I admit this is a very weird Autopian Asks, but weird is pretty much the brand here, so maybe that makes it a perfectly normal question – for The Autopian, at least.
I don’t recall how precisely it came up, but in our last staff meeting, I wondered aloud what the reaction would be if I had a Cord 810 – the 1936 coupe famous for its industry-first pop-up headlights that deployed via crank – and converted them from hand-operated to power pop-ups. Jason was quick to let me know that this was not nearly enough of a defilement to generate a proper paroxysm from the classic-car cognescenti. What I really needed to do, he explained, was remove the pop-ups entirely, Bondo-over the openings from whence the lights once popped, and affix sealed-beam headlights atop the fenders. Now that would ruin a Cord 810.
Indeed, that would do the trick. And it got me thinking about other classics ripe for ruination. Why not flip the Cord bit, and pop-uppify a car legendary for its prominent peepers? I speak of the Austin-Healey “bugeye” Sprite, seen below as it appears on Bring A Trailer, and thoroughly blasphemed in the graphic above with its bugeyes hidden beneath the hood.
I’m sure you already get the bit, but I couldn’t resist performing a few more Photochops. Feast your eyes on this Lamborghini Countach LP400 Periscopio, unadulterated by the strakes and gee-gaws the Countach would sprout in later years (another Bring A Trailer find, and this one once belonged to Rod Stewart!). The angular “Gandini arch” over the rear wheels is one of its most defining and beautiful features …
… Suppose we get rid of it? Oof, Sorry Marcello. Don’t worry, it’s only pixels. The round-arched Countach can’t hurt you.
One more? Why not. This 1959 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz (Bring A Trailer once more) shows off its legendary tailfins with extra prominence thanks to the absence of a roof, producing maximum kitsch from the jet-age wonder’s maximum-thrust look.
Yeah, let’s just Sawzall those fins right off’a there.
Wait, did I ruin it, or improve it? Let us know in the comments, and you tell us: How Would You Most Egregiously Ruin A Classic Car Design?
This would have to be done to a real one, not one of the corvette based kits. Ferrari Daytona Spyder, tubs, soft wall slicks, bike tires up front on a straight axle with leaf springs, and a blown nitro Ford 427 Cammer sticking out of the cut up hood, and zoomies cut through the front fenders. Something Ed Roth would draw.
Around the late 90s there was a guy who raced at Bandimere in Super Gas with a pro stock-style tube frame car running a fiberglass replica 250 GTO body. Looked damn cool.
I’d find a way to take a classic long-hood 911 and turn it into a notchback. That’s right, like rhe Type 3 Notchback. I can’t think of a more car-defining line than the 911’s continuous curve from roof to bumper.
Touchscreens!
Easy… Stance it makes it low rider use those oversized wheels and low profile tires. Use Temu like super Beatle guys used to use JC Whitney.
Rear taillights that work is my inspiration from a nearly unlit caddy like pictured. Might need a 12v electrical system.
If i got money, preserving the old drivetrain by installing a modern engine is my choice.
Take a Ferrari F40, install a powertrain from a Prius, then paint it the ‘weaksauce green’ that was used on the 2nd gen Prius for a while:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2b/2nd_Toyota_Prius.jpg/1200px-2nd_Toyota_Prius.jpg
Then proceed to go on Ferrarichat and brag about how you greatly improved the emissions and fuel economy of your F40… AND made it easier/cheaper to service and made it easier to drive now that it doesn’t have a pesky manual transmission anymore.
I would gladly own and drive that for the 0.5 seconds it would take before I got threatened by Ferrari’s legal team.
People would legit murder you.
Slammed, stanced, Itasha wrapped Shelby Cobra
I have a now fully functioning 1935/? Well 2025 I suppose, Hooper Bentley recovery truck. The front bit is art deco glamour, the rest? not quite as decorous, more erm, industrial.
A what now?
It is a Bentley breakdown truck, the thing that turns up when a tow is required, the front is full on Bentley, sweeping wings (fenders) and handcrafted aluminium. At the B pillar things change( I think the back of the cab was cut down from a a Bedford ) behind which is an open platform with a Harvey Frost 4 Ton crane. The engine is a 4.5 straight six which shows signs of having had a supercharger at some point, the gearbox is possibly original? and it has two interchangeable rear axles, I have yet to try the dually, I am not sure where they came from.
I hope this helps.
You mean…a tow truck?
Sounds sort of like Miss Agnes, the 1925 Rolls-Royce pickup truck conversion (later given a Ford V8 and a Dodge Dakota suspension) in John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee novels.
Start with a Lotus Elise, then complicate and add heaviness.
Turn the Mustang into an electric suv?
Turn the Eclipse into a faceless ICE SUV?
