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The Lamborghini Countach is perhaps the all-time most uncompromising car for speed and jaw dropping appearance, and one today can set you back six figures. Today's Nice Price or Crack Pipe Kitborghini lets you have all that... at a compromise. More »
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A Hummer can represent the highlight of just about anybody's week. Should however that Hummer turn out, like today's Nice Price or Crack Pipe candidate, to be a knockoff, its price would likely determine if you're getting a happy ending. More »
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The simplicity of Bruce Meyers' original Manx made it easy to counterfeit. Today's Nice Price or Crack Pipe SR2 is his follow up, and a design that truly stands apart. But would you part with $8,900 for it? More »
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The kit car industry has evolved over the decades from simple mail-order fiberglass bodies, to nearly turn-key automobiles. Today's Nice Price or Crack Pipe '76 Blakely was originally a kit, but does its current price mean some assembly's required? More »
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Quien? Factory Five Cobra or awesome Minneapolis garage mahal? You be the judge. We'll take either one. [6speedonline/Alex Bellus via 0-60] More »
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Keeping with the "speedy how-to" vein we've fallen into, here's a clip from 1955 wherein a team of men transform an old-and-busted ‘47 Ford into a fiberglass-bodied Woodill Wildfire kit car in only three hours and fifty minutes. [JalopyJournal] More »
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Last week, reader Curtis sent in an intriguing tip: a self-service wrecking yard in my area had a "kit car that looks kinda like a GT40 powered by what looks to be a Porsche engine." More »
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Hacking up a hail-damaged car and turning it into a giant, highway-capable whale is one thing… but when your Whalemobile started live as a Yugo cabriolet, you're entering an alternate dimension of awesomeness! More »
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Welcome to Project Car Hell, where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Sometimes you need to decide between sportiness and practicality with your project. More »
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This is Down On The Street Bonus Edition, where we check out interesting street-parked cars located in places other than the Island That Rust Forgot. Ever seen a Panther Kallista? tek_nic has! More »
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Welcome to Project Car Hell, where you choose the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! We took it easy on you last time, but we're getting into some serious Hell Projects today. More »
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This is Down On The Street Bonus Edition, where we see interesting street-parked cars in places other than the Island That Rust Forgot. Dominick was car shopping in Malaga when he found these two. More »
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Welcome to Project Car Hell, where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! You want a project car that's different, don't you? More »
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While most Fauxrraris tend to be based on the mid-engined Pontiac Fiero, you can also find Daytona replicas based on the good ol' C3 Corvette. Since the small-block Chevy can be made to churn out power well beyond anything ever put in a factory Daytona, a Corvettari can be very quick (though the Corvette suspension might make for some white-knuckle driving adventures at Ferrari-esque speeds). Here we've got a well-built Corvettari Daytona, built on a 1980 chassis with EFI 400 small-block and Tremec 5-speed. More »
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An interesting difference between Backyard Lambos and Backyard Ferraris is that eBay apparently won't let you use the word "Ferrari" when you're trying to sell your Fauxrrari. That's why the vehicle we're looking at today is actually a "512 tr FERR@RI" replica. More »
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You Ferrari fanciers have no doubt been pointing and hooting at the Fauxborghinis of last week's Backyard Lambo Of The Day series. Not so fast, signore! We're going to follow up that series with some Fauxrraris, cars that offend the purists just as much as they impress the rest of us with their low-buck (and sometimes not-so-low-buck) ingenuity. Today's car is a sort of Mystery Fauxrrari out of Washington state… More »
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If you're going to put a Detroit V8 with FWD transaxle amidships in your Fauxborghini and for some reason the Olds Toronado 425 (or even the 500-cube powerplant from a 1970 Eldorado) doesn't do it for you, how about the readily available Cadillac Northstar? That's what we've got here, and it can be yours for just $22,000! More »
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The Turbo Buick-powered Fauxborghini Diablo we saw yesterday looked pretty quick, but only 400 horsepower? The real thing came with more like 500 horses, so we had to find a Fauxborghini that could beat that figure. Sure enough, here's this tube-frame brute that gets 600 fuel-injected horsepower (or maybe that's bullpower) out of a good ol' reliable big-block Chevy 427. It seems to have been built pretty well, and the price is under 42 grand. Yeah, the huge carbon fiber shift knob is horrid, but you'll be able to buy a new one with all the money you save on engine parts. More »
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Just to show that not all Fauxborghinis are Fieroborghinis, we've got another tube-frame, turbo Buick V6-powered machine, from way up north in Alberta. The engine has a claimed 400 horses, feeding a modified Audi transaxle… but, sadly, it appears that only two of the wheels are being driven. We can't help but think that it would have been more fun to put some kind of Big Daddy Roth-style bubble-canopy body on a setup like this, but the world prefers Lambos!


