The Story of The Land Ark
The Heyday:
This is the first picture I took of my car.
It was delivered to me late November, 1994.
Early on, we decided we didn't want to do a to-spec restoration. The engine was gone, and the replacement one worked fine, so the numbers weren't matching anyway.
Back then, there was no category for what we had done. These were the days before the term "resto-mod" existed. It was a show car, but not stock, and not a "street machine," and not a low rider. It was sort of it's own thing.
Initially I wanted to call it "The Land Yacht." My real dad made fun of it by calling it "Land Ark" because it is so enormous. When I went to the DMV, "Land Yacht" was taken as a vanity plate - and then, the name "Land Ark" was stuck for life... literally.
The paint (which is what people were drawn to first) is a PPG color called Dark Bright Teal. The roof is also PPG - Warm Silver.
The interior is fairly plain light gray vinyl. I got a Grant Banjo steering wheel that has never really been put on right. The kit needs to be modified and I never got around to it.
The wheels are Boyds - called Fluted Sport. They used to have spinners on them, but they kept falling off and one got run over so I needed to replace them, and the only ones I could find to fit at the time were Ultra caps.
I joined a local car club as well as Good Guys. I went to a lot of car shows and won a few trophies. Never first place, but a few seconds. I even drove it in the local parade every year.
It didn't help that the first day I had it, I put some dents in it. You can read more about that on page 4. But, for the first year, it had a couple good sized dents in the hood.
Then, after those were fixed, my step-dad managed to do this to it with his car:
As I said, this was my first car, I was 16. I had a lot of fun with it. I drove it to school every day. I parked it at the very back of the lot and covered it. I got very good at putting on and taking off the car cover.
But, I never drove it in the winter, so eventually I needed to get another car.
Then it came time for me to go to college. I certainly wasn't going to take it with me. So that's when we started renting a garage to park it in. That did a great job of keeping it safe and out of the weather.
And now, the garage is gone. It has been sitting in my parents' driveway for the last few years under a cover.
Time and mother nature are taking its toll. So, after almost 15 years, it is in need of some more work.
Page 1: Before
Page 2: Heyday (current)
Page 3: Current
Page 4: Land Ark Narrative
Page 5: My day at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety
