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samedi 11 janvier 2014 -
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I feel as if I had been handed over keys to the family jewels . And in a way I did, because both low seats and standing in front of me is an indispensable part of the history of Motor Trend . This is Kurtis sports car serial number KB003, the car appeared on the cover of the first edition of the magazine until 1949 , in a photo taken by the founder of Motor Trend Robert E. Petersen . That same year , Wally Parks , the right man Petersen and founding editor of our sister publication of , and Hot Rod , KB003 has a sizzling 142.515 mph on the salt, white sparkling opening nationally Bonneville Speed Trials . There are more than 62 years , helped launch this car brand 's legendary press and cars , and now I am honored to be a part of it . And I'm about to pay ... Kurtis was the product of a sports car auto amazing explosion of creativity that occurred in California after World War II . After suffering a crushing depression and the war of attrition , the Americans were ready to celebrate the booming economy provided jobs and prosperity. They had enough of the cars for tough times - sedans and coupes were breastfed during the years of the war on old tires and rationing dark and sensitive gas Depression . California was where the fun begins . Frank Kurtis , son of a blacksmith , a Croatian , and was in his position .
Kurtis began his apprenticeship drive in the early 1920s to the time before the body shop of LA Cadillac dealer without me specializes in building custom cars for Hollywood stars . Not only that he did not learn of the metal forming and welding , and he also picked up tips on drawing and design of the body only Harley Earl , president of General Motors in the future of the design of his body was a family business , Earl car works , was purchased in 1919 by the company without me . The Kurtis auto rock star in itself in the late 1930s, and after work for a short period of Howard A. " Dutch " Darrin Packard develop customized stylish body - Darrins while the dwarf racers dominated everywhere dirt oval in America in the hands of drivers such as Rex Mays . After the war , he worked Kurtis Kraft , Inc. in Glendale fabrication of hundreds of mini- runners , in addition to a series of roadsters of the Indy 500 mile race famous . Curtis won five cars of the six detainees 500S 1950-1955.
Kurtis was a thinker and a rebel. See dwarves cutting prewar and bounce cornering in dirt as Los Angeles Stadium for Gilmore, realized their center of gravity was too high, and pendants too severe. Participants have less spread and more manageable in the corners and faster with improved stability and smoother traction. Approached the development of the new sports car the same way as thoughtful . Kurtis 1949 was not the first car in the way Frank . Ten years ago , he had built and handsome, unique power Mercury sports car for Denver wealthy ranchers , Bill Hughes. According to an article in the may 1952 sports car review , Curtis Hughes was charged only $ 900 for the car, and sell them at a later time Hollywood director Hughes to $ 3,200 . After the war , the car changed hands again, this time for $ 8000 and reported . It is very likely that Curtis may have heard of the sales process. Around the same time , he had the 1941 Buick allocation , and turn it into a two-seater sports car led to the Indianapolis 500 in 1948. He impressed a lot of people in the driveway of gasoline, including Ford scion Benson Ford , who asked him to build a copy.
This would undoubtedly have made him think: Maybe there was a market for this new type of sports car - something that combines American power easy with more sensitive handling and fresh European style and design modern. He formed a partnership with his St. Louis Kurtis Kraft race car salesman, Ed Walsh, Kurtis to create a sports car and the company, and began to work on the design and development of a sports car can be put into production. Kurtis design and innovative steel frame resemble the internal structure of modern monocoque with front and rear bars to support the engine, suspension components secured through bars which supported the thresholds and steel floor; Firewall support steel dashboard, which has been attached to the largest section of the box beams run along the sides of the machine to the front of the car, and the steel walls that connect the bumper cross beam rear elevated behind the interior rear frame rails. Body panels must be drawn on the carrier on. The images showed that published in the Hot Rod prototype tested by Kurtis in Rosamond dry lake in December 1948 without the chassis rigidity of the basic structure.
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