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Nobody seems sick of this series after one repetition, so we're back for more homebuilt Lamborghini glory today! What we've got here is not a Fieroborghini; much like the Indiana Turbo Buick Countach, this Fauxborghini is based on a tube-frame chassis. The best part? The powerplant: a torque-brute 425 engine and front-wheel-drive transaxle from a 1960s Oldsmobile Toronado, installed amidships just like a real Lambo! Unlike a real Lambo, it's a 3-speed automatic, but gear selection is pretty much irrelevant with an Olds big-block. Sure, maybe the handling and braking isn't up to Lamborghini standards, but acceleration and top speed should be outstanding, what with 360 (or more) Olds ponies behind you.


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I found so many backyard-built Fauxborghinis while trying to find a suitable opponent for the '72 Stutz Blackhawk in last Friday's PCH that it seems a shame not to share some of the better ones with our readers (no, I'm not going to do a whole week of Fauxborghini PCH challenges). Hence this new (and no doubt short-lived) series: Backyard Lambo Of The Day! Today's BLOTD hails from the woods of Northern California, where the availability of good cheap beer from the nearby Sierra Nevada brewery seems to make a keyboard's CAPS LOCK key incredibly alluring. I can't slog through the entire description without getting a terrible headache, but I've gleaned sufficient info to say that we've got a mean-looking Murcielago replica on a stretched frame, with a stroked V6 sitting next to it. The seller was going to finish the project and sell it for $85,000, but he or she lacks the time and garage space to finish the project and that means it's priced at a mere 20 grand. Hmmm... you can get running BMW 750iLs for next to nothing these days- why not buy a cheap engine-donor car and build yourself a V12 Fieroborghini with this car? More »
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Welcome to Project Car Hell, where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! The sporty Simca beat up on the magnificent Humber in our last Choose Your Eternity poll, meaning France gets the PCH Superpower trophy… once it's out of the shop, that is. Today we're going to look at the sort of cars that desperate motivated sellers often refer to as "head turners." You know, it's weird and sort of cool, but also sort of horrible… and wouldn't it be fun to own one?
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Listen people, just because one guy built a really kickass Lamborghini replica doesn't mean all of you are qualified to do the same. Case in point is this "Lamborghini Murcielago LP640 GT" built on the bones of a Pontiac Solstice. The buy-it-now price on this jewel is a modest $70,000, and for that you get styling resembling the bastard spawn of a Murcielago and a fat-bottomed Lotus Elan. Bottom line: Dressing up a Solstice as a Lamborghini will fool nobody this Halloween. More »
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Welcome to Project Car Hell, where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Yesterday, we were not quite shocked to see the backyard-turbo'd VW GTI obliterate the rod-knockitty Toyota FX16 by a 76:24 margin in the Choose Your Eternity poll. Today we're going to consider the Fauxrrari, and- just to make it more interesting- we're not considering Fiero-based cars. That's right, no Fierraris!
