The Nazi Killer: 1938 Tatra T87 - Jay Leno’s Garage

and this is probably the best car no one has ever heard of even real car guys i mention it and i use magnesium v8 hemi overhead cam no i have never heard of it i don't know what you're talking about welcome to another episode from jaylon's

garage

pandemic edition once again I am in my

garage

very quiet and with a very fascinating car, this is the

1938

tatra

t87, one of the most unusual cars, one of the most brilliant of all time, you know what which is funny this is a rear engine car it's a v8 it's air cooled it's 2.9 liters it has a hemi head it has a four speed transmission and the block is cast magnesium for light weight uh you know it's funny here In the United States we all go crazy.

For the Tucker, you know, Tuckers sell for more than two million dollars. Someone, the average, is about one million five. And it certainly is a beautiful and fascinating car, but this is older by 10 years and was a much more finished car. nothing against the tucker, but he used someone else's engine, a franklin airplane engine, to use the auburn cable drive and they almost built what 51 i think everyone was a prototype. Tatra built them as very reliable sedans, these cars got 20 miles per gallon at 60 miles per hour, which today doesn't seem like much, but back in the day when you had a big car like this, six to nine miles per gallon. was the norm and the fact that this got 20 miles per gallon, which is quite a lot. incredible and with the aerodynamics, when you release the throttle at 60, it almost feels like free riding because it cuts the air very efficiently and the drag coefficient in the wind tunnel was 0.24 and on the production model finished with all the things put. and you know, people were ending up in windows and everything was .36, which was amazing, it was just amazing.

You got that it had that big fin on the back for directional stability. The vehicle is about 38 in the front so it is very light when I open it. the hood, you see, you have the gas tank up here plus two spare tires to weigh down the front a little. The advantage is that you can actually drive it with one finger. These were built in Czechoslovakia. The designer was a man named Hans. ludwinka just a brilliant engineer hanzo winker was a contemporary of ferdinand porsche porsche of course developed the volkswagen but actually hanzo winker was one of the leading lights behind it uh biased i would say lewinka was looking over his shoulder and he was looking over the winker's shoulder and when they went to court and won, they awarded him the current three million deutsche marks, anyway, he was never able to collect it, he didn't have a very good lawyer, what happened was when the

nazi

s took control, huh, Lewinka.

They forced him to work for them like many people in Germany were and when the Soviet Union tried him he ended up serving six years in prison. Quite a sad story. He was released in 1951. He sued, won but never got anything and then died, I believe. somewhat penniless in '67, but he was a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant designer and engineer. This body was designed by Paul Gerais and who was one of the main aerodynamicists of the time. He was the guy who designed the Graph Zeppelin that was his and this business. I think it was one of the first truly aerodynamic cars.

It's just a fascinating car to drive, even though it's from

1938

. It really feels like a car from, I don't know, the early '60s. It drives well. Let's put it in perspective. It is handled differently. you know, because of the swing axle, we all know the problem with Volkswagen and Corvair with the swing axle, if you apply 40 pounds of pressure in the rear and 22 in the front, you're fine, but these gained a great reputation because when Germany They invaded Czechoslovakia and took over the Tatra factory. These were luxury cars and they were commandeered by the SS and the high command and they were so fast and so deceptively fast that many of the officers would get on the highway and off the highway. go out at high speed, roll them, you know the wheel would bend down and they would shoot up just like you would in an early Porsche because they didn't know how to hold the throttle in the corner, you know they would roll back and the wheel would dig in and I think the First week they lost seven Nazi commanding officers and Hitler said that's it, no more tantras, I don't want my people driving, just leave them on the side of the road, don't bring them back to Germany. just leave them there and I think in the first week they killed more Nazis than the Czechoslovak army, that's not an insult, it's just one of those stories I enjoy, but yeah, so the car is a bit of a hero in that. sense, uh, but it's a fascinating, fascinating car, we'll take a ride in a moment and you'll see it, but I'll walk you through it and show you some of its elements.

