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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and most hellish! Last time, the Seata Spring triumphed in the poll… but it was short on cylinders. You see, what we all really want to spend eternity with is a V12 Hell Project (actually, what I want is an inline 12, but that's another topic), and we can thank the Germans for really expanding our low-budget dodecahoonage options in recent years. That's twelve combustion chambers, each itching to free itself from the bonds of that confining head gasket seal… twelve sets of rings… bearings… twelve sets of everything , and none of it cheap! But the initial purchase of a V12 car- or cars- can be quite inexpensive, and thus is a true Eternal Damnation Project born! We've done BMW 750iL Hell before , and we'll certainly do it again, since that fine machine ranks up there with the Citroën SM and Porsche 928 in the all-time annals of the Hell Garage. Today, though, we've...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! You want a project car that's different , don't you? Of course you do! Oh, sure, you'd have fun with a Lotus Esprit or Fiat 124 Sport Coupe (incidentally, the Lotus beat the Fiat rather handily in the Choose Your Eternity poll), but you wouldn't have the pride of driving a total oddball orphan genuinely unique machine. That's exactly what we've got for you today! You may not have heard of Siata , but they were once legendary for their Fiat-based (and even Crosley -powered) sports cars. The Siata Spring was based on the rear-engined Fiat 850 chassis, and you'd have a helluva time finding one… until now. We've got this '69 Siata Spring (go here if the ad disappears), which seems to run and doesn't suffer from much rust. What could go wrong, then? Well, a weirdo conversion of a nervous Italian machine, done by a now-defunct...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! You want an inexpensive project car that sticks to the pavement like flypaper? That's what we've got for you today! Now, when you're talking about a couple of rare European sports cars priced low even by collapse-of-global-economy standards, you've got to count on endless a few setbacks in the decade-long interval between the project's glorious arrival in your garage and the even more glorious day of project completion (which will require belief in an afterlife). Jump right in- the bubbling sulfur is fine! These days, just about the only Fiat you can find in North America is the 124 Spider, with maybe an occasional X1/9 here and there. Fine cars, but they're just too commonplace to make for true Hell Project material. If only you could find a genuine Fiat 124 Sport Coupe … but it's just impossible to find an affordable one. Stop...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Hard times is a-comin', and it's time to prepare for life on the move! The global economic meltdown doesn't mean you have to take a break from Hell Projects. In fact, it's more important than ever that you break out your Hell Project skills in order to give you and your'n an edge when it comes time to hit the road in search of work, handouts, escape from rampaging urban mobs, etc… and that means building a vehicle that can haul you, your loved ones, and a large percentage of your personal possessions around the land. We're talking pots and pans, crates of squawking chickens, and mattresses strapped to the outside of the vehicle here, with maybe Grandma lashing down the spare engine with bungee cords as you horse-trade some crafty yokel for a sack of cornmeal to feed your white liquor still. Sure, you could just buy a diesel Econoline...
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It's Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Since the ongoing Carpocalypse is on everyone's minds, let's go with the late-50s Carpocalypse today! I haven't had time to do many Project Car Hells lately, due to all the work caused by my personal Hell Project (which has been fully redecorated and looks far more evil than it did the last time you saw it). Last time we were here, the Mazda 323 GTX edged out the Shelby Dodge by a 55:45 ratio. Today we're going to reminisce about the good ol' days of the late 1950s, when recession coupled with the Big Three relentlessly crushing all competition resulted in rough times for marques such as Kaiser, Nash, Hudson, Packard, Frazer… well, you get the idea. Today we're going to take a look at a couple of projects that hail from their makers' final gasps for corporate breath: Hudson and Packard! Packard purists tend to frown on the "Packardbaker"...
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newVideoPlayer("/PCHTop30.flv", 506, 423,""); We've seen many levels of Project Car Hell since the Sprite-versus-Fiat matchup that started it all. Some PCH contestants have proven more compelling- if that's the word- than others. We've been doing this long enough that it's time for a Greatest Hits episode (though we haven't reached the point of the PCH reunion tour- that comes later), so we've gone through and found the Project Car Hell episodes with the largest amount of viewer traffic. You've voted with your eyeballs, and it's interesting to see what attracts the largest number of optics. It turns out that BMWs and Ferraris tend to be the most popular, with nutso engine swaps also generating plenty of discussion. Here you go: the Top 30 Fieriest Project Car Infernos. Be sure to crank up the Project Car Hell Song while reading! VW vs Porsche Aston Martin vs Alfa Romeo Ferrari vs Ferrari + Lotus BMW vs BMW Pontiac vs Toyota Nissan vs Aston...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Like chlamydia and financial crises , turbocharging was hot in the 80s… …and that means plenty of lightweight, crazy-handling turbocharged vehicles of that era can be had for a few tattered bills and some pocket lint these days. Yes, back when turbos made lots of noise and it was considered perfectly normal for turbo lag to make the car accelerate like a garbage truck dragging an overturned double-wide… right up until the moment at which the turbo built up pressure and the car leaped like a bobcat stung in the ass by an Asian giant hornet … straight into the nearest tree or parked car. Uncivilized turbocharged subcompacts, for total hoons serious drivers! And, since we had a near-even split between the two Detroit heroes in the Get Rich In The Limo Business Edition PCH , we're going to give third-tier PCH contender Japan a shot at wresting the rusty,...