Ugly Car Thread
- Thread starter clydethecat
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Some of the grilles nowadays are ridiculous. Some make me dizzy when I meet them on the road...
It's a car that screams "I'm too timid to haggle."
Thought still a kid and then young adult, I had some personal experience and connections with those and the two Madison Mohs families I understood to be different family trees. When I worked for a startup it was tied to (came out of) a kind of crazy effort a younger Mohs made.
Bruce Mohs was always looking for investors and his efforts were near by. My dad being into cars and entrepreneurial was courted and took me with to check out both the Ostentatienne Opera Sedan and the later SafariKar.
Their roots in the International Harvester Travelalls were obvious. I remember Bruce Mohs impressive sales spiel, my dad inspecting details, and on the drives home criticism of some details. The nitrogen filled tires I recall were big whitewalls popular with antique restorers. You could see the IH elements and I remember my dad pointing out while tough, the IH Travelalls were not sophisticated or performers like the flagship GM and Ford drivetrain and chassis stuff at the time.
The first time I remember seeing the Ostentatienne Opera Sedan my mother's car was a 1966 Mercury wagon. I thought it would be pretty neat if she had a super safe and advanced car you walked into and were surrounded by shag carpeting vs the hot on summer days vinyl seats the Mercury had.
My family's well being went from rather modest or poor to my dad doing well before his early death in that same timeframe of the Mohs cars. When they were going to buy their first special order nice new car I thought it would be cool if they got something like the Mohs or all sorts of things instead of the Buick Estate Wagon my dad correctly argued was a best family choice, and indeed a good car in its times.
Mohs (automobile) - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Confession: I'd also hoped that '66 Mercury wagon could have been replaced with a Boss 302, Z-28 Camaro, and mod looking sin bin type conversion van.
I don't know which IH engines they had but also recall my dad with a soft spot for IH and AMC specifically saying the GM and Ford big blocks and automatic transmissions were better and critical of the I-beam axles the IH had when others had independent suspensions.
Did they actually sell any of those, or are they both one-offs?
Looks like the car plowed into a fence, or grocery cart
Recce
Poster Extraordinaire
Cheap and sold a billion or so.
My understanding was his original might have been a one off and a few Safarikars were made but they all had to be considered prototypes. IIRC, his Mohs Seaplane company made more stuff.
IIRC, the two well known Mohs families in the area were not same family tree. One was the famous guy for skin cancer procedures. The other Bruce Mohs who did these cars. Between the famous physician and well known always trying and promoting Bruce, many in the area know/knew the name and what they did. This car guy inherited a hotel from his parents that had a decent reputation, and a former associate of my employer was a manager for a while so that was another connection. Another Mohs sort of character a child of one of them was part of the twisted story for the startup I worked for in the classic .com to .bomb era.
In recent years local news covered a high school shop class or shop teacher leading some students in restoring a Mohs car.
I met the “car” Mohs once
My brother and I were driving near Madison and spotted a big old model off the USS Iowa sitting in the parking lot of what appeared to be a former motel/night club. This thing was maybe 20 feet long and was on a trailer with wheels. We pulled into the lot to get a better view
Whiling we were looking at it, Mr Mohs came out to talk to us.
I don’t recall that the Opera Coupe came up in conversation. This makes sense since we were there to talk about BB64
My brother and I were driving near Madison and spotted a big old model off the USS Iowa sitting in the parking lot of what appeared to be a former motel/night club. This thing was maybe 20 feet long and was on a trailer with wheels. We pulled into the lot to get a better view
Whiling we were looking at it, Mr Mohs came out to talk to us.
I don’t recall that the Opera Coupe came up in conversation. This makes sense since we were there to talk about BB64
lammie200
Friend of Leo's
Hyundai has some pretty ugly vehicles in production right now.
The hotel he inherited was on old University Ave but I think that was either side of 1960. I do not believe his seemingly perpetual and optimistic efforts with cars, planes and scooters were of the scammer sort. The photos I reposted should have said well enough that it wasn't stuff for everyone. I found this re his scooters.
I don't believe there were actual planes made and Mohs Seaplane Corporation that did this stuff had a Cessna or similar floatplane.
The all of it could be laughed about or criticized but what would our world be if people didn't pursue big ideas? I see from his obituary the born in 1932 would not be in the WWII vet cohort, but close to the explosion of ideas and innovation in non-military and non-space stuff in that time.
To me I still have the impression from stepping into that rear entry car with shag carpeting, and men who looked like the Mad Men series.
Vibroluxer
Poster Extraordinaire
I remember that was the car they gave away as a prize on The Price is Right. It was ugly then.
Vibroluxer
Poster Extraordinaire
around 1990 I bought a 1980 Datsun B 210 ( 100K miles on it) for $450, for my wife to use locally ( in VA), to go to work, shop... we never had any $$, and most of the time, I had a Company service van to drive.
We never put many miles on the 210, but she drove it for 10 years, 'till 2000. Then it got junked
Heck of a car!
It was HHR. They were much better than the PT Cruiser. We had a ‘10 model, served us well. We called it Clifford.
I actually like this one.
That sort of has a cool art deco vibe to it.
It’s what you might call “Understated”.And a very suitable colour too
Ah yes! The Shar Pei model!
Are you serious? This car is so horrible that it’s AWESOME…it only has one entrance….a rear ramp…since there were no doors they were able to put steel girders down the sides of the car for added protection….how tough is that?
And it had 20-inch wheels!
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