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Purchased: 1967 AMT Piranha - Need parts

Discussion in 'The Hokey Ass Message Board' started by Carguy1965, Jun 7, 2011.

  1. burnouts
    Joined: Jan 25, 2008
    Posts: 9

    burnouts
    Member
    from norcal

    My buddy has one restored. His name is frank Zucchi he is in Livermore cal at fz restoration
     
  2. BERNIES WELDING
    Joined: Mar 31, 2011
    Posts: 216

    BERNIES WELDING
    Member

    wow wow wow...........

    that has to be the best find ever. just think of what you have and the possibilities.

    one idea would be to clean up the body and make a mold of all the parts and a limited number of bodies available for kit car builders.
     
  3. That was one of my favorite TV cars.. Hope you can bring it back to life.
     
  4. Kripfink
    Joined: Sep 30, 2008
    Posts: 2,040

    Kripfink
    Member Emeritus

    Bummer!
    Capt Kirk and Napoleon Solo are two of my all-time great heroes. I think Napoleon Solo is one of the suavest dudes to ever draw breath. I used to be in an instrumental surf band called TV 21, and we released a 45 rpm EP in the late 90s with our version of the man from uncle theme. Used to go on stage in black turtleneck sweaters, shades and shoulder holsters and the three of us had those triangular plastic badges with a number on just like in the show. Of course, I had to have Napoleon's number, 11.
    Paul
     
  5. screwball
    Joined: Mar 5, 2001
    Posts: 1,761

    screwball
    Member

    A little O.T. for the Hamb though pre 64. I wont post my 1967 project out of respect for the rules.
     
  6. dragsta
    Joined: Apr 11, 2010
    Posts: 589

    dragsta
    BANNED

    rules, schmules..... this project is different and worthy of a little rule breaking.
     
  7. sololobo
    Joined: Aug 23, 2006
    Posts: 8,378

    sololobo
    Member

    Cool history lesson, I remember the car from the Uncle show. My hero Gene Winfield has done about everything and is still rockin and rollin. Thanx ~sololobo~
     
  8. That's a great find. Fortunately for you, two of the main guys involved in the history of the car (Gene Winfield and Robert Vaughn) are still with us. Gene might be a great source of information, and he's a real good guy.

    Robert Vaughn has always been one of my favorite actors. He plays a great bad guy. He nails every role he does.
     
  9. ChevyGirlRox
    Joined: May 13, 2005
    Posts: 3,491

    ChevyGirlRox
    Member
    from Ohio

    Neat car, I've never seen one before. Love this picture of Gene!
     
  10. Carguy1965
    Joined: Dec 14, 2008
    Posts: 168

    Carguy1965
    Member
    from Illinois

    Sorry about bending the rules. Just wanted to get the word out that I am looking for parts.

    I have been in touch with Gene Winfield for many years and he has been very helpful with the history of the cars.

    Below is a photo of one of the fiberglass chassis tubs in primer. Maybe there is one floating around out there. The other is a shot of a rolling chassis without the body. The gas tank is the long slender thing mounted along the right side rocker panel.
     

    Attached Files:

  11. Carguy1965
    Joined: Dec 14, 2008
    Posts: 168

    Carguy1965
    Member
    from Illinois

    Here is a shot of the rusty front suspension. Most of the rear suspension is missing.
     

    Attached Files:

  12. Very cool car! Keep us posted on the rebuild!
     
  13. This is so cool! Just having Napoleon Solo drive your car adds at least 60% to the cool factor.
     
  14. alsancle
    Joined: Nov 30, 2005
    Posts: 1,572

    alsancle
    Member

  15. scrubba
    Joined: Jul 20, 2010
    Posts: 939

    scrubba
    Member

    One thing has and always impress me about Mr Gene Wifield , he taught himself how to do almost everything he's still doing . The two friends I have that actually know him tell me he's a REAL person , not some phony hero. I saw enough of that when I used to live in Los Angles . You GO GENE Winfield !!!!!!! scrubba
     
  16. LANCE-SPEED
    Joined: Aug 10, 2006
    Posts: 2,259

    LANCE-SPEED
    Member

    There are exeptions like, Winfeild, custom, movie car and so on.
    Eduacate me on the car, was it a production car, race car or what?
     
  17. stude_trucks
    Joined: Sep 13, 2007
    Posts: 4,755

    stude_trucks
    Member

    Doesn't look too good for driving shoot outs, but otherwise looks like a really cool car. Never knew anything about them. Thanks for sharing and good luck with getting it back together.
     
  18. metalshapes
    Joined: Nov 18, 2002
    Posts: 11,138

    metalshapes
    Member

    A sistercar to that one was recently found in Holland.

    Its the one that was modified by Osi ( Italy ), and had a rear engined Renault driveline.

    At some point it got some ( Alpine or Gordini ) go faster goodies, wide mag wheels and body mods to cover those.
    And it was used for racing.

    I have some pics, but not on this computer...
    I'll ad them to this Thread later, once they are retreived from the back up disc.
     
  19. metalshapes
    Joined: Nov 18, 2002
    Posts: 11,138

    metalshapes
    Member

    There is also one with a Corvair driveline, that is used for Vintage Racing...
    ( a roadster, I think.
    But without pics I cant check that to make sure.)
     
  20. Yes please!

    I thought these were all Corvair powered originally?
     
  21. Carguy1965
    Joined: Dec 14, 2008
    Posts: 168

    Carguy1965
    Member
    from Illinois

    CRV/Piranha 101:

    Back in the early 60's, Marbon Chemical produced an ABS plastic called Cycolac. They wanted to promote it's use in the auto industry so they decided to build an all plastic car.

