Why Chevrolet’s Copper-Cooled Car Was A Major Failure – SlashGear

The story starts with Charles Kettering, a bona fide engineering genius behind everything from the modern automotive electrical system to the electric cash register (via MotorTrend). Unfortunately, the Copper-Cooled Chevrolet he designed would have more in common with other inventions of Kettering’s, like leaded gasoline and the ozone-shredding coolant Freon.

In 1919 Kettering was head of the Dayton Engineering Laboratories Company, better known to gearheads as Delco, when GM asked him for the moon on a stick. GM was tired of being beaten in every market by Henry Ford’s iconic Model T. The manufacturer wanted to stick it to its aging rival with a hot new engine that was lighter, faster, and cheaper than Ford’s, all at once.

Kettering had an idea. Water-based cooling systems had always been awkward, bulky things. Water rusted metal, condensed in dangerous places, contaminated fuel lines, and turned to scalding steam when exposed to heat. Instead, thought Kettering, he’d start with a friendlier fluid — say, ambient air — and use a more conductive metal to get the heat out: copper! Replacing water-based cooling with a simple structure of copper fins would check every box on GM’s list: lighter, faster, cheaper. It wasn’t even untested technology. Luxury cars like the Franklin 10B were using similar systems with iron fins to displace heat (via Hemmings).

GM loved it. The company went all in, buying Delco outright and committing to a full range of copper-cooled cars. At the time GM was less a single company than a holding group for five otherwise independent businesses: Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Oakland (later Pontiac), and Oldsmobile. Per Motor Trend, GM originally planned to replace three of the five product lines with copper-cooled models.