The Cal-look Lounge

i went to VW action here in the UK in 1986 when i was 16 years old with a friend in his jeans beetle, there was a swedish (i think) typical 80's looker, it was an oval,pale turquoise, it had a white leather interior, bucket seats, fully chromed engine & was super-detailed....really clean even by todays standards.

i had never ever seen anything like it, it absolutely blew my mind. ;D

anyone else remember this car? or tell us about what car really stopped you in your tracks as a kid (or adult)

Bernard Newbury's ghia not a big fan of them but went i saw this car i think it was 93 for the first time well what can i say.

Well for me I must have been in 1992 when I saw Dave Mason's Black Street Warrior in a Super VW Magazine feature about the DKP Club, then followed by the Feature of the Car itself in Volksworld....I haven't see It in real at that Moment but i did know how my Car had to look like...

Frank

I choose to not consider magazine features, cause there is no such thing as, well, the real thing.

So, the first car that really blew me away, that one also changed my whole wiew of the term cal-look, hot-vw's and street driven madness. In other words it made me see what i wanted to be when i grew up, it was Pre-Cal's brown split. That car alone, one can say, sort of changed my life cause from then on, there was turning back. Big words, but passion rules guys!

I mean, i was into cal-look before i saw the car, but when i had digested that very first impression nothing would ever be the same. My goal form then on was to build something even hotter, wilder and more wicked, groundbreaking, but to this day, I'm still at the drawing board.

Thanks Paul for the incredible amount of inspiration, and for keeping my passion alive!

Belive it must have been Per Hallgrens blue oval ?   Anyway...

First VW that blew me away was Inch Pincher I and especially II (but mag features doesn´t count) right !
Ok Masons stealth black, and ofcourse Aronsons..... :-\

Ok, so in a small town in the south of Sweden back in -77, namely Tranås, where Peter Adolfssons chopped -63 sunroofed beetle named "SUICIDE"
as a 14  yr old and, just gotten my first beetle (ruby red -65)  I was totally blown away ! Still get the shakes !

A year or two later I saw (think at the same time as SOB)  the silvergrey Professor -56 beele, turbo Corvairengined......ooooh man,  It slaughtered Detroit V8s all day long  ! !  And many moons later  I found and came to own that big piece history !

Bernards Ghia before the retrim was the car i wanted.  there was also a blue scandinavian 51 split with crotch coolers in a VW book that I have always wanted.  i still long for a split window with crotch coolers.  When I get round to buying another car, that will be the only acceptable model.  Look what i mean, sort the stance out and yes baby:

(http://images.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/309986.jpg)

hey Jonas....

it wasn't Per's car....it was a much much paler color, without the flip front...otherwise yes, very similar.

Our own swedish gasser....St Moritz Fashion back in the late 70's doing huge wheelstands made my heart tick and sort of showed the way of my life...........The first looker......Mike Martinez absolutly gourges top chopped early 60 type 1 with a 2110 cc engine toped with 48 IDA....and  Lonnie Reed heads.........I have a total of 4 Hot VW magaxines from that date today it is the best one ever made...... 8)

Its not really a Looker but the One on One Fridolin on gas burners that was about a few years ago - I will never forget the first time I saw it at Volksworld Show - It was truely Awsome, The stance, the colour, the wheels , the interior and the fact that it was RHD

Here's a pic after it was sold and fitted with Fuchs it still looks F*"KING  AWSOME  :)

Pete Statt's "Dragon" @ Bug Bash 1987, w/ it's ARPM 2332, IDAs, first gen Superflo heads, 911 fan housing, alloys, mile deep metallic blue paint. There's a post about it here somewhere.
After that it was Jim Kurlinski's green '67 @ Jamboree 1991

That Frid is in Arizona now, sporting two tone paint (added dark green) and it's back on 'burners. I liked it better back then, but it's still a way cool car!

alain ruekens black split window bug.it won europes most beautiful at bug jam 2.just lovely,lovely,lovely! is it still about? this wouldve been 88/89 he was from belgium.