    Marbon designed a body that could be thermoformed out of two large pieces of flat Cycolac (heated and stretched over molds). They then hired a young company called Centaur Engineering to build it. It was a roadster constructed on a tubular space frame with an Sunbeam Alpine engine in the rear.

    The Cycolac Research Vehicle (CRV) debuted in January 1965 at the SAE show in Detroit ( the forerunner to SEMA). It was a hit!

    Marbon wanted to take the next step and hired Centaur to build a racing version. If Centaur could have the car ready for a race at Mid-Ohio that summer, Marbon would bring them into the company as a division.

    The car was completed on time. The second roadster was built on a fiberglass chassis with metal suspenion pieces bolted to the front and rear and powered by a Corvair engine. It also did very well in its' class that year.

    Centaur then built a third roadster for crash testing which was destroyed.

    Next they built two coupes, one after another, which were both sent overseas to promote Cycolac in foreign markets.

    While being test driven at OSI in Italy, an OSI employee crashed the CRV so hard it had to be returned to Detroit for repairs. OSI felt so bad they offered to build a replacement vehicle. So Marbon sent a body and chassis to OSI and they built their version of a CRV using Renault running gear.

    This car was eventually parked, stored, raced, sold, and stored away. It was recently found and purchased by an acquaintance of mine in Holland who is a big OSI fan.

    However, Marbon did not want to build cars, they wanted to sell plastic. So they were searching for someone to take over production of the car so they could sell them the bodies.

    Enter AMT, who was just getting into making real cars for the TV and movie industry. One of their promoters thought the CRV was a no brainer for their new shop in Phoenix so a deal was struck to build 50 cars a year.

    To promote the cars, the first car built was the Piranha dragster and then the sports racing car that Frank Zucchi found, restored, and is using in vintage races.

    Next the UNCLE car was built, and then AMT started building street versions. However, according to Gene Winfield, the cars were not as developed and refined as AMT was led to believe and it was costing them $7-8,000 each to build cars they planned to sell for $5,000. About the same time, Chevy announced the demise of the Corvair, so the Marbon/AMT deal was dissolved.

    AMT turned over the 2 or 3 built street Piranhas to Marbon and they parted ways. Marbon rebadged the cars as CRV's and placed them on display at various Marbon locations around the country. A yellow Piranha was wrecked at Pawnee Plastics in Wichita, KS and had to be returned to Detroit on a pallet.

    Eventually the cars got into private hands...
     
  22. No_Respect
    Joined: Jul 27, 2005
    Posts: 1,172

    No_Respect
    Member
    from So-Cal

    Being a young guy being born more than a decade after UNCLE had left the air I never knew about the Piranha but ten years ago I was staying at Gene Winfields and he started showing me pictures from back in the day and poof a spark went off in my head I saw my first Piranha. After that day I have many pictures of the cars saved on various hard drives but unfortunately I never knew much about them besides they were limited production and were corvair powered.. I always wanted to see one in real life (I have seen the drag one but cannot remember due to being six) I due hope you build her maybe take a mold of her so other people could have one? I know I would be interested in owning one.
     
  23. Can anyone answer...


    • How many bodies were built?
    • How many completed cars do you think were built?
     
  24. Very very cool car, can't wait to see progress pics. Best of luck with the build.
     
  25. Carguy1965
    Joined: Dec 14, 2008
    Posts: 168

    Carguy1965
    Member
    from Illinois

    About a dozen complete cars were made between Centaur and AMT; not exactly sure on the actual number.

    The number of bodies is also hard to determine. Some were defective but usable for parts like hoods, trunks, or doors.

    After the Marbon/AMT breakup, Marbon kept looking for new customers to sell the bodies to and found a kit car company in Nebraska that sold the bodies as a kit car for VW chassis. The bodies were later reproduced in fiberglass, first without modifications and later with.

    The modified "Seagull" bodies have shown up a few times but don't really look like the original design.
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2011
  26. Carguy1965
    Joined: Dec 14, 2008
    Posts: 168

    Carguy1965
    Member
    from Illinois

    Here is a shot of the CRV that was built by Italian coachbuilder OSI after they wrecked the CRV. We call it the OSI CRV.

    The other shot is the car as it was found last year after being parked after a stint at racing. It will be restored soon.
     

    Attached Files:

  27. Ryan
    Joined: Jan 2, 1995
    Posts: 21,633

    Ryan
    ADMINISTRATOR
    Staff Member

    Crazy little things... This is a great side bar post. Keep us updated!
     
  28. swi66
    Joined: Jun 8, 2009
    Posts: 18,172

    swi66
    Member

    The front suspension is unique.
    Certainly not a Corvair part.
    I wonder if the car used a rear Corvair suspension.
    That would make sense as the car was Corvair based.
    And the Early Corvair had a suspension rear assembley that would lend itself well as a "bolt in"
    The Pirahnna was used both in The Man from UNCLE, and the Girl from UNCLE.
    It was used sparingly though.
    In a Robert Vaughn interview he pointed out the car was not easy to enter or exit gracefully.

    The AMT model kit is rare and expensive, and was available in several versions.
    The Drag version was re-produced and is still around.

    There is also a small diecast, I beleive a Corgi Junior.

    I'm a fan of the man from uncle.
    And even have the complete series on DVD.
    Was one of my favorites as a child.
     
  29. fur biscuit
    Joined: Jul 22, 2005
    Posts: 7,828

    fur biscuit
    ALLIANCE MEMBER


    You are right, it was out racing at Infineon Raceway two weekends back. It has a 'vair drive train.
     

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