Low key, I always kinda hated the Sprite, and you fixed it with the pop-ups. Maybe some sort of half-moon shape would be more fitting that squares, but it’s still a massive improvement.
Twingo style.
Or keep it in period with off-the-shelf VW headlight glass.
Wasn’t it originally designed with pop-ups, but they switched to bug/frogeyes to save money?
Correct.
Swivel-style pop-ups, like an Opel GT.
Rename the Sprite to 7-up
Apply modern BMW design to classic BMWs: Ditch the Hoffmeister kink and then make the classic kidney grills as big as the modern ones.
Corvette C3: replace the signature taillights with one big light bar.
Take the amazing raked strakes on a Mondial and square them.
I love the back two thirds of the Ferrari 308/328 – maybe three quarters. The area ahead of the front wheels has always looked just a little too heavy, though.
Conversely, I love the front of GT40, but the back third doesn’t really do it for me.
If I was designing my own car, I’d put the GT40 nose on the rest of the 308’s body, and do something with the rear bumper and taillights to bring things into harmony.
Flames, wide whitewalls, and baby moons… on a Testarossa.
Almost as bad as putting the fins from the ‘59 on that periscopio.
How about something similar on a 911?
https://youtu.be/FTzuAChZd1w?si=mWX-QSUePnJccWsz
Replace the dashboard and gauges with a blank slab with a vertical tablet right in the center.
And while doing so, remove all switches and levers.
Then install a yoke instead of a steering wheel….
What you did there…I see it.
Yuck! I hope no automaker ever tries that!
I learned two bothersome things about the Infiniti G37 community after I bought my 2012 G37X a couple years ago:
1. Its fan base/owner community apparently skews quite heavily toward backwards-behatted Monster-drinking tuner douchebros.
2. One of the most popular interior modifications is a “Tesla screen,” a huge aftermarket touchscreen that replaces the entire center stack of the dashboard – and I mean the whole goddamn thing, knobs and switches and all – with a central touchscreen. It replaces the stereo/infotainment system, the HVAC controls, the volume knob, even the swanky center clock.
It’s one of the single dumbest modifications I’ve ever seen to an automobile in my life, and I say that as a resident of squat-truck country.
Jaguar D-Type, turned into an enclosed streamliner long-tail coupe, converted to electric with a ~40 kWh pack of Molicel P50B and the carbon-banded motor found in the Tesla Model S PLAID, with a transmission delete, geared for a 190 mph top speed.
It would have a 300 mile range at 70 mph and weigh about the same as the ICE version, while out-performing it in every way(except for perhaps range under racing conditions, which MIGHT get two laps around the Nurburgring going 10/10ths, and definitely at least one).
Would probably do 0-60 mph in under 3 seconds and 10s in the 1/4 mile. I’d daily that shit.
Simple Suicide doors on a 300SL Gullwing. The add wheel flares.
Are the first two examples riffs on history? The Sprite was supposed to have pop up lights, but they were axed due to cost and the Cord 810/2 was sold off after bankruptcy and Hupmobile and Graham-Paige bought the machinery to build their versions of it that had fixed headlights (as well as other mods).
In a general, common sense, I’d have to say too-large wheels and tires, slammed suspension . . . basically any garbage you used to see on those car TV shows (I don’t know if they’re still around) from Foose and company or most restomodded boomer bait that would cross the televised auction floors. Other than that, I guess you could pick any individual car with a distinctive feature and eliminate or blandify it, but that gets too specific.
Picture of how the sprite was supposed to look
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/proxy/5AhjjNSbre1JsVLHtYfb46YmK-hr9c8ZhIa-lxxdA0z2N9ps2NwDQOK5lPE1sPa_CdGh2za6clN2cHxbEhhp_4U3_zORH8nUgzZdspVgKv-pnQ2xTAufctymtg
Headlights much like on a Porsche 928
Somehow that’s reminiscient of the barreleye fish:
https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/3797f155a43274511f76053e2e742c9b02586d49/0_35_1683_1009/master/1683.jpg?width=480&dpr=2&s=none&crop=none
What looks like eyes in front are actually like nostrils; its green eyes are facing upward inside the transparent dome. Freaky!
1: Hupmobile did exactly that to the Cord 810
2: The car shown looks better than the original.
Unless you’re wrapping a classic around a tree, free rein.
Plastic cladding on an E-Type? 911 tailfins? Ferrari’s with landau roofs?
911 tailfins ? That would be the 935, right?
Piano black everything?
Are you kidding me? It’s easy!
Replace all the chrome with black plastic. Not shiny plastic either, the rough stuff you see on like a first generation Chevrolet Avalanche.
For bonus points, put them on low profile tires with modern flat faced wheels that have the black paint on the insides of the spokes.