The Creation Of Something Special In 1160 Pictures…

June 28, 2014Gargling Gas 1 Comment

… special to me anyway. Search Gargling Gas for the Buick Grand National and you’ll find a fair few posts on my infatuation with it.

It’s not totally unrealistic to find a solid example and have it shipped over from the States for a reasonable price (£10-15K). Most sensible, and let’s face it, boring non-car people will probably cry, “An American muscle car in the UK? Are you mad?” Yes, probably, but then I could counter the remark with something like, “Wow, £5K on touching up the woodwork on your stairs”, or, “£25K for a small soundproof recording studio?” Each to their own and all that…

People spend out on the things that make them tick, whether it’s a giant train-set or a set of rare stamps, and everyone knows and accepts this. Except when it comes to cars (I’ve found) people are quick to comment, frown, stroke their metaphorical beard – or in the case of my mother-in-law, her beard. Non-car people suddenly turn into Jeremy Clarkson and offer advice based on a one car experience, whether it was their own, a family member’s or even a friend’s.

“Oh, you wanna steer clear of Fiats, mate. My sister’s cousin had one… nothing but trouble.”

“No, no no… I’d go with a turbo diesel. Reliable and just as fast as petrol engines. They’ve come a long way with those diesels, y’know.” Etc…

Now I’ve gone off on a tangent and will swiftly get back to what this post is about.

Today I found a great piece featuring a Buick GNX on the American Resto Mods website. Pictured above is a very tired 1987 Buick GNX exhumed from a Louisiana bog in 2011. The poor thing was left parked in the mud since 1991 – 20 years! Who would leave a four-year-old GNX – any car, for that matter – in the mud for two decades?

Thankfully, the mud being situated along the gulf meant enough oil content to prevent any serious rust. In fact, the important and structural parts of the car were solid, and apart from having to evict insects and mice from their cosy home, the Buick was great restoration material.

Click the link below, and in 1160 pictures, witness the love and dedication that transformed the above into the stunning example below.

1987 Buick Grand National Restoration

A few Gargling Gas Grand National posts:

Love At First Sight

Buick, Please Don’t Taint A Legend

45 Minutes Of Dirty Rats

June 7, 2014Gargling Gas Leave a comment

It’s Saturday afternoon, my wife is out and my dogs are asleep. This means trawling the web for cool car videos, cranking up the volume and kicking back without any requests to fix things or throw tennis balls.

If you’re a car guy, whether you like tuner imports, American muscle or the latest supercars, a part of you has to respect the Rat Rod. They are ugly, noisy and uncomfortable, but they look amazing and are usually pretty damn fast. Its rising popularity has spawned the TV show, Vegas Rat Rods (Sin City Motors in the UK), a series showing there’s a lot more than just rusted old parts that go into a build. Oh yeah, and there’s the junkyard diva, Twiggy lending a helping hand.

The Rat Rod was what you once considered a vehicle pieced (botched) together out of any parts that would make it function until the inevitability of an other component failure. If it received bumps, scratches and the exposed metal rusted, who cares? It was just a machine that carried stuff from A – B; it got the job done.

Over the past decade, these classic rust buckets have merged with the resto-mod scene, scrap-worthy vintage shells now fetching silly money so they can be kitted out with new drive trains, suspensions, and even turbo chargers. You’ll hear the word “Patina” used a lot within the Rat community, as a true Rat needs to possess a layer of corrosion. Some builders may simply coat their vehicle in matt black paint, whilst the majority leave the areas of patina on show and treat the entire shell with a clear coat, protecting it from further corrosion.

As you can imagine, the sky’s the limit with these builds – literally anything can be added for originality or personal expression. The Ford Model A is the granddaddy of the Rat Rod basis, a foundation onto which anything can happen…

…which leads seamlessly onto the video below.

Will the dogs wake up? Will my better half return? 45 minutes is all I ask… Are you with me?

