1948 Tucker "Tin Goose"

[THarrison351]

Made by Danbury Mint and based on the prototype 1948 Tucker 48 better known as the "Tin Goose" this is a beautiful diecast and really captures the current condition of the 1:1 car. The prototype originally had a ginormous 589 cubic inches (9.65 L) flat-6 cylinder with hemispherical combustion chambers, fuel injection, and overhead valves operated by oil pressure rather than a camshaft. This unique engine was designed to idle at 100 rpm and cruise at 250-1200 rpm through the use of direct-drive torque converters on each driving wheel instead of a transmission. The problem was it was never fully developed, loud and difficult to start, and oh yeah, no reverse. It's too bad DM didn't model it on the original version because Franklin mint has a passable version in multiple colors. Another difference is the prototype had conventional rear doors as opposed to the "production" model having suicide doors in the rear. This is an exceptionally well detailed model and it looks much nicer than the Franklin Mint version. I do have one of those too, but it's packed away. This one had a paint smear from the tampo print on the fender. I polished it off with Zymol cleaner wax. The only other things it needed were a good polish and the engine cover support put back together. Someone had over opened the cover and pulled the two halves apart. Here's the photos after the repair and polishing.

I haven't been taking pictures of the chassis on previous cars, but I made an exception.

Tomorrow I'm posting Al Capone's 1930 Armored Cadillac Imperial V-16 Sedan. This car was filthy and a pain to polish.

 

Edited January 22, 2020 by THarrison351

[Gramps46]

Very impressive Tucker.  Have never seen one in the flesh so thanks for sharing your pictures.

[randyc]

Idk, I think I'm glad they did the prototype instead of the production car.   I'd love to see them compared side by side.  Especially the underside.   The prototype is pretty fascinating in it's own right.  Based on an Olds frame, I think it was.  And the body on the tin goose was hand made by  the best "panel beaters"  that Tucker could find.   The Tucker movie gets some of it right and some if it takes "artistic license" to make good film.   But I have spent hours reading about Tucker and the history of the company after the movie.  I have read a couple books on the design and history as well as Internet articles.  The Tucker club has most of the real cars documented as to where they are and what happened to them.  

Coincidentally, they did get reverse to work in the prototype.  Problem was, they had to shut the car down completely to shift it to reverse.  I think they eventually were using NOS Cord FWD transmissions mostly as they tried to develop their own.

Another interesting fact is that when they debuted the prototype, it had wooden bumpers carved and painted to look as chrome-like as possible.   I'm not sure there are any photos of the car like that.  Most of the photos on the net are recreations fo the moment where they debuted the car.  And these show a very chrome looking bumper.  The restoration has chromed steel bumpers.

I might have to look into one of these to go with my FM version.   Thanks for posting this.   Greatly appreciated.

Edited January 22, 2020 by randyc