It has hydraulic brakes on all four wheels. You know, nowadays. we live in a world where almost all information is shared universally if there is a breakthrough in germany and the suspension design we learned here there is a breakthrough here they find out in france or italy wherever, while hansel winker was working in czechoslovakia more or less on the other side of the

tatra

mountains so he just did his own thing engineering wise design wise this doesn't really look like any other car huh there's a story that hans and winker had a cuz i think his name was breer he worked for chrysler and the airflow reminds of this but when you look at the wheels on the toucha and the wheels on my 34 chrysler info it almost looks like the same wheel so maybe there is some truth on that, but it's one of those rumors that yes, really no.

I know I like the window placed here, it looks like one of those Fords, what was the trimotor? The plane, you know, and it had three windows in the front, it's a four-seater, you have a sunroof, it's fascinating because you have the rear seat compartment here, then it has a firewall, then it has a luggage compartment, then it has another firewall and then you have the engine, so the engine is so far back that no fumes come into the car, no noise comes into the car, it's all sorts of behind you and you're sitting in the front here and because of the weight distribution With only 38 on the front you can really steer it with one finger, it almost feels like a 50's power steering, how could it be so light when it's moving?

That's why they have two spare tires in the front and the jack and everything, just to have a little more weight over the front wheels once you learn how to drive it. Okay, it's really a wonderful cruiser car. This car is 70 70 to 75 horsepower from the factory, this one we rebuilt, made new pistons, then we dynoed it and got 85 horsepower, so we got another 10 horsepower using a more modern carburetor, but other than that, that's the only quote from the rest mod we have. Have we just changed? It was not necessary to change the brakes. The fairly powerful suspension was great.

Everything's fine. Let's start with the front, of course, unique and you have three headlights, which is unusual, certainly, the one in the center does not rotate. it's just a third headlight now we put these two straps here because Bob, who passed away one day, said let me check it for you, he left it open, I went down the road and the whole hood blew up so I'm just going. Blind with the hood smashed over the windshield and slowly I was able to pull over to the side of the road and put the hood down and straightened it out a little bit and came back here and then we fixed it but yeah that was it so we said do you know something?

Put these straps on here so that doesn't happen again, so let's open this up. Your speakers, as you can see, are outside the car, which actually makes a lot of sense because you can actually hear them. You know a lot of times they put the horn under the hood. and you hear it fine in the car, but not so good outside, as you can see, I only have one spare tire here, I didn't feel the need for two. I usually keep the tank pretty full, so the front end stays low. A little bit we added a new oil cooler.

This is the oil cooler. These lines go all the way to the back of the car and it works very well. You've got a pretty good oil capacity in this thing, so it's always circulating. because and the other interesting thing is that the oil cooler is far from the engine. You know, in many modern cars the oil cooler is there, so it also absorbs heat from the engine, while the engine remains very much in front. You know, the engine is obviously in the back so the oil doesn't get anything but cold air coming through there this is your gas tank here this little one what we have here that little tank what the car has is a system central lubrication you have a pedal on the floor and they say every 70 miles or a couple of times or whatever, you just step on the pedal a few times and it shoots oil or lubricating grease to all the lubrication points in the car, so that's it great, like I mentioned before, the two speakers and your spare tire are there, okay, your real trunk is in front of the engine compartment, but let's put it back down, let's secure it, there we go, there we are, you always want to put them so that the hood doesn't fly off again okay it's a unique looking car just on the road people just freak out when you go buy them on this thing I think it's some kind of custom car or batmobile or something you know , come on, let's go to the railing, I'll show you the engine compartment.

This is probably the most controversial side of the car due to this huge fin for directional stability. It actually works, although on a windy day, when you have those junctions on the highway, you can feel the reverse move a little with this if it's blowing really hard. uh your rearview mirror you have a window and then you look through these slats and everyone's talking about the Lamborghini mural, you know, it had the slats, weren't they the first? Well, no, this actually came first. The rear view isn't great, so we put the side mirrors there, nice chrome bumpers, lots of air, but let's open it up.