Old Parked Cars: Unique Unusual But Great

May 31, 2014Gargling Gas 1 Comment

Gargling Gas adores the battered and bruised, the old dogs that compare and brag about their scars, cars that have served a purpose and clocked up the miles rather than sat gleaming in garages.

Take Christine’s ugly sister above, for example, a car that has attended the ‘University Of Life’, a mechanical Stephen King that could bend your ears for hours about their road trips, owners, bumps and scrapes they’d been through.

Whilst I try and feature all the aspects I love about cars, this post may not resonate with every petrolhead, gearhead or car guy out there. To Gargling Gas, some cars possess character, charm and personality, no matter what their condition. I recently wrote a post on murdered-out cars that partly conveys why I am so passionate about the automobile.

Not many sites are purely dedicated to such a specific aspect about the car, but I stumbled across an amazing place called, Old Parked Cars, and this is exactly what it presents. It reminded me of a guy who published a book solely on atmospheric photos of parked cars, a book I posted about – check it out, Patrick Joust is very talented at capturing just what I’m whittling on about.

I’ve also previously mentioned the horror author, Stephen King on here. If you are aware of his work you’ll have probably detected his love of machines, trucks and cars. Whilst Joust manages to capture a cars’s presence on film, King does it wonderfully through words – I wrote a post on Evil and Cars and King crops up the most.

Actually, now that I’m coming to this post’s conclusion and can see all the highlighted links I’ve added, I’ve just realised I have no conclusion – what I’ve done is unconsciously pieced together a jigsaw of EXACTLY why I love cars – a bit of a long-winded way of doing doing it, I admit, so I apologise if you’ve stuck with it and questioned just what the hell I’ve been banging on about.

Do remember this though, “Because cars have feelings too…”

ZZZ ZZZ Sleeper

May 25, 2014Gargling Gas Leave a comment

What you see above isn’t quite what you’d expect. Okay, so it’s obviously a sleeper build (the title and reg plate also give it away), and you’d be right in thinking this ordinary 80s Ford possesses a little extra grunt. Now take a closer look at the Granada’s wheels – you’re probably now expecting the build to have taken on more than the usual sleeper modifications.

I first saw this car featured in a forum a few years ago when it featured a 600-hp Ford Cosworth YB engine. Even that was a monstrous transplant, leaving a demon sleeper capable of embarrassing pretty much anything on the roads.

I have so much respect for the owner and builder for what he did next I think I’d swoon if I met him. I know he is from Norway, and judging from his history with his beloved Ford Granada, he’s missing a few nuts and bolts upstairs. As if 600-hp wasn’t enough, he ripped the Cosworth engine out and installed (wait for it) a twin-turbocharged 4.7-L V8 built by Ford and re-engineered by Koenigsegg. Multiply its previous power output by nearly 3 and you are left with 1700-hp… Jesus H Christ.

Isn’t she a thing to behold, a wonderful experiment taken too far? Of course, all this ludicrous power is harnessed by a lot of other modifications – follow this thread for a detailed diary and pictures of the build.

What I admire most about this creation is the fact the owner knew exactly what his sleeper should be. The Granada isn’t the obvious choice as there’s the classic Escort and Sierra that are the usual Fords to take on the mods. It’s 80s, boxy and cool, and although it suggests a few extra hps, you’d never suspect a whopping 1700 of them.

I take my hat off to you, you mad Norwegian Doc Emmett Brown – you’ve created the world’s most terrifying sleeper.

If you agree and want to see more of this chap, check out his Facebook page and watch the monster come to life in the video below.

Fall From Grace: Mercedes 280ce

May 21, 2014Gargling Gas Leave a comment

The car above is everything I love about cars. Affectionally known as Grace, the beautiful Mercedes has a few tricks under her dress. From the image above you see a wonderfully cared for 1972 Mercedes 280ce, a car anyone would be proud to be seen driving around town. However, approach her and dare to get a little personal and you’ll see there’s a lot more than meets the eye.