For me it was back when I was only 14 or 15 years old (1978-79) and a friend of my brother stopped by after getting his car running.  Brian Seavers (sp?) was his name and he pulled up in a pretty-much stock looking 1968 sedan.  It sounded different than other VW's, however.  So he pops the decklid and what I saw impressed me.  I saw a clean engine dressed in gloss black paint, Santana pulley, 009 distributor, dual IDF's with Berg linkage.  The exhaust looked different too (I would later know that it was a Fourtuned merged header with dual quiet packs - the cool ones that tucked up high inside the fenders so that the chrome tips pointed slightly downward).

So Brian is telling my brother all of this stuff about the engine and about all I remember was him saying it was a 1776cc and that it had a Berg CW crank.  So after a few minutes Brian has to go and he does one of those classic heavy footed start ups where you hear the Webers bark upon start up.  He gives it a couple of blips of the throttle and slowly starts to pull away and as he turns around he side-steps the clutch and promptly puts the car into a slide and the rear fenderwells begin to billow tire smoke.

From that moment on, I was hooked.  I knew what I had to do just as soon as I could drive.   ;D

I grew up 5 miles from Baldwin Motion / Motion Minicar so I saw the Thunderbug many times.

I also knew Joe Aragon of the International Motor Shop who ran Mini Funny III during the 70s and 80s.
(http://www.glenn-ring.com/temp/mf3_1.jpg)
(http://www.glenn-ring.com/temp/mf3_2.jpg)

Scan it and share it!!

Schnell!   :D

The car that print in my mind how a VW should be, is Bernard Newburry (again!) Dark lord Oval. I see it for the first time in a super vw mag and later in flesh and bones.
When you see a car that look cool, you always think that you will change something to makes it suit to your taste. Not this one. Just pure perfection. More recently, the Gobi beige ragtop from the Das'twins make me, almost, feel the same.

the car still exist i saw them maybe one or 2 years ago always  in black with graphics  ;)

well done fabs.not sure if i spelt his name right ::) got any upto date pics of it or old? yes i remember the graphics.two heartbeat type squiggles through the door bottoms.was it a genuine split or did it have a rear window makeover?

I have just sold the gas burners from this car, I bought them from the guy in Florida who bought the car into the states.

they were collected this morning    ;D

the first car that really blew me away was a mid 60's yellow looker from France doing a burnout in the water box at Bug jam 2.

i think it was the fact that is was a street car and it looked so clean and simple that really stuck in my mind. 

Ivan's 67... seeing it blat around Surrey in the mid-90's was always a treat. A truly special car.

(http://i47.tinypic.com/5f281e.jpg)

Keith Goss's 'Chopped' – to own it 20 years later was a dream come true.

no it was a late model with fiberglass split windows , i hope that the car still sit  in the bodyshop lat time i saw him  he the car was there i will take picture

and soon as i found picture of alain's car i will post them  ;)

Seeing that at Guildford Ladymead was always pretty cool - not quite The Dairy Queen was it though what with Burger King, Homebase and Halfords  :D

I have some pics of those nights at Ladymead somewhere, the Choptop, Ivan's 67 and others... will try and find them.

you forgot to say you drove it as well tim.very cool car indeed 8)

Indeed - was an excellent weekend with that car, apart from the traffic on the way home from the Pod...   :D

(http://i46.tinypic.com/14kgs54.png)

In fact the black ragtop in the above pic was another car that "did it for me" when I first saw it (97?) and Neal does it proud to this day...  8)

Bergler

--louis

Yup....  I saw this car come in to the gas station I worked at in HS.  I talked to Gary about it....I was hooked, had to have one!   8)

Mark Thurbers brown metallic og DKP car parked right next door to my house for about a year when I was 15.

Bernard Newburys Ghia  :)

this, my uncles old cal look beetle, was the coolest thing ever!! got me into vw's too
i even went as far as building a replica, but couldn't afford to finish it at the time.