Here's something interesting. What you have here. I just received these cables. Look at those two blocking plugs on the firewall, but in Czechoslovakia, gas. The stations were few and far between, so the idea was that every time you sold the car you had to sell it with some spare parts in the car in case your owner needed them, most of the time they just put spark plugs in, Sometimes they leave a piston. or a connecting rod, you know you're going to fix it on the road, uh, but that's what it was and that's why it's there for the sole reason that it was a requirement in the past that you had to have spare parts with the car. when you sold it to the customer, there's the Weber carburetor that we put on it, which was originally Solex cast magnesium, just brilliant, just brilliant, very light, air cooled, your fan is buried underneath and these blades here, depending on whether Whether it's hot or cold, you open them. and close them to direct more cold air to the engine or to get hot air out, but it tells you that in winter you move the tilts in one direction and in summer in the other direction.

A very clean design and it's a V8 that always scares people. They expect to see a little four cylinder or something, but it's a 2.9 hemi head, like I said, brilliant design and a wonderful engine and, of course, air cooled, so you'll never have any problems with, you know, freezing, water or something like that. You know, it's brilliant, check your oil right here. We made pistons on this. We use the original rods. They were OK. We had Magnaflux and we found that they were fine. George Swift. You know, our chief mechanic did a beautiful job putting this engine together.

Now he has gray hair and he's like that, but it's okay because the engine is okay, but when it's running, I always pass by George's house. Look, George is still running and he's very happy about it, but as you can see. I have air ducts on the side so it's always fun, this thing never overheats. You know, I have friends who have tatras and they drive them around the world through the desert, whatever, and they're fine. okay, so there's your coil, there's your ignition, everything here is as it was in 1938, we haven't modified anything other than just getting a more modern carburetor, here's your air filter, here and that's pretty much it for the engine compartment engine, come on, let's take it. a look inside the car, I put that down there to show the interior, these really were luxury cars.

I'm sitting in the back seat now the front seat is all the way back because I have long legs and I have a lot of room in here and it's pretty comfortable, I mean the fact that this thing got 20 miles per gallon was pretty amazing back in the day and right behind me, here's your luggage compartment, these seats come forward, you see this opens here and then you have this luggage compartment here. You have a rear window that goes into the engine bay so you can see why it stays relatively quiet here. I haven't been back here in a long time.

There's nothing there that closes and then you have these kind of sliding pieces here. and you have another little window here so it's not claustrophobic and a huge sunroof so you also havemagazine pockets back here, so it's actually a pretty nice place to be and I love this green leather, so it's pretty cool, that's it. The original interior of the car is also an extremely well made car and is not cheap. I don't know the exact price, but certainly equal to, I think, any American car of the time, Buick Chrysler, any of the high-end items that we had.

I mean this was just a completely different way of thinking, this is the ultimate aerodynamic car, in fact there aren't many cars today that have a drag coefficient as good as this, you'd probably have to go to a pre or one of those cars to match it and considering it's almost what it was 80 years earlier, uh, that's it. Pretty surprising because the wind tunnel technology was in its infancy, it was cool, but okay, come on, let's get in the front seat now and you have little ashtrays and all the doors pop out to the front since he has suicide doors in the front, although I don't.

I don't think any manufacturer has ever used the term suicide door quite spacious, you have a big sunroof right here it goes all the way back, I mean it's really fantastic and I love these three windows. You know something about a split windshield. I always like it. I don't know why, even though you know the '57 Chrysler was the first to have a full wraparound windshield where they could fold the glass, they look cool because you feel like you're on some kind of old airplane. it has a speedometer and it turns counterclockwise it goes in this direction which is weird because you go into it and do what you know and then of course you have the air temperature or similar head temperature I guess amps , oil pressure, uh, fuel and of course you have a clock right here uh four speeds you have this lever on the floor right here I'll press it a couple of times that shoots lubricant to all points of the chassis again very comfortable leather seats ashtray glove box very useful here you have all your fuses right in front of you, you know, a lot of attractive manufacturers bury the fuse box under the hood somewhere, while this is right here, right on the dash, just open that little thing of there and you can check all the fuses, the horn in the center, uh choke. it's down here on the heater controls uh I love this steering wheel, it looks reminiscent of the Ford Banjo steering wheel, could be where they got it from, uh, you know, most people have green visors, these are purple for some reason reason, I don't know.