As you can see, someone has gifted her some rather nice black shoes and Pirelli rubber. Her stance has been altered to lift her gorgeous rear end, and just look at the results. Like I said, this is what I personally like about cars, and whilst I respect 100% originality in restorations, I also love tasteful customisations – if you were to purchase Grace, all the original parts come with her, like it or not.

Grace has personality and charm. She’s from a time when cars were beautiful and expected to last longer than 10 years. Her drivetrain has been fully rebuilt and virtually all of her working parts have either been reconditioned or replaced. I guess you could call her a resto-mod as some of the parts are new and the overall finish clearly shows off some modern touches.

Grace is pretty yet menacing, beautiful yet dangerous, and I have fallen head over heals for her. I think if I owned her, I’d like to shoehorn the 6.3-L AMG lump and make her a true Sleeper. If you want Grace in your garage, check out the link below. Oh, and just like all beautiful women, she’s not cheap.

Gorgeous Grace

Little Red Corvette

May 17, 2014Gargling Gas Leave a comment

The Corvette is to America what the Aston Martin is to England. It doesn’t need any introduction, and since the majority of my readers are from the States, I don’t need to waffle on about heritage or what it means to the U.S. However, I will say that the word ‘Corvette’ – in my mind – evokes images of those signature rear lights, Face from the A-Team, and the crossed flags badge. The Corvette is light and slender and designed to cut the air like a bullet. The horsepower is always massive and models of past were loud widow-making maniacs… which is why I’ve always fancied one.

Over here in the UK you can pick up a 2008 car with low miles for under £30,000. The C6 is a great-looking car, and I found an eBay example for £28,000 that possesses a massive 6.2-L V8. Because the Corvette is light compared to the European cars, and the fact it pumps out 440-bhp, it is fast… very fast. You get the looks, a wonderful sound track that can crumble buildings, and enough power to lay thick elevens every time you even glance at the accelerator.

Although Jeremy Clarkson contradicts himself a lot when it comes to the Corvette (most cars come to think of it) – he loves it, he hates it, it’s too flimsy, it’s the most uncomfortable ride in the world, you can’t have one in Britain etc – I don’t think it’s too out of place in the UK. We are a nation of people who need big 4X4s just to pop to the Post Office. Certain parts of the UK you’ll only find Range Rover Sports and Mercedes G Wagons, all driven by mums who need to fit in two children and a handbag. Why would the Corvette be out of place? It’s not massive compared to these 4X4s, it’ probably more economic than the supercharged Range Rover, and it’s no bigger than an Aston Martin or Ferrari 599.

If you want that car with savage acceleration and a gut-rumbling sound track, the Corvette is the one for the job. It may be a little flimsy, but it is light and will keep you on your toes when the road turns bendy. If I suffer a midlife crisis, I’ll take a red Corvette over the 911 any day.

H.R. Giger Inspired Car Art

May 14, 2014Gargling Gas Leave a comment

Yesterday I sadly learned the passing of the incredible and incomparable surrealist painter, sculptor and set designer, H.R. Giger. If you’ve seen the Alien movies you’ll have witnessed the mind of this Swiss genius. I’m not usually a Sci-Fi fan, but the horrors Giger introduced into the Alien movies pushed them heavily into the horror sub-genre – I’m a big fan of violence, blood and gore.

I was lucky enough to watch the first film at a friend’s house, aged 11. If I’m to be totally honest, I did scare me a little as the film set and Aliens were so startlingly real – this movie makes the CGI of today look silly and amateur.

A few years later at secondary school I was friends with a kid whose father earned a good living supplying the U.S. with his massive modern art canvases during the late 80s. This friend had a few H.R. Giger books in his room, and thumbing through them because of my love of horror, I realised this chap had a lot more going on in his head (pic above). Obviously, been a teenage male, this horror erotica stuck with me.

I was very sad to hear the great man had passed and it reminded me of the inspired car art pictured below. Further investigation led me to a whole load of Giger inspired automotive art, so seeing as this is a car site and I’m a big Giger fan, it’s totally fitting that I say R.I.P. and present some of the art inspired by the man now casting light somewhere dark, dank and brimmed with horror.