Uh,yaw, well, it looks to be in better shape then when I saw it last............It had been stored outside, and it was gettin' rough At least it wasn't ''street rodded"! The Lancia that Lowey did via Pourtout, is alittle easier on the eyes than '' his '' BMW , but it would require alot of expensive scotch to call it swoopy or tasteful. " Humpty Dumpty was pushed "
I agree. The BMW 507 restyle was just plain wrong, taking an exciting and agile sports car into a boulevardier direction. What he did with one of Bob Gregorie's better designs, the '40-'41 Lincoln Continental is no better. Gregorie . . . Loewy . . . Gregorie . . . Loewy . . . Thankfully Loewy messed about mostly above the beltline and didn't totally waste a perfectly good Continental coupe. The great puzzle for me, however, is the funeral-coach quarter windows. Mike
Perhaps I missed it earlier, but I don't recall seeing the handsome Coachcraft '41 Mercury with the three-position steel top on this thread. This elegant piece of restyling and coachwork still knocks me out 60-some years after I first saw it as a youngster. It was red back then, but the current color plan is very decent and respects the original work. And while I'm here, I apparently missed some tribute to one of the more agile of the swoopy cars, the Maserati Tipo 60 sportsracer -- the "Birdcage." The headlight and engine air intake scheme were rather so-so but the shape of the rest of this rascal was as clever as the reasons behind its design.
That BMW looks like a pantomime pastry chef. I must admit that any admiration I might have had for Loewy has upon ample later reflection been offset by awareness of the enormity of Loewy's crime of designing a streamlined pencil sharpener: This is where all this crap about the mechanism being none of the duly titled owner's business started, and it's just been getting worse. (I can't deny that it's kind of cool, though.)
I don't consider a Voisin as "swoopy" by any stretch of the imagination...but I couldn't pass up posting this first image. (1935 Voisin C25 Aerodyne.)
They are sooo eccentric. Voisins are no doubt fascinating pieces of engineering, and I imagine that their build quality was first rate, but I'm still a little baffled at the Pebble Beach judges picking Mullin's Voisin for Best of Show last year. Elegant? Welll...
I had seen all of these before, and were part of the basis for my remark. Interesting anecdote about this car: when I was a lad of 10 or so, our family lived in West Hollywood. Peter Stengel, the guy who commissioned that Merc, was a tenant in a duplex belonging to the family of a playmate of mine. Since I was already into cars even at that young age, my pal took me to see this strange car that lived in his building. At that time (as you said, Mike) the car was red, the top was covered with white top material, and the T-tops were mysteriously in Navy blue fabric. Odd, but OK. At a still later time, the car belonged to Mark Dees, and was painted a very handsome metallic root been top and bottom. It was exhibited at the Pete in that scheme. I'm not sure who owns it now. It may belong to the Pete, but I don't know. I love the look of these things. I was stunned the first time I saw one, because the wheel humps were taller than all the rest of the body -- There have been others as low since, but that was a first for me. I got to have that reaction all over again twice a couple of years later -- the first with the introduction of the Lotus 23, pretty swoopy in its own right, and the second with the picture of the Shadow Can-Am car on the cover of R&T. Mind boggling. I'm not sure that "swoopy" is the right descriptor for the Shadow prototype -- "Unbelievable" is more fitting. I don't believe it ever competed in that form, but its introduction was certainly memorable.
Here's a random few I haven't seen in the thread: Ford P68 aka F3L aka 3L GT. Wasn't raced much but man it's pretty. Kind of reminds me of a GT40 mixed with a 330 P4. The AC A98 Coupe. The car was built by AC on a 289 Cobra platform and raced exactly once, at Le Mans in '64. It was wrecked and hidden away until found and restored recently. The Deco Rides Deco Scoot, from the people who built Scrape: Oldsmobile Aerotech - Olds made a few of these just for shits and grins. The first ones were powered by Quad4 engines but the later one had a V8. The long tail version is my favorite.
1969 Holden Hurricane The futuristic research vehicle described as an experiment “to study design trend, propulsion systems and other long-range developments” has been restored to its former glory as a labor of love by a dedicated group of Holden designers and engineers. Codenamed RD 001, the Hurricane is a mid-engine, rear-wheel drive, two-seat sports car incorporating a remarkable array of innovative features and technology, much of it years ahead of its time. Features such as electronic digital instrument displays, station-seeking radio, automatic temperature control air conditioning, rear-vision camera and an automated route finder were all showcased in this ground-breaking vehicle 43 years ago. Many of these technologies have only recently made their way into mass production, demonstrating Holden’s remarkable foresight into both design and engineering technology. The Hurricane stole headlines and dropped jaws nationwide when it debuted at the 1969 Melbourne Motor Show.
Hey Mike, I think the Lincoln you've pictured is the Frank Lloyd Wright ''custom'' and not the one Loewy did? The one Loewy did had port holes and was painted light pink. As legend has it, Loewy finished up the build, and dressed up the chauffeur in a light pink outfit, complete with pillbox hat, then brought the vehicle around for Edsel Ford to check out. Edsel is said to have taken one look at the vehicle & chauffeur, stepped back into the doorway, drew a cold shudder, and refused to meet with Loewy about the Continental. The Wright Continental was purchased in 1940, driven by Wright, but later wrecked by his son-in-law. The Ideal Body Shop of Madison Wisconsin did the '' conversion '' to Wright's direction. Wright owned another Continental, but I don't think it was built into a kustom. " Meanwhyle, back aboard The Tainted Pork "
. Here's Loewy's 1941 Lincoln Continental, then and now. It sold at Gooding & Company's Scottsdale sale in 2008 for $451,000... .
You're right; I was confused for sure. Thanks for setting matters straight. The Loewy Continental is equally as wrong and disrespectful of a very decent design, however -- IMHO, of course. Mike
So many fine vertical grille wonder cars in this topic, so I must add mine supercar here too.. 361 CI , 303 HP, standard overdrive trans + 3.60:1 gears IT so FUN to ride with my "ELLI" Edsel, just look pedestrians faces, "what a hell is coming from there ..." It´s surprisingly fast too !
Delahaye has already been pictured but I wanted to bring this thread back up so here's a few more from the king of swoopiness, Delahaye... I especially like the red one. p.s. the maroon Jag xk120 pictured earlier just knocks me out!
Oh yes, I always thought the '42-'47 Chevrolet Aerocoupe had great potential as a swoopy road-race car. Maybe with a chop and channel, maybe just low and level.
Noble streamline car and trailer: http://weirdrvs.rvtravel.com/2013/04/noble-streamline-car-and-trailer-catch.html http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdOxeZGRLiM
The Jalopy Journal