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The story of Steve McHugh, the man behind the radical Nova kit car we initially posted on a lark (and because we're automotive sadists) just keeps getting curiouser and curiouser. Steve recently emailed us to let us in on a little secret — he's been building crazy-ass cars for nigh on twenty-eight years now. Since 1980, Steve's been applying his personal style of vehicular extremism to anything he can get his hands on. He even sent us pictures of this favorites. Heck, we'll let him tell you all about it below, along with more pics of Steve's marvelous mechanical masterpieces. More »
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Forget about all those backyard Fiero hack jobs, your Fieroborghinis and your Fierraris. Really, forget 'em! You can now own a genuine Canadian-government-backed 1986 Enterra Vipre, which is currently getting some solid eBay bid action. The Enterra Vipre was based on the '86 Fiero GT chassis, so you get the mighty six-banger. Thanks to Josh for the tip! [eBay Motors] More »
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We've seen a lot of Fierraris lately, hopefully the world runs out of Fieros eventually so we aren't subjected to the ongoing night terrors they induce, but this one is particularly brash. This p**sy magnet yellow Fierrari Enzno is perhaps the finest example of the breed, complete with crooked, off-brand Ferrari prancing horse logos, four off-kilter exhaust tips, pop-up DVD player, brilliantly executed engine-cover-mounted TV antenna, luxurious APC racing seats... the list goes on and on. The best part is this car's claim to fame. More »
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Britain beats Italy, though by the slimmest of margins, in yesterday's Choose Your Eternity poll, with the '64 Lotus Elan eking out a 51/49 victory over the '60 Lancia Flaminia. That means we'll need to set up a Britain-France PCH Schmackdöwn Challenge™ pretty soon... but that comes only after we cross the river of flaming gasoline that separates us from Fiero-Based Project Hell. The General saw fit to build vast quantities of mid-engined, plastic-bodied cars back in the 80s, and that means that hundreds of cigar-chomping entrepreneurs believed they could make vast quantities of cash putting "improved" bodies on Fieros. Fierraris, Fieroborghinis, Pantieros, Fiersches... and let us not forget Fiero-based coke-dealer-centric statusmobiles! More »
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Would you love to have a Noble but can't wait for the M600 and don't have the scratch to buy a new M400? It's your lucky day because there's a gently crash 2007 Noble M400 just waiting for you in Indiana. On top of being a sweet shade of p**sy magnet yellow and having only 8706 miles, it only needs a radiator, condenser, windshield and some super easy fiberglass work at the nose. At least, that's what the seller says. We suspect this one might have lived a very hard 8700 miles. But hey, only a $35,000 reserve! Act soon while supplies last. (Thanks Jon) More »
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What we have here is a 1974 Porsche 914 with a Chevy 350 engine and a Ferrari-influenced body kit, sort of a German Malaise version of the Fierrari. The owner needs to sell because he's "just sick," plus he's accepted a lifetime career opportunity in NYC and, you know, "Goodness only knows what insurance would cost and what vandalism it would be subject to there." The disturbing part is this statement: "On the road it sounds like a gay deep throated angry demon!" Yes, that's exactly the sound we're all looking for in a car! Thanks to Yurikaze for the tip! [eBay Motors] More »
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Yesterday, we had what may be our closest Project Car Hell vote yet, with the '91 Jaguar XJ-S holding a 199 to 194 lead over the Toronado-ized Dune Buggy in yesterday's Legends of LeMons Choose Your Eternity poll. I'd say that counts as a tie, and- try to follow the logic here- that means we need to do away with the unifying theme for today's entrants. You want a project that's so cool you wake up in the middle of the night just feeling happy that you own it, yet wake up screaming an hour later as you realize that the price to finish the project is your immortal soul! More »
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The Fiero Ferrari we saw recently was pretty nice, all right, and there's no denying the appeal of a Fieroborghini or the Fierenzo. But if you crave a Fiero-based Italian supercar, yet also need the VCR and mirrored ceiling of a limo... well, today is your lucky day! We've found this fine Fierrari that's been stretched and converted into full Limo Overload (and we mean that "Overload" part literally, because this vehicle still has the stock Iron Duke four-banger, which isn't quite working; the seller states "really dont exactly know? could be major eng? or Minor?"). But so what? You've got room for a GMC Twin Six in that easily-expanded engine compartment! [eBay Motors] More »
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Sure, Junkman has some nice cars in his collection. There's the Honda Coupe 9, the Pontiac-powered Deutsch-Bonnet, and the insane Porsche 356. But something was missing... until Junkman obtained this Chevette-based 1977 Leata Cabalero. Make the jump to hear what he has to say about this beauty! More »
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Even though only 11% of you chose the If only they'd put Lamborghini bodies on them at the factory poll choice in Friday's DOTS Fiero poll, I feel compelled to share this fine example of a "Lamborghini Countach" that I spotted in the island's East End last week. Sure, the fit and finish isn't quite up to Yugo standards, but at least it's not another boring Camry or Malibu! I'm pretty sure it's based on the Pontiac Fiero chassis, but its smog check records indicate that it's registered as a 2000 model. That's why I'm including a poll, so that all of us have a chance to debate this car's identity.
