The Chrysler Airflow was met with short-lived enthusiasm. Falling end over end over the face of the cliff, it landed on its wheels at the bottom - whereupon it was driven away under its own power. In one demonstration, an Airflow sedan was sent over a 110-foot cliff. Chrysler was at pains to point out just how stout the Airflow really was. The structure was, however, a tightly integrated body-and-frame design in which the welded body contributed substantially to chassis rigidity. Nor did it result in reduced weight, for the Airflows were heavier by several hundred pounds than their conventionally styled 1933 counterparts. Bodies, as author George Dammann has noted, 'were constructed around a cage-like steel girder network, to which the body panels were welded.' This was not, strictly speaking, 'unit' construction that would have to wait until the introduction of the 1941 Nash 600. Alexander Klemin, chief of the Guggenheim Foundation for Aeronautics. The Airflow's structure, appropriately enough, was designed by Dr. The Chrysler Division's two six-cylinder lines retained their conventional styling, but DeSoto placed all its bets on the success of the Airflow - with dismal results, as we shall soon see. In addition, DeSoto fielded a six-cylinder Airflow. In the end there were four Chrysler Airflows, each with its own wheelbase, and all with straight-eight powerplants. The introduction of this revolutionary new automobile would be, he believed, an appropriate way to celebrate the upcoming 10th Anniversary of the founding of the Chrysler Corporation. A wind tunnel was constructed at Dayton, Ohio, and there Breer and his cohorts, Fred Zeder and Owen Skelton, undertook their research under a cloak of secrecy. With Walter Chrysler's blessing, work got under way on the development of a streamlined automobile. Breer was just beginning to recognize the handicap posed by wind resistance.

If the airplane, or for that matter the bird, was shaped in such a way as to minimize wind resistance, could not the same principle be applied, Breer wondered, to ground transportation: to trains, to trucks, to passenger cars? Especially to passenger cars, for by that time (late 1927) some of the better automobiles were capable of speeds as high as 80 or even 90 miles per hour. It was one of those illuminating moments. But as they approached he came to realize that what he was seeing wasn't geese he was observing a squadron of military aircraft on maneuvers. According to company legend, one day Breer was watching what he took to be a flock of geese in flight. Chrysler's great engineering triumvirate, who supplied the inspiration for the project. It was Carl Breer, one of the 'Three Musketeers' of Walter P.

1934 chrysler airflow imperial