Tuesday, February 26, 2013

1958 Ford De Paolo



This Ford concept car appears in the 1966 book Automobiles of the Future by Irwin Stambler. The description of the car appears below.

"Exotic engines of tomorrow may provide the power for a sports car such as this, which could be mass-produced while keeping the appearance of a racing car."

Though Tremulis didn’t design the 1956 DePaolo 3/8-scale model, another of Tremulis’s designs (the DePalma), inspired Buzz Grisinger to submit the DePaolo design for Ford’s Stylerama program. Named for Peter DePaolo, Indy 500 winner and, later, Ford racing coordinator, the design – which looks to borrow much from contemporary Bonneville streamliners and “represent an inversion of the form most typical of American automotive styling,” according to the Farrells – eventually became the catalyst for Robert McNamara’s interchangeability program, which aimed to reduce costs by creating common body panels across the Ford, Mercury and Edsel model lines.

The Farrells credit Tremulis with a number of other concept cars as well, including the aforementioned DePalma and X-1000, the 1954 Mexico, the 1954 Taj Mahal, the 1955 Madam X, the 1956 999 dragster, the late 1950s Wind Brake Car, the 1956 Scorpion and the 1961 Astrion. He would found his own consulting and design firm after leaving Ford.

Source: Internet

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