Why do you have a little light here? I mean, you have hooks to hang your jacket on. Ceiling light here. I mean, this was a luxury car, it was used by politicians and celebrities and it wasn't cheap. The car that preceded this one, the T77, was even longer. but I think this one is the best, it's the right size, its top speed was 103 to 105 miles per hour, which was incredible for a four-door sedan from the 1930s, you know, 60 miles per hour was barely achievable because I think the average speed limit was probably 40, 45 miles an hour, something like that, so this was a pretty performance car, one of those cars that did everything, it was comfortable, it was fast, it was definitely the same, I think the Mercedes-Benz of the period, but being in Czechoslovakia and Hansel Winker was not Czechoslovak, he was Austrian, he didn't even learn to speak Czechoslovakian, but that's where he built his cars and, simply, a brilliant engineer and one of those anonymous heroes.

You know a lot of these guys like henry. Ford, uh, like Ferdinand Porsche, were brilliant and didn't like to give Bugatti much credit. You never heard of any of his chief engineers or any of the ideas he got from Miller or anything like that. It's simply the form. I guess maybe it's ego, but let's take this thing next door, put it on the shelf, show you what it looks like underneath and some more unique features of the car, okay, we've got it. up on the lift and as you can see there's not much to see down here that's what aerodynamics looked like in 1938 aerodynamics on top aerodynamics on the bottom there's not a lot of air places to go here uh, you know, this car It is mechanically different.

From any other car I have, you have a rigid tubular chassis instead of CV joints. The car has two crown gears, one on each rear axle shaft, but you can't really see anything here like they rotate around a pair. straight gear differentials the two spare tires i mentioned are the ones the whisperer is in front of, you know what's interesting, there was a guy called gordon wilkins, he was a british automobile writer and because of the happy trend of these things, he says that driving cash gives you the uncomfortable euphoria you get from shampooing a lion and I thought that was kind of interesting, you know, just interesting, but hey, you've got your spring in the front here, but you've got a completely undercarriage. smooth here, probably makes it a little tricky to work on.

The transmission is there and your engine is back here, there are your shock brakes and you see why it cuts the air so smoothly because of all this, so yeah, cool car, come on, let's take it for a spin, you know this website. These are unique driving experiences and this really is a different type of car to drive. You know, my thing with so many modern cars is a little boring because everything is so standardized that all the switches have to be in exactly the same place and you know. there's just nothing quirky or unusual, whereas this has so many fascinating little quirks and things about it that just make it really interesting but quite enjoyable to drive, I mean it drives much better, much faster and more modern than anything else on 1938, yes.

Someday I will tell you a funny story. Look at one of the European magazines that came out after I bought it, trying to find something on Tatcha and this is probably the best car no one has ever heard of. I mean, even the real car guys, I bring it up. I get up and walk into the magnesium hemi v8 aerial chamber, no I've never heard of that but I don't know what you're talking about you know that okay then I see this thing join the tatra club oh okay , so I called this guy. No, I can't really remember what country I was in and we talked for a few minutes, you know, I said I'd love to join the club, yeah, yeah, talk, taco is what's mine, you know what model, so I say what.

