how anyone thought they could one-up the perfection of a chevette is beyond me.

Do I detect a hint of Grand Prix in the nose, and Aspen in the ass?

My god is it ugly.

It looks like an aborted AMc Eagle.

Jesus, is this the Malaise poster car or what?

Add a 76 antenna ball and it could be something Homer Simpson designed.

I wanna be like Junkman when I grow up.

Seriously though, if this is Chevette-based, this means that someday the frame will rust out from under all those pretty body panels and the car will collapse outward, TV-comedy style. At least with the regular Chevette, you could tell the car's overall health by gazing through the rocker-panel rust holes, just like coring redwoods to check their age...

Did you wash your Cordoba with hot water?

Junkman Fantasy Garage

All the malaise of a full-size car combined with the shame of a compact.

That thing looks like it would make a cool golf cart.

That car is so hideous, it's heroic. Someone should have got a medal for making so many people recoil in horror.

Having said that, I'd have bought it too, just to freak out people.

Leata Cabalero (correct spelling)

If you insist. The correct spelling is "Caballero". Duh.

I went to that 356 link and let me say, that man should be ashamed of himself. He ruined that innocent car.

Wasn't there a mid-Eighties jaguar somewhere he could have butchered to fulfill the redneck fantasy of a small block Chevy in everything?

Its so hideous, so bizarre, so....I WANT ONE!

I think the original owner was Hans Moleman
or as his drivers license reads Ralph Mellish...

(google it, friends...)

i used to wonder why small cars looked like small cars. i always wondered why no one made small cars with big car styling. now i know.

Wow, all the tackiness of a mid '70s Monte Carlo coupled with the sadness of a Chevette!

I miss opera windows. And leisure suits.

Please, oh please, swap in an LSx. This vehicle would become a rolling juxtaposition of malaise and mighty.

It really didn't catch on?.........can't imagine why.

@clinto: I mean, I personally don't care for it either, but I respect the craftsmanship that went into it. I just hope the 356 was in really bad shape before he got it; I can only pray he didn't do that to a running clean example.

Of course, for the record I don't care for the Deutsch-Bonnet; given that the frame was swapped it's just as tasteless and ill-handling as the old Camaro on a Blazer frame swap.

On a second note, I have to applaud the marketing genious that must have been involved in selling 100 of these things!

I love the details in the ad text, 12,000 mile warranty and.... 40 MPG! woohoo! What a bargain!

Aaaaargh, me eyes!

What kind of twisted... ah, I can't even finish.

I need to gouge out my eyes now...

The 1977 Leata Cabalero, for folks with neither adequate money or commone sense! It redefines fugly.

We need more looks into Junkman's garage. Really, this guy is my hero. And this baby just needs some 13-inch slot mags to complete the package.

Junkman, if I can't be you, will you at least write me into your will?

It would only be fitting if Jalopnik decided to add the exclusive DAFAF annex to the JFG. Candidate vehicles must have been commercially sold somewhere at some point, yet be so obscure and/or funky no other site would ever have the cojones to run a story on them.

The exhibit would feature a rogue's gallery available for viewing at any time, provided there are at least a dozen vehicles in it. However, cars can be parked in the annex for just 90 days, so readers have to keep sending in candidates to keep it open!

There was a Leatamino, too. [static.howstuffworks.com]

@Armand4: I was thinking gold wire hubcaps myself.

"Look, honey! It's the Verne Troyer Pimpmobile!"

@Armand4: No way! Those cheap wheel covers are so perfectly crappy for this rig I can hardly believe it. Hands off, don't mess with perfection.

This looks like random GM parts assembled into one vehicle.

It seems that they also produced a Cabaleromino version.

This guy was a visionary for creating a luxury compact years before the new Mini, A3, 135i, C30, etc.

He was a failure for making it this ugly.

@fatbraff: That was itself an homage to a Monty Python sketch. Google it, friends.

@Triborough: It's as if Johnny Cash worked on the Chevy assembly line instead of Cadillac in the song "One Piece at a Time!"

Good detective work on the Cabeleromino!

i wonder how much he wants for that rusted out tractor in the backgrounds? i think i could resell it Poland - the Shabalero on the other hand - even desperate Poles arent that desperate!

Uh, how many fewer than 100 were ever built? 99 fewer perhaps?

@Bret: I'd go at it from the other angle, swap in a giant engine that makes about 120hp, make it the Malaisingist car ever.

A fine reminder that sometimes "RARE!" just means "no sane person wanted one when they were new"... that is hard-core Malaise indeed. All it needs is a V8 producing <25 HP/Liter..

@rgseidl: Seconded!

A dream of mine is to build a museum of horrible/low selling/über-rare cars

"Hand-built" and "handcrafted" isn't always a good thing.

Yet, despite all logical sense and intelligence this beauty still made it out of the 70s unscathed. Which is why the 70s were absolutely the best time in history, period.

Precursor to the Cimmaron

Duesenberg, eat your heart out.

Yep, folks, just the thing to roll up to the country club in. And you know it'll stay safely parked because the pimply-faced parking attendant wouldn't be caught dead in it out on the street.

* Does anyone remember 'Sandford & Son'? With Redd Fox?

My god, that is homely on so many levels....

It's Grand Prix + Monte Carlo + Dodge Aspen, then beaten to a pulp by an ugly stick and left in the sun to ripen then decay.

I love it. It's warp 7 better than a Chevette.

But dammit, if it isn't LTDSCOTT rubbing our nose in that beautiful LTD all the time it's JUNKMAN making us all feel inadequate with his only partially revealed inventory.

You know the panties just fly off when you get a girl in that love machine.
Of course it may involve a little kidnapping to get her near it.

Mr Lutz, me and the boys back in design have been working on a secret project we know youre gonna love...

Gotta respect the abilities of modern science when they enable this kind of quality of life for a Down's Syndrome-born Ford Granada!