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HelloHi, get your ad done. You know you want to.
Trivia:
All entries had cast-iron blocks
All entries opted to keep their steel panels
Entries are evenly split between manual and DCT ones
There are no twin-turbo V10s in the roster
Only one entry opted for an active suspension
The fastest car was the slowest one
The color scheme for your entry reminds me of the M3 GTR from Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Iāve never seen anyone use such a livery on that body before, and it looks ace. Besides, you deserve extra kudos for having the audacity to swap the stock V8 for a Barra turbo six from a contemporary BA Falcon XR6 Turbo.
This is Sunset Garageās first fully clean-sheet design, created by our new in-house design division with passion and care. Inspired by the swooping lines and boattails of cars from the 1930s, as well as the waves in our own backyard, this beauty looks like nothing else on the road!
The customer must provide a 4.6 Ford V8 and chassis from a New Edge Mustang donor, which we will convert to flat-plane and rework so it screams and revs. We also will add the latest in suspension and tire tech to harness this power. This will back up the looks with the sort of fun no other car can provide!
The car comes with a sumptuous interior, featuring Aliraconnect 8 and Herman Cordone sound, courtesy of our partner company, Alira.
One just like this can be yours today for the incredibly low sum of $30,000 plus a donor car!
Your submission looks unrecognizable given its relatively humble underpinnings (and especially so for anything with the '95 Lancer coupe body of that size). Granted, there is precious little authenticity on the outside, but itās a minor criterion compared to exterior design as a whole.
10:21 AM, Saturday, XX/XX/2021
Darrell sits in his bed, his laptop beside him as he reads his e-mails. He can smell the fragrance of coffee coffee and hear Julia and the kidsā voices from the kitchen, but his mind is elsewhere. Two weeks have passed since his initial request for restomod proposals, and heās received four of them. None of them are from Lonestar Labs: his drinking buddy, Joe, has insider info that this local garage is busy with an $80,000 Fiero project.
BRM, Mons Customs, Sparky Tās and Sunset Garage. Darrell has heard of a couple of them. All four looked and sounded promising at first glanceā¦ So to make life easier, he invited the more mechanically adept Joe over to his place.
Joe arrives a loutish 15 minutes late, and after a relatively incident-free dinner with the Butler family (in which the guest mostly stays silent so as to not unduly expand the vocabulary of Darrellās kids) demands to see the proposals his friend has received. After looking thoroughly through the e-brochures, the two discuss Darrellās options.
The Godzilla is the first car they go over. While Joe praises the rock-solid powertrain of the drop-top and Darrell is impressed by the idea of a classy muscle roadster, the styling - with its bland front end and half-baked rear - clicks with neither man. Darrell in particular proclaims that a six-eyed Mustang is just distasteful. Joe notices a further particularly irritating detail: the tires on the beastly 4000-pound bruiser are stated to be skinnier than the original! Resolving to leave the Godzilla as a fallback option, the two turn their attention to the next proposal.
After the overly rotund Godzilla, the lean, mean Canary has quite an impression. Darrell points that the rear of the car has had no serious improvements, and that he would have preferred a car that doesnāt scream ātrack toyā as loudly - the scaffolding in place of the child bench doesnāt help; otherwise, though, he is impressed. His hopes for the Mons proposal rise further when Joe goes into a long-winded rant about how the car is very well set up for spirited driving, will accelerate like a rocket, and has an engine to rival sophisticated OEM offerings like the GT350R. The Canary is an exciting prospect, but Darrell does push onto the other two proposals - if something can indeed beat this thing, itād have to be absolutely stunning.
Darrellās review of the Speed Six begins with him listening to Joe bash Sparky Tās for cannibalizing Cobras and Falcons for its parts, and a thought occurs to the family man: The other proposals, all of which ask for pretty much his entire $30,000 mod budget, include fabricating bespoke suspensions, cylinder heads and the like. Meanwhile, the Speed Six seeks to skirt by on a somewhat smaller budget, but the end result is the most outdated product of the bunch - and the slowest, too, even despite its supposed track aspirations. And though Joe - apparently an old-school Need for Speed fanboy - likes the paintjob, the box-track car exterior does nothing for Darrel. Itās the only car of the four that retains the rear bench, but neither man is swayed by this.
Darrell knows that his jaw dropped the first time he saw the mad, radical convertible design proposed by Sunset Garage. And earlier on, when Joe was clicking through the e-brochures, he clearly saw Joeās jaw (ha!) drop even further. Whatever pang of sadness he should have felt at the erasure of his Mustangās entire exterior is drowned in awe at the jagged edges and hyper-low profile of the Volante. Joe eventually picks himself up from the floor and explains that the Volante can be expected to handle and accelerate well, but will lose out to the Canary in most performance categories - a missing gear here, a fraction of a second there, a tenth of a g off, and so on. The active suspension system seems to be a culprit in the weight, and the engine isnāt quite as bloodthirsty (or generally thirsty) as either friend would prefer, but itās all still very competitive, and goddamn it looks good. As Darrell braces himself for a difficult decision, his middle child, Rex, walks in, notebook in hand - probably to ask for some help with his math homework. As soon as he notices the Volante on his fatherās computer screen, said notebook falls to the floor. As does the poor kidās jaw.
