In the recent feature on the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Museum here at Mac’s Motor City Garage, we included a shot of this unusual car: the 1948 Tasco. Here’s more.
The ACD Museum is an appropriate home for the TASCO. The vehicle was the work of famed stylist Gordon M. Buehrig, who was responsible for many Auburn, Cord, and Duesenberg designs, including the stunning coffin-nosed Cord 810/812 and the Auburn 851 Speedster. The TASCO wasn’t nearly as pleasing in its aesthetics, which Buehrig readily acknowledged, calling the awkward machine “my Edsel.”
The Tasco prototype in one of its original outings.
TASCO was an abbreviation for The American Sports Car Company, but the ambitiously named project never progressed beyond this single running prototype. Buehrig and a handful of stylist friends, including Virgil Exner and Bob Bourke, then working for Studebaker, hauled a 1939 Mercury out of a South Bend junkyard to supply the TASCO’s chassis and drivetrain. Derham in Pennsylvania fabricated the body, which employs extensive aluminum construction with fiberglass front wheel enclosures.
Fully detailed 1948 TASCO quarter-scale model at the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Museum
European sports cars of the era reportedly supplied the inspiration for the TASCO’s basic footprint, and a ton of aircraft construction and design influences can also be seen, for example in the dash and center control console. In the years immediately following WWII, airplanes were obviously on designers’ minds.
1948 TASCO dash and control console
One unusual feature at the time was the pair of lift-out plexiglass roof panels, which today we would immediately recognize as “T-Tops.” When the 1968 Corvette was introduced, Buehrig pursued a legal case against General Motors, but the results were not announced. The prototype eventually found its way into the possession of Nevada car collector Richie Clyne, who donated it to the museum. While the car can’t be called a success in any real sense, that doesn’t make it any less fascinating, and it makes a great addition to the collection.
1948 TASCO Auburn Cord Duesenberg Museum right front view
Gordon M. Buehrig U.S. Patent drawing no. 152,320
I kinda like it. The cockpit and canopy are unusual and well executed IMO. The outrigger wheels weren’t that unusual for the era, especially on race cars. The rear window recalls the Plymouth Barracuda and that type of treatment was revived on cars like the Honda CRX.
The TASCO’s main problem is the front end. Imagine it with a Plymouth Prowler front end. That would be much more attractive than that (probably) very effective front bumper but that looks like someone stuck an oil pan up front. The scoops on either side of the grille have a tacked-on look, especially with the pod lights on top. But I think that an attractive grille would go a long way toward tying the scoops into the bodywork.
Oh, and air conditioning was developed enough for that much glass around the passengers. It would have been intolerable in California and during Midwest Summers.
I sorta like it, too. It’s no great beauty like his Cord 810, but it’s really interesting.
I concur. It’s really not bad at all except for that nose. I don’t even necessarily mind the scoops that much, if something could be done with that ill-fitted … thing … in the center.