Motor Trend - USA (2020-09)

Cushenberry started with the

frame from a 1952 Jowett Jupiter,

an obscure British sports car

built from 1950 to 1954 and powered

by a 1.5-liter flat-four engine. The front

fenders and doors came from a 1960

Pontiac, the upper rear quarter panels

from a 1960 Corvair, the windshield and

roof from a 1953 Studebaker, and the rear

With this car the name of the Hot Wheels

version is a little snappier than that of the

1963 original, the Car Craft Dream Rod.

The Dream Rod started as a project by the

staff of MotorTrend stablemate Car Craft

to imagine their ultimate hot rod.

Drawings of the car appeared in the

October 1961 issue of the magazine, and

in 1963, hot rod and custom car show

promoter Bob Larivee commissioned

Silhouette builder Bill Cushenberry to

turn those drawings into a real car. And

what a car, with parts rummaged from all

over the place.

Its real name was the King T, and

when completed in 1964, it was

regarded as a landmark Model

T–based hot rod. Owned by Don

Tognotti, it was built in Los Angeles

by Tognotti and Gene Winfield, who

fabricated a custom tubular steel

frame to support a 1914 Model T Ford

body originally purchased for $300.

Conceived as a show car from the outset,

King T was powered by a lightly modded

265-cube small-block from a 1955 Chevy,

driving through an early GM Hydramatic

transmission controlled using the vintage

Model T spark advance and retard levers

mounted on the steering column.

What made King T stand out—apart

from Winfield’s eye-popping Lavender

Pearl paint job—was its chrome-plated

independent rear suspension, complete

with inboard-mounted Airheart disc

brakes. Designed and

fabricated by California

race car builder Walt

Reiff, it used the center

section of a 1955 Chevy

back axle and driveshafts

from a GMC truck—each

shortened 4 feet.

King T won the Amer-

ica’s Most Beautiful

Roadster award at the

1964 Oakland Roadster Show and was the

subject of a popular 1/25th scale plastic

model kit four years before it became one

of the Hot Wheels Original 16. Restored

to its original 1964 spec—with Winfield

giving it a fresh paintjob—King T sold at

auction in 2010 for almost $86,000.

window from a 1957 Borgward Isabella.

Inside was a 1958 Mercury dash, and

the powerplant was a 289 Ford V-8. The

Dream Rod was remodeled in 1966 and

renamed the Tiger Shark, but in 2008 it

was restored to its original specification.

Big Dreams. Life-size vehicles. Now on the app.

IN EVERY EPISODE OF LIFE SIZE,

streaming on the MotorTrend

app, professional race car

driver and builder Nicole Lyons

explores some of the real-world,

full-scale versions of vehicles

from the Hot Wheels Garage

of Legends. Lyons not only tells

the stories behind the unique

designs of each vehicle but

also gets to do something many

people only dream of doing—

take them for a test drive.

The opening episode, “Bone

Shaker,” details the 425-horse-

power, open-roof, skull-grilled,

spinal-column-shifted 1932 Ford

hot rod that epitomizes what

people love about both Hot

Wheels and homemade cars.

Next comes “Twin Mill”

(pictured), the first car that

Hot Wheel commissioned to

make life size. Twin Mill has two

engines, two superchargers,

and zero visibility. After

highlighting all the full-size Twin

Mill attributes, Lyons takes the

temperamental dual-engine

behemoth on a test drive

through the desert where things

get ... smoky.

After that, we get inside the

Life Size cars that performed

a six-story loop and record

corkscrew jump and take them

for a spin with Tanner Foust.

Then we meet Hot Wheels

designer Brendon Vetusky,

who radically modified a 1967

Pontiac Firebird that became

a 1:64-scale Hot Wheels car, as

well as a modern-era reprise of

the Deora concept with famed

designer Chip Foose.

Finally, Darth Vader’s personal

car makes an appearance.

Wait, what? You can only

see it if you watch it on the

MotorTrend app.

With six Life Size episodes

already available for viewing,

signing up for the MotorTrend

app means you can binge this

and other shows—including

NASCAR All In, Roadkill,

Engine Masters, Dirt Every

Day, Autobiography, Wheeler

Dealers, and Texas Metal. Q

Nicole

Lyons and

the Twin Mill.

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