Turbine Trucks And More Turbine Hotness (Now With More Pics)

by Paul Niedermeyer

Published: December 12th, 2009

turbine trucks and more turbine hotness now with more pics

Chopped and Diced has a nice set of turbine pictures, including the big trucks from Ford, GMC, and Chevrolet. The trucks probably made the most sense for a practical turbine application, given their steady power output requirements and low maintenance. But diesels just haven’t been beat when it comes to high thermal efficiency, which tops 50% in the case of the giant ship engines we showed you last week. More turbine trucks and an insane looking home made turbine bike after the jump:

Paul Niedermeyer

More by Paul Niedermeyer

Comments

Join the conversation

2 of 18 comments

Toad on Dec 13, 2009

These trucks look extremely cool, but trucks are all about making money, not looks. As the owner of 10 trucks, I can tell you that simplicity, reliability, comfort, and economy are all that really matter. For example, can you imagine the cost to replace the front windshield on the Ford turbine truck (not to mention the load on the A/C system from all of the sunlight)? Most truck windshields are only $100 -200 installed. I cannot begin to imagine the cost of turbine repairs, not to mention trying to find parts or qualified mechanics to do the work. Simple, proven trucks are popular for the same reasons Honda Accords are. I have seen trucking companies nearly bankrupted by buying trucks with "new & and improved" components that repeatedly fail, causing the trucking company to lose customers due to missed delivery times and expenses that continue while trucks stay in the repair shop not producing revenue. These kind of problems have even forced Caterpillar out of the heavy duty truck engine market. On a brighter note, for a really cool visionary vehicle from the 1930's that is not well known take a look at the GM Futureliner http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Yy-0iDHAz8. Saw an unrestored one sitting in a parking lot north of Chicago 20 ago, should have bought it then!

Like Reply
ZoomZoom on Dec 14, 2009

I like that Chevy too! It would be fun to pull that one into a Walmart or a 7-Eleven store!

Like Reply

Recent Comments

EBFlex Honda all day long. Why? It's a Honda.
Lou_BC My ex had issues with the turbo CRV not warming up in the winter.I'd lean to the normally aspirated RAV 4. In some cases asking people to chose is like asking a Muslim and Christian to pick their favourite religion.
3-On-The-Tree Agree turbo diesels are probably a different setup lower compression heat etc. I never towed with my rig and it was all 40 miles round trip to work with dealer synthetic oil 5,000mi changes. Don’t know the cause but it soured my opinion on turbo’s plus the added potential expense.
DesertNative More 'Look at me! Look at me!' from Elon Musk. It's time to recognize that there's nothing to see here, folks and that this is just about pumping up the stock price. When there's a real product on the ground and available, then there will be something to which we can pay attention. Until then, ignore him.
Bkojote Here's something you're bound to notice during ownership that won't come up in most reviews or test drives-Honda's Cruise Control system is terrible. Complete trash. While it has the ability to regulate speed if there's a car in front of you, if you're coasting down a long hill with nobody in front of you the car will keep gaining speed forcing you to hit the brakes (and disable cruise). It won't even use the CVT to engine brake, something every other manufacturer does. Toyota's system will downshift and maintain the set speed. The calibration on the ACC system Honda uses is also awful and clearly had minimum engineering effort.Here's another- those grille shutters get stuck the minute temperature drops below freezing meaning your engine goes into reduced power mode until you turn it off. The Rav4 may have them but I have yet to see this problem.