What Ever Happened to Chrysler's TURBINE CAR? (Part 9)

(From Allpar.com)
Consumer Testing Selection

The operation of the Turbine Car was much the same as that of a car with a piston engine and an automatic transmission. To start it, the transmission shift lever was placed in the "Idle" location and pushed down to engage the "Park/Start" position. The ignition key was turned to the right and released . Starting was automatic. Within a few seconds, the inlet temperature and tachometer gauges on the instrument panel would read about 1700 F and 18, 000 rpm, respectively, indicating that the engine had been started.

The present performance and economy of the Turbine was comparable to a conventional car with a standard V-8 engine. The engine would operate satisfactorily on diesel fuel, kerosene, unleaded gasoline, JP-4 (jet fuel), and mixtures thereof. And, even more interesting, it was possible to change from one of these fuels to another without any changes or adjustments to the engine. The users of the cars would also appreciate the many other advantages of the turbine engine.

The cars were built at Chrysler Corporation's Engineering Research Laboratories in Detroit. At the assembly area, the Chrysler-designed car bodies, which are built by Ghia of Italy, were lowered onto the new engines and chassis components. The turbine engines were built and tested at Chrysler's Research Laboratories.

The objective of the program was to test consumer and market reaction to turbine power and to obtain service data and driver experience with the turbine cars under a wide variety of conditions. Each selected user would drive the car for a period up to three months under a no-charge agreement. The car would then be reassigned to other users to provide a broad consumer sampling base. In total, the 50 cars would be distributed to about 200 motorists on a rotating system over a two-year period.

Under the user selection procedure, Chrysler gave its accounting firm the date and metropolitan area location of each planned delivery. Random selection of user candidates for each location were then made by the accounting firm according to the selection and distribution criteria specified by Chrysler to meet market test objectives.

To qualify initially as a turbine prospect, a candidate must have owned a car (or, be a member of a household in which a car was owned by the head of the household) and must have had a valid driver's license.
Turbine candidates were being picked as follows:

From Chrysler's letter inquiry file which contained 25,000 names. These applications were in the form of unsolicited letters from people in hundreds of cities in all 50 states (and 15 countries). Requests ranged from that of a 12-year-old boy asking that his father be given a car to that of an 83-year-old retiree.

From major population centers in the 48 continental United States. Chrysler specified this to assure a high degree of market exposure to turbine-powered vehicles and to test the cars in a variety of geographical areas and in all kinds of weather and terrain.

In accordance with the make, price category and age of the new and used cars owned by candidates at the time they wrote their letters to Chrysler. In this respect, the program intent was to select users whose car ownership pattern would reflect the great variety of the types and ages of cars on the road at that time.