A Revisit with Tex Smith's XR6 - with pics

Hey, remember Tex Smith's Hot Rod XR6?

Was a big deal in its day -- won the AMBR in 1963, was a Hot Rod cover feature, and became an AMT model kit. Employed a slant six Chrysler, wild asymmetrical styling, and other unique features. Here's a little historical feature on this one-off rod with some new photos you haven't seen before...

Tex Smith's Hot Rod XR6 | Mac's Motor City Garage.com

 

If the car remains un restored, props should go to the late Mal Barlow for keeping it that way in his collection here in Connecticut.

 

Somethings is missing? ?

 

Always did like that car....

 

now isn't that strange. i had been wanting to get the model for many years. i sold a henry j i had recently and finally had the money and bought one off of ebay. that thing is not cheap anymore either. always thought it was done very well. at the time, it was way out in left field compared to most street cars of that time.

 

Often, when you finally get to see these famous cars in person, they can be a letdown. You discover they're not that special in reality, they just looked great on the pages of the magazines. The XR6 is worthy of its hype.


Another look at Tex Smith's XR6 | MCG

 

Ditto! Mrs. Barlow was just as big a "Car Guy" as he was, I miss them both, they really enjoyed the hobby. Bob

 

That thing is so oddball, but I've always had a softspot for it. Beautiful slant 6, VW beam up front, the asymmetrical styling. A total icon of the wild 60's.

Always wondered if the VW beam had stock leaf packs or was it fortified somehow and did it have adjusters or stock anchors.

 

Built the model back in the day. Should have saved one.

 

Agree about famous cars seen in person. I will never forget the first time I saw Bill Jenkins' 68 Camero "Grumpy's Toy". It was pretty crude, dirty and needed a polish job something terrible. This was when it was nearly new!

 

The VW front end has torsion bars.

 

This picture looks like leaf stacks to me...no?

 

That's a VW Beetle front end assembly, which uses transverse torsion bars and trailing arms.

 

The XR 6 was one of a number of cars that influenced me as a child and opened my eyes to the fact that these cool "Hotrods" were built by everyday people.
Tex drove the point home with his excellent writing skills.

The car has many features we consider oddball now but in the day they were considered cutting edge. Look beyond those dated details and you have a pretty incredible Hotrod at the core.

As for VW's having torsion bars or leafs...they have a version of both!
A tightly packed group of what are essentially "leafs"...being used to support the vehicle by twisting from the fixed center point. Torsion in other words.
Everybody is right.

Imagine that!

 

The asymetrical styling was a pretty polarizing style. You either liked it or you didn't.

I like how Tex even carried the asymetrical theme over into the interior. The driver's seat is taller than the passenger seat! That car is so goofy, but there's something about it that just oozes Sixties Cool. Maybe it's the Slant Six (aka: The Leaning Tower of Power)

 

I remember reading an article on it from a '63 or '64 Car Craft mag where they "cut & twist" the beam to get a good preload and ride height out of the front end. Years ago when I first read that it made no sense untill the VW days when I did that like 2.3 bizzilion times. I'm pretty sure your right it still has the stock VW spring packs.

 

Thanks Chip. I figured it must have been cut and turned or early adjusters. Love how the snubber arms were just, unceremoniously lopped off....CHROME IT!

 

Hahaha...I didn't even notice they did that!
It's not even cut straight...but it doesn't matter anyway. It has CHROME.

With the right front bodystyle, VW beams actually look pretty good and remind me of the old pre-war European Grand-Prix (?) cars.

The thing that really kills them is the big shock bracket they have stock.
Once thats cut off and the shock relocated to the body...or maybe replaced completely with a lever shock...the pre-war style really starts to work.

With trailing arms front and rear the XR 6 must ride SMOOTH.....

 

Torsion bar?
Yes, but not in the sense of a Chrysler/Nissan/solid torsion bar.
They are a stack of leaves that twist. They are anchored in the middle to define a left and right.

Cool car in its day. I'd like to see a modern interpretation.

 

My thoughts exactly! I've often thought about using a VW beam and turning the arms to the front and making my own batwings to utilize a set of link-pin arms, and hang a tube axle off the front. For a light weight track roadster....In fact, I think Buttera's last little roadster had something like that, 'course his was ENTIRELY fabricated and the car was not my thing at all, but lots of amazing stuff. I think it would be neat to utilize the VW stuff and go as OLD-TIMEY vibe as possible.

 

If I was REALLY being honest, I've thought about this for my '63 Dart (w/ slant 6!). A little too scary of a proposition, I keep telling myself....

 

Right on!
People are too quick to dismiss the unusual stuff.
One of the things the early Hot Rodders had OVER us was their incredible imagination...unhindered by the "right and wrong" of the opinions of others.

They just DID stuff!
If it worked or it didn't...well, that was just how it went.
Experimentation was the norm.

I picked up this picture from the HAMB a while back. Don't know who posted it...and you might have it already.
I like how he indexed the mounting bits to allow suspension height adjustment.

 

you could certainly take a cue from the earliest of VWs that didn't have the tall shock towers on the front beam. Thye ran a lever type shock off of the arms instead. Or, for that matter with what is being discussed now, set one up with Dragmaster style friction shocks off of the lower arms.

 

That is pretty much exactly what I'm talking about...thanks for the pic!

 

Absolutely.

 

I was in high school when Tex built that car and getting home and finding the new issue of Hot Rod in the mail and reading about what he had done to the car was a lot of fun at the time. It's good to see that it has been well cared for over the years and the owner (s) after Tex sold it didn't decide that it needed to be changed.

 

I really like your take on the car. Some guys approach the matter as "I would never build a car like that" as if that were the point. I wouldn't build it either but I can still appreciate it.

And I'm also glad the car was never redone to make it more conventional or updated to reflect passing fads. One of my favorite angles is rear-quarter view. Sporty.

Another look at Tex Smith's XR6 | Mac's Motor City Garage

 

Yeah, a picture of the model kit...

 

Must have been that melted black rubber on the rear quarter panels...

 

There's one of those model kits on eBay right now!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/AMT-Double-...205?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item27cab127ad