2019 Hot Wheels™ Legends Tour: Los Angeles

MotorTrend

Hot Wheels® comes to Los Angeles! For this final event

Transcript

00:00 If you look at the judging criteria, the first item is the right spirit, right?

00:04 Anyone can do or can try to build something, right?

00:07 Versus a guy who's experienced professional builder.

00:10 Hey guys, I'm Magnus Walker here at the final Hot Wheels Legends Tour in Santa Clarita.

00:24 This is the last one, so you should be here because if you win, you go to SEMA and if

00:29 you win at SEMA, you get your car made into a Hot Wheels.

00:32 Hello, my name is Daisy Czajwik.

00:45 I'm Stanley Czajwik.

00:46 And this is our Buick Chafer 1933 IndyCar.

00:49 Everything started in 2003 in Czech Republic, where we established our company, Hot Rod

00:53 Czajwik, and we started to fabricate all these IndyCars, race cars and Hot Rods.

00:58 So, we opened a new branch of our company here and started doing the dream work.

01:04 We built this car in Czech Republic and brought it here.

01:07 And the car is handcrafted, made of aluminum body, everything set up together.

01:11 It's a tribute car, 1933 Buick Chafer.

01:16 It's a 500-speed racer from Indianapolis.

01:21 It's exactly the same as it was, but the car never touched the race.

01:26 Yes, I built everything from scratch.

01:28 Engine, exhaust, intake, seats, tank, floor, everything.

01:32 My name is Rick O'Donnell.

01:44 I have a '74 Opel Manta.

01:47 So I bought a Nissan 240SX and I cut the top of the 240SX off, cut the bottom of the Opel

01:52 Manta off, and then welded the two cars together.

01:54 I bought an LS3 500-horse crate motor and new transmission and radiator, and it just

01:59 went from there.

02:00 I live very close to Willow Springs Raceway, so I go out and drive the car at the track

02:04 every chance I get.

02:05 It runs with Porsches, Vipers.

02:07 It's very light, 2,600 pounds, and 525 horse, so it's a very fast car and it handles good.

02:12 It's still a work in progress just because I kind of reached peaks at the track where

02:16 I couldn't go any faster.

02:17 So I started doing suspension tuning and I added a wing to it and some more aero in the

02:21 front.

02:22 It's a lot more fun when you're improving.

02:25 My name is Tony Quinones and this is the Viper trike.

02:29 It's one-off.

02:30 It all started with a blank sheet of paper and a 10-cylinder Viper motor.

02:34 One of the key components is the center hub steering.

02:37 That allowed me to get away from the motorcycle front end.

02:39 It's backed up by a two-speed Powerglide fully built for drag racing, and that runs an independent

02:44 rear end.

02:45 It's coil-overs all the way around, and it's a one-off chassis, all built on a jig table,

02:50 engineered in CAD and laser cut.

02:53 The body is one-off carbon fiber.

02:55 When you're sitting in the back and you're looking down the nose of it, you see the V10,

03:00 you see that tiny little wheel, and you're just thinking, "What did I get myself into?"

03:13 So it's been a nice, warm day, guys, and I think there's some deliberation to be happening.

03:18 So where do we lean?

03:19 Because so far it looks like we have a lot of contenders and no clear vision, right?

03:24 Yeah, we're both like the Opel.

03:26 So it's an Opel body on top of a Nissan S13 chassis, built the whole thing in his backyard,

03:32 and races it all the time.

03:33 The first time I ever saw it was at Willow Springs, chasing down a bunch of Vipers.

03:37 That's unfair because he tries to please everybody here.

03:40 Yeah, no, no.

03:42 American muscle car, you know, the GM, everybody.

03:45 Because Opel was a GM, German car.

03:48 And he found the car in a field.

03:49 Like, this car was abandoned, rusting in a field.

03:52 It was used as a car that people tested paint on, you know?

03:56 And he owned that look.

03:57 He just shaved some of the paint on, owned it, cleared it, and rocked it.

04:01 I'm going to bring up the Trike.

04:02 That thing is absolutely unbelievable.

04:04 I think that's one of my favorites.

04:05 The Viper Trike is by far.

04:06 The craftsmanship and everything else about that car.

04:07 How he figured out the steering, though.

04:08 It's just mind-blowing.

04:09 So I guess we came to a conclusion.

04:10 We've got two cars.

04:11 Let's go to work.

04:16 Hey, guys, say hi to the Hot Wheels team.

04:22 Hot Wheels!

04:24 Thank you, Hot Wheels family, for showing up here.

04:28 Really, really happy to see you guys here to support our brand.

04:31 Nobody knew a year ago when we celebrated our 50th anniversary that this will become

04:36 the biggest national traveling car show.

04:39 400-plus cars registered.

04:41 This is the biggest one this year.

04:43 This tour is a great tour, but it wouldn't be possible without any of our partners.

04:47 Thank you, Model 1.

04:48 They lubricated.

04:49 Lubricated.

04:50 Thank you, Dickies, for really great support.

04:54 And thank you, our host, Walmart.

04:56 Mechanics, because this is the headquarters of mechanics, are actually located here.

05:00 So yes, one more, mechanics.

05:04 Thank you so much.

05:06 As you can imagine, this was a tough one.

05:08 We had about five cars, narrowed it down to three, and then we got to two.

05:12 So this one is Opel Manta with the 240SX chassis with an LS motor in it.

05:19 Hi, my name's Rick O'Donnell, and this is my 1974 Opel Manta.

05:24 What inspired me to build this car is having something that was a little different, mainly

05:27 to take out to the track and drive high-performance driving events.

05:31 I absolutely went overboard on the roll cage, just did a whole bunch of cage work to really

05:35 make the car stiff.

05:36 The motor's actually mounted to the frame rails, not to the crossmember anymore, because

05:39 it's mounted so far back.

05:41 You basically drive it as hard as you can, wide open, corner to corner.

05:44 I kind of hit a couple of spots where I couldn't go any faster at Willow, so that's when we

05:48 started doing some aero.

05:49 We added the front splitter and the wing, then went back to suspension tuning to get

05:53 the car to grip a little better and not be so violent.

05:55 It was a total backyard build.

05:56 I don't have a lift.

05:57 Most of the car was done with a MIG welder and a four-inch grinder.

06:00 And it does have a gas gauge, which is great, because it gets about two miles a gallon on

06:04 track.

06:05 The car really shocks a lot of people.

06:06 It doesn't look like much from the outside, but when you get to the track and they see

06:09 the car go, it's pretty impressive.

06:11 We just finished up our last stop of the Hot Wheels Legends Tour here in Los Angeles, California.

06:20 We picked an amazing winner, and our final stop is at SEMA, so we will see you there.

06:24 [MUSIC PLAYING]

Category

Transcript

Recommended