ClassicCar

Interesting - on that 2nd link (hudsonandrods) the fellow claims, from his father, that the only color you could get a Hudson in is green!!!!



So I guess everybody now has to repaint their cars.



Regards the Tucker - I turned this up on a google search:



"Regarding the convertible, the Tucker Club historians have interviewed every designer they could be find and just about every person involved with Tuckers when they were being built. There was never a convertible, even a prototype.



I rarely say "never-ever," knowing that cars said to have been destroyed occasionally show up alive and well, but in this case I suspect that the experts are right."



Who knows. Strange unknown's show up all the time. Regards the Jet Convertible, for example.



Let's see - $275-$300k for an Italia, $5mil for a Tucker convert - yeah, I can almost cover those prices. Only need, oh, $274,000 for the Italia, couple bucks more for the Tucker.



Hudsonly,

Alex Burr

Memphis, TN

This Tucker vert seems shifty...



How many Hudson fans didn't know that a Jet vert existed?



How many Hudson Jet fans didn't know a vert existed?



How is it possible that most Tucker fans knew nothing about a vert? Theres only 50 cars total to keep track of? Someone would have known of this thing and tracked it - like the Jet...



I don't think I'll buy it

My husband's been a member of the Tucker fan club for years and we have personally seen Tuckers #1007, 1016, and 1047 as well as the movie prop car in Ypsilanti. Although this may certainly be an authentic unfinished Tucker from when the plant shut down, it did not leave the Tucker Corp as a convertible... a 48 which had received alterations to window openings for a prospective 49 is more likely. Leftover parts and another Tucker to use as a model for recreating panels has probably been beneficial in this build. I think this is a neat project that's being misrepresented.



There's a thread on the official Tucker site on this:

http://www.tuckerclub.org/bbs3/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=57&sid=dd7fcf62f6bac9bc0ddf21dd81878957



P.S. I've changed my comp's desktop background to the converible Tucker picture and won't say a word about it until my husband goes to use the computer tonight and I see his reaction, lol.

Here is the reply from the seller....



The car that was in Detroit was #27, was on frame #52, and was outfitted with parts from various other Tuckers. #27 is listed on the Tucker Club's website as being the car the was rolled during testing at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. It has been and still is in Roscoe, IL. The information you have about there only being 50 cars is incorrect. The first Tucker ever produced was a prototype sedan, known as the "Tin Goose". Fifty-eight frames and bodies were built at the factory. From these parts, 36 sedans were finished before the factory was closed. In addition, one prototype convertible known as "Vera" was started but not finished at the factory. Since the factory closed, an additional 14 sedans have been completed for a total of 51. The convertible is expected to be completed in May of 2009, pushing the total to 52. The car we have is body number 57, not 27 or 52.



We have a letter from a verified Tucker Corporation accountant that reads “Dear Allan (previous owner), Long time no see. I hope your address hasn’t changed and this gets to you okay. Did you ever get the Tucker convertible finished? I would like to drive over and see it sometime. Give me a ring at 414-275-XXXX and tell me when it will be convenient to get together and bring each other up to date. Sincerely, Mel Koeppen”. We have paycheck stubs, tax withholding statements, and a picture of Mel Koeppen (the accountant mentioned above) in a newspaper from 1948 that further verifies he was an employee. “The Indomitable Tin Goose” (page 90 softback version and page 99 of the hardback version) verifies that #57 was in Tucker Corporation experimental department when the plant closed.#57 was mentioned in a “Tucker Topics”, the Tucker Automobile Club of America’s newsletter in 1994 as being a convertible. The person we bought the car from interviewed Tucker Corporation employees who said that they knew that the project existed when the plant closed. He is willing to sign sworn affidavits that outline his interviews.



Let me know if you have any additional questions or concerns.



Justin Cole, President

Benchmark Classics, LLC

5400 King James Way

Madison, Wisconsin 53719

608-275-3800 o, 608-658-0550 m, 608-275-3807 f

Preston Tucker was having a difficult enough time putting together fifty-something REAL cars in order to satisfy some Federsl judge that the Tucker car was real and not a scam on investors. He surely would NOT have had the time, nor the inclination, to dally with the idea of building a ragtop while all this was going on, much less generate a prototype!



I call this ragtop Tucker a hoax, plain and simple! The "seller" can wish for his $5M all day long, or even a half-million, and either way, he won't get it from any but the most gullible and unknowledgeable buyer, IMO. There is no "mystique" to anything here. When ALL of the particulars, all of the people actually involved in building Tuckers that have been asked; in this case have said clearly that NO convertible body, prototype, or even a thought of building one was considered, there isn't much of anything to debate here.



This car should be called what it really is: a Tucker car built from leftover parts after the factory closed, and owner-fabricated parts, and made into a "what-if?" Tucker convertible concept. Nothing more. Then, the seller would have a much more honest presentation of what he has. The owner thinks he has $5M sitting there. Unfinished! Right.



It may well be "built" from parts left over when the plant closed, but other than that, it's an incomplete Tucker sedan that has been modified as a ragtop, then hopelessly misrepresented as something it clearly is not. Anyone with even a little common sense and a rudimentary knowledge of the Tucker history can figure this one out.

I think a telling comment is when Alex Tremulis was asked about a convertible he said he had never heard of one. You would think Tuckers car designer might know about a convertible. I do not believe this secret project nonsense. How many times have we heard this. At the end Tucker was barely getting by I do not think he would waste the time and resources on a separate convertible project when he could not complete the cars he had. Also he was a safety nut and I cannot see a convertible fitting in with his theory of safety when he was out there promoting Tuckers ability to survive a rollover.

I think it is fake aswell. The only documentation the dealer can put forward is the offer of an signed affidadavit from some accountant who called it a "convertible". It means nothing. Parts car!

51hornetA wrote:

I think a telling comment is when Alex Tremulis was asked about a convertible he said he had never heard of one. You would think Tuckers car designer might know about a convertible. I do not believe this secret project nonsense.

Exactly!!!