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! You want an insane project limo, right? Sure you do! Last time, we had a momentous upset in the Choose Your Eternity poll, with a Detroit car somehow managing to beat two French cars! Granted, no Citroëns were involved, but we're sure there's some weeping and gnashing of teeth in Paris right now. Not like France loses its PCH SuperAwesomeMegaPower rank, of course, but for now that turbocharged Falcon has brought a bit of the pride back to the reeling Motor City (and we're going to have a Detroit-on-Detroit matchup in honor of that accomplishment). Today we're returning to a level of the underworld we haven't visited since the Octo-Door '57 Chrysler took on the Stretch Ferrari 400 : Hell Limousines! Chrysler never built a Hexa-Door Dodge Dart station wagon- which we think was a terrible miscalculation- but when the Vatican demands such...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Yesterday, the Humber Super Snipe got out-prestiged by the Aston Martin DBS, according to the Choose Your Eternity poll , and you'd think we'd follow up Britain-on-Britain and Italy-on-Italy matchups with a matchup honoring the other PCH Superpower, France. Instead, we're going to make PCH Supergalactic Megapower France do battle with lowly PCH underdog America today, and then we'll have a France-on-France matchup. Can a Ford Falcon ever hope to generate the kind of toxic sulfurous flames needed to make an ordinary garage into a Hell Garage? The early Falcon was simple and reliable, shared a lot of components with other Ford products, and served as the basis for the first-gen Mustang, which- as we all know- benefits from compre-goddamn- hen sive aftermarket parts support. Sure it can, provided there's a backyard-built blow-through-carbureted...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! We went for a Lambo-on-Lambo matchup last time, with the Espada taking the win over the Murcielago , and that means we need to give equal billing to Italy's rival PCH Superpower, Great Britain. And, just to make things more interesting, we're not going to have any British Leyland products! Looking for a James Bond Aston Martin? Of course you are, but you're not one of those run-with-the-herd types who gets seduced by gadgets and impulse-buys a project DB5. No, you watch On Her Majesty's Secret Service for the 19th time and impulse-buy this 1968 Aston Martin DBS . What are the first words that come to mind when you see this fine British automobile? I mean, after "basket case" and "burn victim," that is? Exactly: Beautiful car . Even sitting in a dirt lot in California's Meth Gold Country, where it spends every winter...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Yesterday, the Warsaw Pact Hell Truck Projects ran just about neck and neck, with the trio of Romanian AROs beating the Soviet GAZ-69 in a 51:49 split. Today… well, after looking at all the backyard Lambos I've found lately, it seems like a good idea to have some real Lamborghini Hell Projects. Most of the time, it's tough to find a Lamborghini that isn't in great shape, since most of them don't exactly wear out their odometers during their lifetimes, but we've got a couple of genuine projects for you! You know what really counts most in the hearts of rabid highly devoted Italian-car freaks aficionados? Originality. A low-mileage original Italian supercar is sure to shatter your sanity knock 'em dead, but the prices- holy crap! Still, if you're willing to expend a lot of blood a little elbow grease, you can find a nice original...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Yesterday, the Warsaw Pact Hell Truck Projects ran just about neck and neck, with the trio of Romanian AROs beating the Soviet GAZ-69 in a 51:49 split. Today… well, after looking at all the backyard Lambos I've found lately, it seems like a good idea to have some real Lamborghini Hell Projects. Most of the time, it's tough to find a Lamborghini that isn't in great shape, since most of them don't exactly wear out their odometers during their lifetimes, but we've got a couple of genuine projects for you! You know what really counts most in the hearts of rabid highly devoted Italian-car freaks aficionados? Originality. A low-mileage original Italian supercar is sure to shatter your sanity knock 'em dead, but the prices- holy crap! Still, if you're willing to expend a lot of blood a little elbow grease, you can find a nice original...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! Last time, the '72 Stutz Blackhawk blackjacked the Buickborghini and stuffed it in the trunk, for disposal in a hole in the desert later on (the way so many Blackhawk owners in Vegas solved their problems back in the day), according to the 71% of you who voted that way in the Choose Your Eternity poll. Today we're going to go with a couple of choices that allow me to use not-often-seen-in-PCH flags in the poll: Romania versus the Soviet Union! 1989 wasn't such a great year for Romanian strongman Nicolae Ceauşescu , but, even as the rabble beat down the jeweled doors to his palaces, he could console himself with the inspiring thought that the "Romanian Jeep," the ARO 244, was available for sale throughout the world. Even in the evil, decadent United States, a truck shopper could march right into a seedy office above a taxidermy shop in...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! The sporty Simca beat up on the magnificent Humber in our last Choose Your Eternity poll , meaning France gets the PCH Superpower trophy… once it's out of the shop, that is. Today we're going to look at the sort of cars that desperate motivated sellers often refer to as "head turners." You know, it's weird and sort of cool, but also sort of horrible… and wouldn't it be fun to own one? The Basement Lambo was great, but who's got that kind of time? You might not want a Fiero-based Fieroborghini , but how about something in between? Say, this tube-framed, turbo Buick V6-powered Lamborghini Countach replica (go here if the ad disappears), which is priced at a low, low, super-low $8,000! Now, part of the reason this car is so cheap might be that the general pall of loserness cast by the sword-sliced Muncie home invaders (see photo...
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Welcome to Project Car Hell , where you choose your eternity by selecting the project that's the coolest... and the most hellish! We had as close to a tie as you're going to see in the Hell Garage, last time around, with the '77 911 Turbo just barely beating the '78 911 Turbo in the poll. Now it's time to return to some mano-a-mano PCH Superpower action, and not only that- it's time to look at crazy orphan cars from across the ocean, cars that will make passersby shun you like the freak you are admire your rebellious spirit. France versus Britain! Simca versus Humber! You got your Reliants and your Lloyds, but when you're talking about weird British marques that Americans can't identify… well, it's tough to beat a Humber. You get your Rootes Group-ish Chrysler-influenced styling, Lucas Electrics, and ahead-of-its-time technology (well, not really, unless the time is being set in Detroit) with the Magnificent Humber Sceptre ! Just look at that fine hunk...
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