As the evening draws to a close, Darrell gets his thoughts in order and at last comes to a decision:
The Speed Six (4th Place) is the first to go. While there are some very nice ideas behind the design and engineering, it ultimately ends up a leopard fighting lions, with below-par gear and the weakest engine by a very wide (~60 hp) margin, and Darrell dislikes the boxy fenders and the bizarre, nonexistent pseudodiablo door mirrors.
The Godzilla (3rd Place) is next on the chopping block. While the car has probably the manliest and coolest powerplant of the group, and compensates for the shortcomings of its manual transmission very well, it falls flat in the style department. The idea was great. The execution? Well, when Darrell first saw the taillights he though the BRM people screwed up their rendering. And thatās not acceptable.
Darrell was very close to picking the Mons Canary (2nd Place) after Joeās impassioned speech on its engineering virtues. The car is remarkably solid and rational with that regard, with just the right amount of spending allocated to everythingā¦ Expect for the styling. While Darrell prefers the Canary to the prior two entries, it still looks as if somebody took his Mustang and put modern LED rice on it - and though itās done tastefully, it has the vibe of a tryhard tuner. And that is why it was beaten by a car with much more irrational, flamboyant engineeringā¦
Eh, itās process of elimination, you knew this was coming. The Sunset Volanteās flamboyant approach to engineering is more than rescued by its equally flamboyant approach to styling. The whole visual package, from the color (or lack thereof) to the mean fenders and the lightstrip-based illumination, comes together in a shocking design, as evidenced by the reactions of Darrellās entire family. Darrell was also impressed by the well-sorted suspension that takes away the woes of a low ground clearance or the inherent harshness of the carās sporty ride, and the wonderfully upholstered seats. It was far from an easy decision, what with the Canary being both faster and more nostalgic, but in the end, the Volanteās charm won out, and Darrell wired a $30,000 dollar sum over to the West Coast.
Darrell is ever independent, but he is also a show-off. Having taken delivery of the most stylish car in the county, he was anxious to stick it to the snobbiest and most competitive of his peers and neighbors. So one might be surprised to learn that he hid the thing in his garage for 2 whole days after delivery - right up until Rexās karate practice that week. It was the only family chore a 2-seater was capable of performing, so when the time came, Darrell lit up the streets for the very first time in the Volante, catching stares whenever he went. Picking up his son from practice was even more satisfying, though: watching fellow parents and kids alike freeze in place and stare as the Butler kid nonchalantly made his way to the stainless-steel beast, hopped right over the door into the passenger seat and was driven away in a glorious cloud of tire smoke.
āThat dirtbag Darrellās new toyā was the talk of the suburb for the next couple weeks - no wonder, seeing as it made the normally quiet area come alive with flat-plane barks and yells. Tales of gapped S550s and LC500s were told, and the price of Darrellās new car was the topic of every wifeās (and husbandās) gossip. And Darrell was happy, and more smug than a fox: after all, he hadnāt bought a new car. He just spent $30,000 to make everybody like his āpathetic piece of junkā Mustang GT. The only question that remained was when to divulge that fact to everybody elseā¦ Something to look forward to.
Thanks to @Texaslav for the really well-written writeups! Iām going to work on some ideas and hope to get ARM12 up within the next few days!
Awesome, and congrats! 
Thanks for hostng this round texaslv! I canāt say Iām surprised to finish last. I kind of shot myself in the foot, thinking I had an extra week to work on this and didnāt go quite as crazy as I had planned. And I figured the Barra six would put me at a disadvantage, but as a straight six fan itās the swap I would do with a Mustang.
Either way, this was a fun one!
Hm, two overly bland cars in a row which tanked my chances? Maybe itās time to think biggerā¦ Absolutely love the round, it was a super fun car to work with!
After spending some time getting ideas, looking through car bodies and coming up with some briefs, I went to go double check my schedule, armed with some new exam info I got today. After combining all that with the work I knew was coming already, itās becoming clear that 2 weeks from now is going to be a really busy time. Considering that Thanksgiving is also coming at about the time this challenge is set to finish, adding more busyness, I think it would be unwise for me to host. I apologize for the delay, but I think Iāl pass this down to @cake_ape .
Allright, Iāll be happy to host. Thanks for passing it on @HelloHi. Once more, Iād like to offer you a chance to vote for which car youād like to mod in the next round. This time I have not two, but three cars in the running! Please indicate your preference in the poll below. The poll will be live until Saturday midnight (whatever timezone the forum is on??). Then Iāll have a brief out early next week featuring the winner. Without further ado, the candidates are:
0 voters
With only a few hours to go, I think it is safe to call this one and declare the Caddy the winner. Iāll work on the brief and get it up sometime later today!
