Mormon Meteor Duesenberg Special 1935: American record-breaking car (12 photos + 1 video)

There is only one Duesenberg, the most powerful, the fastest and the most famous is the Mormon Meteor, Ab Jenkins' racing car, which, on the Bonneville salt lake, showed miracles of speed and endurance.





In the 30s, the beaches of the city of Daytona Beach in the US state Florida was originally used for various races, but soon the place changed to Bonneville in Utah. This is a dry salt lake, and its a flat surface allows drivers to develop high speeds.



Ab Jenkins was born in 1883 and came to Utah in the 1930s to engage in professional racing. He was not so much interested top speeds, how many endurance races, so it is not uncommon spent up to 30 hours behind the wheel, with the exception of a few short breaks for refueling, snacks and going to the toilet.





In 1935, he contacted a well-known manufacturer duesenberg premium cars and bought a chassis for his future car.



Jenkins further shortened the chassis and turned to August Duesenberg with a request to tune the company's inline eight-cylinder engine. He developed the same 400 hp. with a working volume of 7 liters, but began to issue power at lower rpm to maintain durability unit.



What Jenkins didn't want was the Duesenberg style, so he contacted several independent studios and asked them to develop a car in aerodynamic style. The car was named Duesenberg Special. The most interesting thing is that oil companies financed this development, who saw the success of this whole undertaking, not forgetting about advertising.



Jenkins drove his car to Bonneville in October 1935 and the first day he made an hour-long race at an average speed of 249 km / h. This the indicator became a world record, and at the same time he spent 24 hours behind the wheel with an average speed of 218 km/h.



This world record will be valid until 1961. These numbers certainly were impressive for their time, but Jenkins is not suited. As the aviation style became more and more popular, he contacted Curtiss and bought a Conqueror engine which installed on aircraft.



And this time, August was invited to improve his car. Duesenberg, so under the hood was an engine with a working volume of 26 liters. This 12-cylinder engine developed 750 hp, but, naturally put on so much weight that Augustus had to major changes to the chassis and suspension system.



The car was renamed the Mormon Meteor and hit the track in 1936. year. He began to break records when he covered 500 kilometers with an average 265 km/h, then drove for 24 hours at an average speed of 247 km/h, and then 48 hours at 239 km/h. All figures mentioned were worldwide records of the time, some of which were not broken until the 90s years.



Jenkins retired from professional racing in 1938 and decided get involved in politics. An aircraft engine was removed from Meteor and returned a Duesenberg engine, and Jenkins drove it daily until 1943. After that, it will be put in a garage and it will stay there until 2004. After it was auctioned off, restored and today is a frequent visitor at classic car collections.



One interesting thing needs to be mentioned about the hero of this story when he died in 1956. He was in the US state of Wisconsin with executives Pontiac, where he would drive a pace car for the Road race America. He died suddenly of a heart attack, and in his honor the company Pontiac the following year introduced a model named after the location in where Jenkins had his greatest success, Bonneville. So another great American automotive icon was born industry.