It's the benefits of joining the club that we have a newsletter and we have a spare schematic we get various parts, you know, and we exchange tips for the owners, everything is fine, take a Christmas party, I said I'm not sure I can attend to Christmas. party I said cool, I'll join you know, okay, and I said, how many people are in the club, because counting you four, I'm going to four, you mean, it's just you and two other guys until I joined and I said, uh, yeah , well, it must have been It's been an amazing Christmas party, hey, wow, that's a little peculiar, you know, and then you always know these guys, you know every fact, you know every little washer, every screw, how many millimeters they were , you know, yeah, but I love that, that always worries me, the book fahrenheit 451 uh, they also made a movie where they burn all the books and people walk around and they all memorize a book, so they become that book and they have that knowledge and that's how it is when you join these car clubs, there's a guy who knows everything about Hemis, now the guy knows everything about Ford Falcon sprints and you know, if you use the right tire pressure, like I said before, 22 in the front, 40 in the rear, it's actually pretty good, it's a great car. to drive fast, i wouldn't want to drive that fast because it has basically the same swing axle configuration as the volkswagen, the gold wing mercedes, the development of which was credited to hans ludwinka, he was kind of the genius behind this and really I never got its credit, you know, the front overhang is very short so you can see everything in front of your big field division and as I mentioned before, I love the three windows, the triple corner, which is fantastic, even with five people inside, this thing is comfortable and As I said before, you can drive it like a modern car.

You know, I have a lot of cars. You just take two lane side streets and put this thing on the highway, it holds its ground although, as I said before, if there's a strong crosswind, that tail will wag. it will move, it can move you a little bit, it's a bit like a boat in rough waters, you know, the steering is incredibly light, I mean it almost feels like one of those 1950s Chrysler power steering units, it's so easy turning and the brakes are phenomenal and of course you have the central lubrication, you step on the pedal and it lubricates the chassis and the engine revs like a modern engine, I mean it's probably good for 4,500, maybe 5,000 rpm, which is incredible at that time. don't take it that high because it has a lot of torque, it's 2.9 liters which is big by European standards, like I said before, we made pistons, we kept the original rods, just, like a blueprint, everything George did a wonderful job on this, it's probably 10 years since you rebuilt this and not one iota of problem it doesn't leak oil and I love these traffic haters.

A guy contacted me and he took a Tatra engine and put it on a motorcycle as a running frame or something and said it was pretty cool because it's still a pretty light engine. Pretty good turning radius of course, it's funny because no one has any idea what it is. People think I made it myself or it's a customized Plymouth like '49, no no, it's 1938, it's Tatra. I would say in the last decade these have become quite valuable, you should google the name Paul Gerais, the aerodynamicist, he was quite a guy, like I said, he designed the Graph Zeppelin, I think Edmund Rumpler, I think that was the another type.

Was it he who built a streamlined car and was he also a contemporary of Hansel Winker? Hanzo Weekend had a son named Eric who wrote a fabulous book about his father and the automobile. You know, it's funny, there were so many engineering geniuses in that first quarter. 20th century you know w.o bentley the duesenberg brothers bugatti hanzo winker frederick lanchester I mean it goes on and on edward turner all these guys and just sitting down with a piece of paper and a pencil and maybe a slide rule and a How do you call the deal?

You know, but I've always liked cars that were one man's vision. I say a man because women didn't design cars in the beginning, there just weren't many women engineers now. I have many, the chief designer who designed the NSX, the woman we had in the garage did a beautiful job, Mary Barra at the mgm, but in the past, you know, Duesenberg built what he liked, Bentley built what he liked , Alex, Isagonis, who designed the mini I didn't like the radio so I couldn't get a minion with a radio so people made a fortune selling radios to a lot of owners, you know, gordon murray.

Gordon Murray didn't like radios either. He put a record player in the mclaren f1. I added it because people say I mentioned the F1 mclaren in almost every video, so I want to make sure I have it there so they say: Hey, you mentioned it again, but this is a car you can drive from Los Angeles to San Francisco without problem. You know, it's a car that I enjoy driving long distances, extremely comfortable and it's very different, but in a good way, it's different to the way a Sichuan ds is different. Everything looks totally different, just the way the gearbox and the engine. everything is made differently everyone approves of this people like it it's like imagining a rear engined volkswagen with a v8 and lots of power and a longer wheelbase and that's what it really is because it was kind of the father of that, although ferdinand Porsche gets all the credit, I'd say fifty to sixty percent of the credit should go to Hans Ludwinka anyway.

I hope you enjoyed this little ride in this unusual car. The only interesting thing about this pandemic is that there is almost no traffic in Los Angeles, so they can get out and drive. See you next week, thanks for watching.