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The last time we set foot in the Hell That Is Project, the blown Kaiser Manhattan just barely beat the blown VW Corrado, showing that heartbreaking dilemmas can be fun! For today, I wanted to pick a couple of glitz-heavy high-roller machines, but there's something important missing from all the ones I could find for sale. Yes, what your Excalibur, Johnson Phantom, Zimmer Golden Spirit, or Tiffany really needs is a Hemi! And not one of these here newfangled 426 Hemis. We're talking about a genuine 392 engine (check out Allpar's history of the Chrysler Hemi if you're in the mood for a good read). That way you'll combine excellent taste in automobile styling with an engine that bellows "High Roller Approaching!" to the world. More »
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The problem with wheel-driven cars is that they're just too safe. No whirling blades to slice-and-dice unwary pedestrians, no engine braking, no hellish roar from the prop. That's why you need to buy this 1985 Jetstream prop-driven car. Powered by a Chevy 400 with gear reduction and guaranteed to scare the chickens! We're a little puzzled by the mix of photos, some showing a gleaming white machine and others showing a Lord Humungus-style mud-colored one; we figure the latter photos are the more accurate ones. Thanks to Uncle Trash for the tip! [eBay Motors] More »
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Remember the Classic Motor Carriages Gazelle ('29 Mercedes SSK replica built on a Chevette chassis) we saw a few months ago? The one that's been open to the elements for several years now, enraging its parking-challenged neighborhood as its owner moves it just often enough to avoid getting towed? With a For Sale sign offering the car at the extremely optimistic price of $12,000? Well, the Gazelle has a partner in consuming precious street parking: this Shay Reproductions Model A! More »
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Nearly two-thirds of readers surveyed felt that the Wright Cyclone 1820-powered Mercury Cyclone was the way to go in yesterday's Choose Your Eternity poll, no doubt because, like, pistons rule! Today we're going to take a look at Kit Car Hell, which last scorched our hides in the Fieroborghini versus Bradley GT matchup. Inspired by the stylish lines of the Classic Motor Coaches Gazelle we saw in a recent DOTS, today we're going to look at a couple of classy machines built on Volkswagen pans. Thanks (and a Project Car Hell Tipster T-shirt) to Discontinuuity for the tip! More »
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You've always wanted a 1929 Mercedes-Benz SSK roadster, but felt the price was a bit high and the technology on the outdated side? Many felt that way in the 70s and 80s, and felt strongly enough to purchase the Classic Motor Carriages Gazelle. Available in kit or assembled form (until CMC was forced out of business in 1994), the Gazelle has a devoted following of enthusiasts to this day. Like an original SSK with stories to tell this example has quite a story, too, being the source of much neighbor grumbling in its downtown neighborhood for many, many months now. More »
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Now that we've established that 70% of you would prefer to hook up at the Beelzebub Acres Mobile Estates Park with a 1951 Cadillac-based motorhome, you'll need a lightweight machine to tow behind the rig (since it's likely that your V8 Vega or Pinto will end up on fire in a ditch and thus be unavailable for transportation). But there will be no sensible Samurai or mundane Metro for you. Oh no, not in Project Car hell- you'll need something agonizingly cool yet coolly agonizing to go with your Caddabago... More »
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