A Shrunken Corvair Named Kumquat
From the West coast division of the Corvair shortening department comes this 1963 convertible dune buggy variant of the American air-cooled rear engine sports car. The car originally rolled off the assembly line as a factory turbocharged Spyder in 1963. An accident that buckled and creased both doors landed what was left the Spyder languishing engineless behind a gas station until 1971. What was left of the turbo convertible was purchased for 50 bucks to acquire a still complete dashboard. The catch was that the entire car had to go with the dashboard. Where it went began the journey of car shortening, engine transplants, and an orange paint job that lent the shrunken Corvair its name.
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A Shrunken Corvair Named Kumquat
From the West coast division of the Corvair shortening department comes this 1963 convertible dune buggy variant of the American air-cooled rear engine sports car. The car originally rolled off the assembly line as a factory turbocharged Spyder in 1963. An accident that buckled and creased both doors landed what was left the Spyder languishing [...]
1969 Honda Electric Rear Driver
Garage talk concerning engine swaps or drivetrain transplants is plentiful. Thousands of instant message windows, forum posts, and Facebook updates are populated at any given second with declarations of Hayabusa powered mid-engine rear-drive Ford Festivas (or similar) with induction systems managed by MegaSquirt. And so on. Some folks actually go so far as to get [...]
Tool of the Week: Snow and Ice Scraper
As much of the world plunges into the sort of deep freeze that may be the work of a clandestine global super villian, the trusty snow and ice scraper seems the perfect mid-winter Ernst Starvo Blofeld edition of Tool of the Week. Growing up in New England meant carrying one or more of these handy [...]
Economy Seat Covers
The dry climate and salt free roads of California are kind to older cars like the Starlet. The same warm California sun has detrimental effects on vinyl interiors. Throw in twenty plus years of sitting and sunbathing, and it’s a good bet that even the rich Corinthian leather in those 1981 Cordoba seats has seen [...]
Corollla Rescued from Crusher
Proving wrong the previously held belief that a car is on a certain path to the jaws of the crusher once out on the California junkyard ground is this 1983 Toyota Corolla. We have lost count of how many near mint condition cars, trucks, and vans seen at the self-service junkyards of California that left [...]
Ford Double B Wrecking Truck
From the before and after division of the project car department comes this 1934 Ford BB wrecking truck. The former tow truck is shown here in before condition, after the heavy-duty Ford made the journey to South San Francisco by way of the windy rusty city of Chicago. Bob McLennan of Champion Speed Shop fame [...]
Concrete Ape in Vermont
Driving along Vermont state highways one is likely to witness the majesty of the Green Mountains while curving down around rivers and creeks into bucolic small towns. Either that or a giant gorilla holding up a Volkswagen beetle. This particular Gorilla guards the used car lot at Pioneer Auto Sales on State Route 7 in [...]
Henney Kilowatt in Florida
The jet age was upon us. Radio magnates, vacuum cleaner industrialists, and battery manufacturing cabals pooled their vast economic resources. Top electrical engineer Victor Wouk and Pulitzer Prize winning chemist Linus Pauling were put on the job. French automaker Renault was called in for their expertise. From this global effort sprang a compact electric automobile [...]
JDM Astro Van and Resurrected Corolla
The resurrection of old Corollas and return of a Chevrolet Astro to the United States from Japan is proof that the end of 2009 is at hand, or that the last Santa Clara gathering of this year is now in the past. The Datsun crew by way of Ratsun Forum showed up with an eclectic [...]
Forgotten Chevy Truck
There is no finer automobile for around the ranch work than a solid full size pickup truck. This 1963 Chevrolet C20 truck had evidently finished the job. What job? The old Chevy is the sort of truck that Hoss Cartwright would drive into town for some dynamite to blow those stumps out in the west [...]
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