I hope the next owner of this 1956 Cadillac Fleetwood Series 60 Special custom limousine has a lonnnnng garage. This super custom limo is listed on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $7,500 or you can make an offer. It’s located in Egg Harbor Township, New Jersey and shipping for this car will not be inexpensive. Thanks to Peter R for submitting this find!
I’m surprised at the seemingly-low asking price given the incredible amount of work that has been done on this car. The body looks perfect to me, at least as far as being straight. There is some surface rust lurking from maybe not getting a good coat of primer on all of the surfaces quickly enough. And, that’s one crazy horror flick looking front end! When you read the description in the eBay ad, it’s amazing to see the vast amount of custom work that has been done already in this 60-inch-stretch custom limo. Wow!
One area that I would have major trouble troubleshooting is the roof, now that’s scary-looking! “Hey, Scotty G, but, but.. there’s no trim!” Well, fret no more, my friends, the seller has the trim all laid out for the next owner, including those classic, last-year, P-38 inspired tail fin tail light lenses! This was an ambitious, super custom job. I can’t imagine taking on something this huge and this custom with all of the fabrication and engineering and design work that this one requires. Although, any tv reality show could have finished this whole thing in 3 days, so it really can’t be that hard..
And, here’s the interrrrrrrrrrrrrr…. ggggahh! FORD?! What in the?! This is where the formerly super impressive build totally goes off the rails on a crazy train. Why in the name of all that’s good and holy would anyone even remotely consider using a Ford interior in a 1956 Cadillac Fleetwood Sixty-Special Limousine?! My mind is.. uhhhh.. (see how empty it is, I can’t even think of the next line). All is not lost, however, they have done some nice looking preliminary work inside the money part (or, is that money pit?) of this Limo: the rear passenger section. But, as you can tell, the interior is very much a work in progress, too.
And, here’s the… NOOO, not again! Brace yourselves, this is a 4.6L 2003 Ford Crown Victoria Police Interceptor engine with 224 hp. Sigh.. that’s more than somewhat disappointing. Why a late model Cadillac engine with much more power than that wasn’t used I’ll never know. The same with the front interior. But, I guess it’s just a pragmatic money-maker, not some trailer queen show car. It’s designed and built to be a dependable, profitable, wedding limo, nothing more, nothing less. The hood will never open once it’s in use other than for regular maintenance and nobody will see the front interior other than the driver so I guess it doesn’t really matter if you look at it that way. What are your thoughts on this super custom Caddy limo? How would you have done things differently, if anything?
That’s a pretty interesting ride. It looks to me like decent work, and the price isn’t outrageous for what it is. It would be possible to finish this out as a pretty classy ride. Shame the dash is modern, but hey, as ya say the folks in the back won’t ever see it and frankly it’ll be a much more comfortable vehicle to drive with a more modern and ergonomic interior.
As a side note, after spending the day walking around a 56 sedan, and two Superior 56 hearses, if anyone wants to try their hand at building one of these or a copy of those grand lodge style touring wagons, I know a guy. *wink*
The only thing I can think of is that the original interior was too far gone. If it were me, I’d have at least used the interior from a more modern Fleetwood.
They must have had a rusty old police car.
That was my thought too. They used what they already had available.
In high school I wondered why some guys tarted up their 4-door 1978 Novas or their 4-door G-Bodies; why not build something cooler? Ah, because you already have THAT car, so you run what you already have.
Limos are everywhere, and cheap too. Why?
WOW! The amount of design and work that went into this must have been unbelievable. I wouldnt even know where to start! Props to the builder. If the seller is the builder , its too bad he has to sell it………after all that work. The Facebook pix are pretty amazing
Its going to take some coin to finish .
That dash kinda looks like a square peg in a round hole. I hope whoever ends up with it can straighten it out.
What a turd.
What a stupid waste of a caddy. Would have made a great stretch with a GM crate motor and its caddy dash.
Yes, this one evokes mixed feelings…. on one hand you’ve got to credit some quality fitting and re-engineering work, it can take a lot of work to fit the interior and drivetrain like that into a completely different vehicle, neatly and make it work properly.
…on the other hand the choice of drive-train and interior seems way off target. As others said above, why not a Cadillac engine for it. There are plenty of beat-up, rusty 4-door Cadillacs from the 1970s around that can be bought pretty cheaply as a donor car. The 472 motor is a pretty good one isn’t it.
This unusual Limo body has potential to be the basis of an awesome special, but at the moment it just seems like an awkward mish-mash.
If I may comment on this from a former “Wedding limo industry” participant;
I ran the East Coast’s largest vintage & modern Rolls-Royce style limo service until the cost of liability insurance began skyrocketing back in the early 1990s [my insurance was doubling every year, without us ever having a single claim!]
99% of clients booking a vintage limo don’t give a damn about originality. They want “THE LOOK” of an old car, but they still insist on the reliability & convenience you can only get with a modern car. That means more than just having a vehicle that runs & drives. It means an A/C system that keeps them nice & cold in the hot summer months, And warm in the cool times. It means having a killer set of electronics inside, & more.
I owned my own antique car shop, and even then we had days [& nights] where it looked like the car was not going to be ready to go out for the next job. Often because of a failure the day before, of a part that would take several days just to find, then it had to be put on the car.
