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FordNucleon

1957 United States Concept car 1 production year
Production1957
Recorded originUnited States
ClassConcept car
Background

The Ford Nucleon is a concept car developed by Ford in 1957, designed as a future nuclear-powered car—one of a handful of such designs during the 1950s and 1960s. The concept was only demonstrated as a scale model. The design did not include an internal combustion engine; rather, the vehicle was to be powered by a small nuclear reactor at its rear, based on the assumption that nuclear reactors would eventually become small enough to make this possible. The car was to use a steam engine powered by uranium fission, similar to those found in nuclear submarines.

Text adapted from “Ford Nucleon” on Wikipedia ↗ · CC BY-SA 4.0 ↗ · retrieved 2026-07

Chronology ledger

Dates with their meaning intact

Production chronology1957

Sourced production or model lifecycle range used by the main catalog timeline.

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