This beautiful “T” is one of five produced by brothers Steve and Phil Averre of the Ave-T corporation in the early 1980’s. It was featured in a magazine and looks just as good in pictures now as it did then. It’s located in Denver, Colorado, and is listed for sale here in the Barn Finds Classifieds for $12,500.
As you can see from the November 1985 cover of Hot VWs, the car hasn’t changed much in the last 36 years! You may be wondering about a “T bucket” without a functional grille — that’s because this is a rear (mid?) engined one! The car is powered by a flat-four Volkswagen engine mounted behind the passenger compartment.
And what’s in the front? A nicely installed custom fuel tank. Based on the pictures and the article, the car was assembled to a very high standard (as you would expect for a car to be featured in a magazine). The seller is including correspondence between the original builder and the creator of the car which would be cool to have; I love it when I have the history of a car!
This photo of the engine shows the standard the car has been kept to — it’s almost show ready still!
The front of the engine is easily accessed from the rear of the front seat. The tether is a nice detail, and again shows the standard of craftsmanship that went into the car to begin with.
Needless to say, the interior was done to a high standard as well! It actually looks comfortable as long as you like a low seat as I do! The custom windshield is great looking — but note the lack of doors if you aren’t into hurdling. It might be worth trying it out.
The only differences I can see from the magazine pictures are the different colored suspension components and the removal of the front grille. Can you spot any others?
I’m not sure what you’d tow with this little “T” (note the hitch), but I’ll bet you’d have fun doing it! Let us know if this magazine star becomes yours!
Where do old hotrod magazine cover cars wind up?
Barnfinds.com
Finally the age old question has been answered.
The first look was great
But then i read vw
And it was all down !
The distinctive sound of a vw engine combined with the smell/stink of a carburetor running rich , wich they always do
Is a complete turn off for me
My last carburated car was in a 1969 camaro and that was 15 years ago
Loved the car but used the money for a real estate project and recently semi retired from that profit
I don’t miss the car …
I’ve been off road racing air cooled vw boxer engines in tube chassis dune buggies for almost 30 years and I haven’t met anyone who doesn’t agree that the sound these engines produce at maximum rpms drifting out of turns in 2nd gear is
One of the sweetest sounding engines you’ll ever hear running headers into a straight pipe or any of the other performance exhausts we’ve run on them. I love my v8 dual exhaust idle ing and winding them up sounds awesome but for a 4 cyl engine vw’s (+porsches)have a special sound that anyone who has spent anytime working one thru the gears around a track or wherever knows what I’m talking about it
YES! An unbelievably beautiful sound. There is a whole open-wheel racing circuit built around these engines. I used to watch the Formula Vee races at Laguna Seca. Exciting to watch. One could almost speculate that that is what this car was meant for.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formula_Vee
I think these guys could have sued Daimler-Chrysler for copyright infringement as the Prowler was a spitting image of this car.
Jamie, I spotted a few changes you didn’t mention. The fenders and roll bar are missing, the windshield frame is different, headlight housing is chrome now.
I agree. There are way to many differences for this to be the car on the magazine cover
Hahahaha! Then it’s one of the five that were built.
No rear fender and the radio antenna is missing
One really can´t critizise this car since it is a labor of love built to a high standard. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder and I agree with the fact that the Plymouth Prowler looks like a copy; in my view, if you want to copy something, make sure its beautiful and I think this one is exactly that.
Cool for the price, not wild over the wheels on this.
So this is mid-engine, as in the 4-cylinder is in front of the rear axle?
The tether chain on the seat back actually makes me nervous…..When the seat is “closed”, unless there is a place to hook it out of the way, the slack portion could become caught up in the accessory belt.
@DayDreamBeliever:
With all the attention to detail that’s gone into this build, you would think that would have been a consideration. I’ll speculate that the tether recoils back into itself after it’s unhooked, just like an air hose reel.
Nice looking car.
That being said, I also realize VW’s provide a lot of options for kit cars, etc. but I never get too excited about them. I loved my ’73 Super Beetle but all these things kind of sound the same, they generally the mark their territory w/ some oil leaks, their valves need to be adjusted, performance is limited unless you get crazy w/ mods… Meh.
Nice car for a good price. VDubs will run with V8’s with some mods, and they are relatively cheap. Back in 82-3 there was a guy in town with a normally aspirated VW bug that would fly. We were in my 68 Charger R/T (which was no slouch but I wouldn’t run him)and saw him across the intersection (4 lane rd) beside a nice 56 Chevy trying to get a race. They lined up and when the light changed the bug got a car and a half jump on him. I think it was because the 56 driver was slack jawed that a bug could carry the front wheels for thirty feet and a foot off the ground. The baddest VW I ever saw. And yes, it sounded awesome at full throttle.
Gary Rhodes I grew up in a small town outside of Atlanta in the mid 70s. There were a few badass Bugs at my high school that could and did pop wheelies in the school parking lot. I owned nothing but VW products for a number of years, I could go places in the woods where a Jeep wouldn’t fit! Great cars, and in those days you could “ hot rod” a bug really cheaply, great time to be a teen…