And people have no regard for the car’s paint finish, or interior materials. Ever tried to clean out a vintage car’s wool and broadcloth interior, after the bride had too much champagne & barfed all over the back of the limo interior? [not to mention the spilled champagne we dealt with monthly.] Or scratches from the shoes of the bride when the photographer decides to sit her on the front fender for a photo shot without asking the driver, and the bride’s shoes scrape down the side of the fender as she slides off the car.
Or putting up with State regulations of the limo/taxi industry. I had several 1950’s Vanden Plas Princess limousines & a ’47 Daimler limo with a Hooper Landaulet body [hand built bodies created like most cars from the pre-1935 era were constructed; wood body framing with a covering of metal]. The state regulatory agency insisted I install seat belts in the limousines, even for the folding jump seats [impossible]. Even when I had a mechanical engineer explain in writing that one cannot install seat belts into a body shell built out of WOOD, the regulatory agency insisted we have a seat belt set in the vehicle for each occupant. The actual regulation said there had to be a seat belt for each occupant.
When we actually filed a preliminary “intent for lawsuit” against the agency, the initial hearing Master suggested the regulatory agency might have difficulty with the ruling against them, so we came to a compromise: We placed 7 Brand new sets of seat belts, still in their boxes, in the trunk of each car, and had renters sign a release stating they knew the vehicles had no working seat belts. But we met the letter of the law in having 7 seat belt sets in the car!
Remember, the regulation said all passengers had to have seat belts available in the car. This was before the state required passengers to actually use the seat belts. Today in Maryland you cannot legally rent a vintage car for limousine service, as there are none to rent, due to the state regulatory agency requirements.
I’m including a photo of the fleet, circa 1989. One of the Princess limousines and the Daimler limo are the 2 on the right.
These are all good reasons why this man created what should be a very reliable stretch limo with the “look” the clients want, & the reliability of a modern car, with quick access to parts at the last moment. If you decide to get into the vintage limo business, and want to end up with $1 million after a few years, the best way to achieve this is to start with $2 million. Probably why he’s selling the car now!
Ok,
I hear you, BUT these guys could have built this on the caddy frame and used a GM crate Motor with GM driveline. All reliable stuff with off the shelf parts AND they could have used the original dash with a modern wiring kit from Ron Francis. As for the seat belt thing, its a 1950’s caddy with steel construction so you can add seat belts.
You can also add them modern electronics too and use a high amp alternator and battery system. I did all of this to my 51 DeSoto custom and kept its original look and feel.
As for your cars, You could have added belts to the floor and elsewhere. They wouldn’t do crap in a crash but at least they would be there.
I have to agree that the insurance industry rapes the limo and professional car industry as they have the lowest claim rates on the road. I owned a vintage limo company in the 1990’s and much of what you say is true.
As for the seat belt problem. Technically, unless the belt is bolted to a factory designed and engineered position, one could be open to all sorts of lawsuits especially if the vehicle is out for hire. I had a 1971 Winniebago in the UK and the rules there required it to have seat belts. They had been bolted through the wooden/plywood floor using large repair washers. The inspector at the vehicle testing station told me to remove them because an insecure belt is more dangerous than not having one. Wearing a belt gives the wearer the false sense of security and in the event of an accident one is momentarially secured and then it may break away and that could cause one more damage. That is what the UK Ministry of Transport inspector’s opinion was and who was I to argue, especially if my inspection pass depended upon complying…… LOL.
Bill, the Md MVA sends me a notice to have my 32′ motorhome tested for emissions. When I take it there, they say it will not fit and they give me a waiver but I have to take it there so they can see.
In some states you will never get the needed “certificate of convenience and necessity”.
It’s called “hot rodding” folks. You use what ya got.
Strip it down and start over. It’s probably worth the $7,500 or a reasonable offer for the quality of the body and the stretch. The roof does need work to fix that moonroof gone horribly wrong. You can see a picture of it in the ad. I imagine that they started with a good body that had been stripped of parts, leading them to use the other parts car that they had.
As is, I can see a little kid asking, “is it gonna eat me”?
Yes. Yes it is! Great as is to film a horror movie around…
Probably find the easiest way to get the Ford motor and transmission to work correctly was to use it’s original dash and wiring harness.
Personally I would have kept it all GM and used a bigger and more torquey motor to move that huge weight.
My understanding is that this is equipped with a “one year only option” of a single lane 1956 bowling alley. Few of these exists today as it proved to be a less than popular option. I am told the Cadillac Branded balls and pins are impossible to source. Try EBay.
Chevy in a Ford revenge maybe?
I think it would need a Cummings diesel just to get it rolling.
I think a Cummins would be better.
Spell check strikes again!
We so negative on the power choice, guses you never were in a high speed pursuit? Dash, I will give you that.
Actually probably the smartphone.
more like a cummins ISX or ISM if not shove a cat 3126 into her. But I think that she would be a good money maker as a Nostalgia Limo. A good side show car for a limo or a bus company to use.
Comments not read. This one is too expensive…period. Caddy or not. $2,000.00 tops
Almost looks like the Cad sheetmetal was mounted on a stretched Crown Vic chassis in a quest for modern parts and operating systems. One crew made a General Lee jump car out of a CV instead of using up yet another old Charger.