]

    Isn't it a dream of all of us?:D
     
  15. hoodlumsaint
    Joined: Oct 27, 2009
    Posts: 1

    hoodlumsaint
    Member
    from kaneohe,hi

    looks like ol' preston himself standing there with the tie ! [probabably looking out for the media cameras]
     
  16. Mario Anderetti has driven a Tucker,

    [​IMG]

    This is a photo of the Tucker Indy car,,with Al Miller at the wheel

    [​IMG]

    and a photo of the man behind the dream,,,Posing as SuperMan. :D HRP

    [​IMG]
     
    Last edited: Oct 28, 2009
  17. Toner283
    Joined: Feb 13, 2008
    Posts: 1,327

    Toner283
    Member

    Check out the 2 door Tucker convertible. The guy who owns it claims it is a factory prototype but the guys on the tucker board are convinced he is full of crap & it is a custom phantom that is modified from one of the known cars. whoever you believe it is still pretty cool. IMO the proportions are pretty much dead on.

    http://tuckerconvertible.com/index

    Discussions about the truth/lies behind the convertible.

    http://www.tuckerclub.org/bbs3/viewforum.php?f=7&sid=748f0d1322120163250a891e144179f5
     
  18. kwoodyh
    Joined: Apr 11, 2006
    Posts: 641

    kwoodyh
    Member

    Tucker VooDoo maybe? :D
     
  19. Well who woulda thought.

    Looks like it might have been more at home on La Carrera Panamercana.

    Whatever its a pretty cool pic and well worth some conjecture.
    I don't know when they started the rule but back when I was younger you had to sell a certain amount of a car body to the public in order to run it in a sanctioned race. I don't think they ever built enough Tuckers to satisfy the rule.
     
  20. Chuck Carman
    Joined: Oct 19, 2009
    Posts: 238

    Chuck Carman
    Member

    That's pretty wild. I was always fascinated with those mutants.
     

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  21. Mike51Merc
    Joined: Dec 5, 2008
    Posts: 3,856

    Mike51Merc
    Member

    The race car in the photo is wearing a license plate and appears to be owned by a used car dealer by the writing on the door and front fender.

    I seriously doubt it was a Tucker publicity stunt. It looks to me that some dealer took an unsellable trade-in (because of the manufacturer's demise) and prepped it for racing.

    Obviously we don't know the sanctioning entity of the race, for all we know it could just be some local amateur oval track.

    The real question is WHICH Tucker this was and whether it is accounted for today.
     
  22. t442163
    Joined: Feb 11, 2014
    Posts: 1

    t442163
    Member
    from Rahway, NJ

    Where is this fake Tucker / Studebaker located?
     
  23. Ramblur
    Joined: Jun 15, 2005
    Posts: 2,101

    Ramblur
    Member


    Canfield Speedway hosted Nascar races for 3 years (50-52) Memorial Day weekend on the half mile dirt. They also ran local races till probably the mid sixties before nearby residents got it shut down. The Tucker is listed here as running the 1950 race with 0 laps and axle listed as the cause. So yes it seems it was slated to run Nascar but fell slightly short.

    http://racing-reference.info/race/1950-05/W
     
  24. whtbaron
    Joined: Sep 12, 2012
    Posts: 579

    whtbaron
    Member
    from manitoba

    Seems to me that out of the 51 Tuckers produced, the whereabouts of 47 of them are fully documented. I'm not sure if the remaining 4 includes the wrecked and burned cars or not. Chances of finding another one are pretty darn slim.
     

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