Hot Rods The Most Valuable Car Ever Hotrodded?

bent it

 

To be fair, I am not into Maserati as such and not remotely an expert.

 

Alive and well Vintage Racing today. Bob

 

1953 Buick Skylark and 1936 Cord Westchester

 

Westchester (sedan) Cords are only worth $50-60,000. A driver-quality 1953 Skylark sold for $93,500 at this year's Hershey RM auction. Full concours resto Skylarks have gone for twice that, but the market for them seems to be fading.
I guess the question could be split into two:
What is the car of highest current value that has been rodded?
or
What is the car of that had the highest value when it was rodded?

 

I'm pretty sure its it is known which Maserati's were used for the Mantaray.
They were used in the Kirk Douglas movie The Racers ( 1955 ), and they were brought to the States in a batch to complete filming.
Some other well known racers were in that batch as well, and survived and are still being raced in vintage events.
The Stovebolt Spl. is one of them.

The most expensive car that was ever Hot Rodded has to be the Futura.
It cost 1/4 million 1955 dollars to build.

 

when i read the title the first car i thought of was a j foyt's land speed pierce arrow. we even had a thread about it. as always i was in left field.
https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/pierce-arrow-on-the-salt.204326/

 

I kind of meant, "what's the most valuable car that's has been chopped up and hopped up by a hotrodder?".

 

"I kind of meant, "what's the most valuable car that's has been chopped up and hopped up by a hotrodder?"."


OK... If you feel Barris was not a Hot Rodder...

 

Cushenberry to be more precise, but I didn't want to confuse you any more...

 

a couple of mild customs from expensive cars
Von Dutch painted Gullwing Benz and Dean Jeffries custom Porsche

here is what is supposed to be a Duesenberg

 

IIRC I think it brought over $4 million at auction a few years ago.

What do you think it's worth today?

 

To me?

Nothing at all.

But restored back to its Ghia Concept Car spec, priceless...

 

Batmobile vs Ford GT40 Roadster #109

Classic matchup, right there.

 

Larry Wood's 32 Nash Ambassador might be in the running. It is a full CCCA Classic with a big block

 

Interesting, the 166 Ferrari that they put a different nose on for the movie was later given a totally new body just like the original. I got to fine tune the body and paint it in the early 1980's. One of the nicest projects and owner I ever got to work with. Bob

 

In 1960 a Kiwi called Pat Hoare managed to by an ex works 1958 246 Dino V12 Ferrari directly from Enzo .
They were friends during WW2.
This was the same car driven to victory at the 1960 Monza GP by Phil Hill, and the last front engined car to win a Formula 1 Grand Prix.
This car was fitted with a 330HP 256 Testa Rossa Engine in 1959





In 1964 the rules were changed limiting the engine size to 2.7 litres so the 3.0 V12 256 engine was unable to race [256cc per cylinder x 12 = 3072cc]

So Hoare had Enzo supply him with blueprints of the '64 GTO, along with some components including the large wrap-around windscreen.
Hoare's long-time racing mechanic Ernie Ransley removed the F1 body-work from the Ferrari, which, fortunately, was kept and stored. Ransley then set about the task of converting the steering from central to RHD for the local NZ roads.
They built tubular framework on which the body could be shaped and mounted, and they shaped the body from sheets of 16 gauge aluminium, over a 9 week period.
The car was 6" shorter than a GTO because of the F1 chassis. But the F1 pedigree made it quicker than Ferrari's own GTO's.







The car now has been converted back to an F1 Car

 

Metalshapes, yes, you are correct. My dad and I purchased the Maxson - Jeffries sprint car [ex Foyt / Bowes Seal Fast special built by AJ Watson] back in '85 from Dean's ex wife Judy. In the garage, there were two Maserati 4 cylinder engines that Judy confirmed that were used in The Racers. We sold them to Chuck Davis [a collector of Miller Indy cars and Miller-Meyer/Drake- Offenhauser engines]. We were just interested in the sprint car and the spare Offy engines. She said, "all or nothing!" We ended up with two spare 220's, a laydown 270 and a two speed Offy transmission which we later sold to Watson for a restoration. As I remember the Maserati's were fairly complete, but were missing the turbochargers and carburetors.

 

Thanks Offy 220, it is always nice to read first hand knowledge on any Vintage Race Car stuff. Hope I can find a copy of that movie The Racers. Bob

 

Bid to $10 million with no sale - but it had been Un-Deaned
Dana Mecum paid $5 million for it I've heard.

 

Thanks so much for the update.

 

Not the most expensive to ever be rodded, but a pricey one. I saw this ’31-‘32ish Auburn convert about 15-20 years ago at shady classic car lot in central Iowa. It was an old 50’s build. Channeled, leaded rear fenders, and a Cadillac engine/trans. At the time the guy wanted around $20K for it which although I thought it was cool, was way too much for me. But it sure would drive the classic crowd crazy.