(http://img109.imageshack.us/img109/2930/3341671299d739e314f9b.jpg) (http://img109.imageshack.us/i/3341671299d739e314f9b.jpg/)

for me it's this one:
(http://www.keversite.nl/fotoalbum/fotos/60667.jpg)
awesome car, with about 230-240 hp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pu94PDd2iCA
Kristof

 For me got to be Hectors 67, and to see in the flesh a few years ago confirmed the pictures.  Perfect !

Gary Bergs (first gen) '67. I saw that car all the time when I was in Jr high and high school. I lived down the street from the Bergs

Thanks Tim, glad you like it.

It's very special to me, that's for sure, but it's always nice to hear someone else likes it.

Thanks Tim, glad you like it.

It's very special to me, that's for sure, but it's always nice to hear someone else likes it.

For me, it's a tough call... going to the Classic in 2002 and chatting with John Rayburn and other DKP folks was perhaps my first time seeing true Cal Look cars in the flesh... for me it was seeing DKP cars during that event that was the first time I was truly 'blown away,' I guess.  Sarge's '67 and Darrel B's beige car are two of my faves... 8)

Try not to repeat yourself  :D
Try not to repeat yourself  :D

the twins 66 first time i went into a vw with "big" engine

For me it was Chris Addingtons Karmann Ghia back in the 80's 8)

For me it was seeing Cory Macs car driving by Sonora high school, painted just like his drag car,Mac Attack, and thought that was the shit.

So many to choose from! All are great.

Durachrome Bug when I was a wee Lad.

Up close and personal, around 1974, Marc Souter's Aqua '67 w/ gold five spokes.

Mabe's "Street Cleaner" ghia. BADASS!

that sounds like a cool car, so, it seems like aqua paint was being used in the 70's....i was always under the impression it was more of an 80's colour, or was this car a pioneer?

my future 64 project is gonna be a mid/late 70's looker and i really love those aqua shades?

first car that got me hopping was John Maher's green Mr Beetle race car seeing it go off the line with the wheels up at the 87 summer nationals blew me away it was my first drag race meeting I was 16 years old and I had to get me a bug after that.
(http://www.vwdrc.com/gallery2/d/789-4/mr+beetle.jpg)

The car that blew my mind is Mr. Mark Herberts (R.I.P) black cal-look making burnouts and dounuts in "the Quaife test" :D 
and than Pauls Hamilton Digger :D once when he did 9,95 no NOS and (I think before that) w huge Wheelie :D and steal did low 11 :D

I'm a pup having only found my love and the scene at 19 in 2003,

Big Bang 2004 was my first ever experience of a drag strip and 2 vehicles sold it to me that weekend. (very un-cal look vehicles so don't shoot, but both won't need explaining)

(http://i.pbase.com/u44/slimboyfat/medium/28561885.220_2008a.jpg)

(http://i.pbase.com/u35/slimboyfat/medium/31835260.252_5231.jpg)

Jick,

You'd see pastels used in the 70's, but they were everywhere in the 80's, not just limited to VW's.
Marc's car also had Herculon inserts on the seats and dashboard. It the first VW I ever rode in with a close ratio transmission. Later, he replaced the five spokes with Centerlines... car looked good with those wheels too ;)
I'll have to find the old photos of my '64 I had when I was young... Buggy bumpers, Porsche chromies, low, loud, and painted Ford Grabber Blue... no wonder the Cops used to pull me over all the time ;D

~DR.

                                                                You couldn't get your big toe under the front apron of Dave's car. That car was the inspiration for my Brother, when he was going to get the car I ended with, from my Dad. My Brother , of course, ended up with his EMPI demonstrator.

The Quarterflash race car :o

just for you dave  ;)

garry berg 1967 blue bug
in super vw number30

Thanks for posting Marc's car Fabs!

~DR. ;D

The SSB at Knolwoods in '99!

excellent choice! only 'discovered' that car in a book a couple years ago, but i was blown away as well.


beautifull car and very nice dashboard and steeringwheel. i wouldn't mind looking at that all day long.

courtesy of fabs, here's a pic of the one

better like this jim  ;)