It's funny how times change. Imagine cruising down to the local auto mall, picking up a spankin' new sports coupe, bringing your new prize home, then whipping out the Sawzall and cutting the roof off. Then, if that's not good enough, imagine cutting out the floorpan and dropping the body down a little bit, spraying on some new paint, and taking your new ride racing. To do something so drastic today would be considered complete lunacy, and you'd probably end up locked away in a nice little cell with a custom-tailored jacket and Thorazine injections every hour. Rewind the calendar 60 years, however, and such radical customization on factory-fresh rides wasn't quite commonplace; it wasn't unheard of, either. Such was the case with the stunning '40 Ford Opera Coupe you see pictured here.
Owned by Seal Beach, California, resident Mark Drews and freshly restored by Jim Bruns and his crew at Bruns Kustom City (you may remember Bruns' blue suede '53 Cad from the January '03 issue), the car you see here is rumored to be the first '40 Ford channeled in Southern California, and we've been able to piece together some of its interesting past. According to articles that appeared in the October '53 and January '54 issues of Hop Up magazine, a paint and bodyman named Bob Creasman bought the car new, drove it in its stock condition for three years, then chopped the top and channeled the body over the frame 4 inches. These radical mods to one of Ford's most classic designs caused quite an uproar at a time when hot rodding was still in its infancy, and the black lacquer beauty received quite a bit of attention. In 1948 Creasman decided it was time for a change, so he fitted his coupe with the fadeaway fenders you see here. Packing a stout '43 Merc motor and the aerodynamic mods described above, the car ripped off a 105-mph pass at the dry lakes in 1949. Right around this time things start to get a little fuzzy, and the coupe passed into oblivion for nearly half a century.
A few years ago, youthful kustom enthusiast Mark Drews found out that a traditionally styled coupe was hibernating under a blanket of dust in a garage in the San Fernando Valley, so he began to research the history of the car in an attempt to verify its early-rodding roots. After uncovering the Hop Up articles, the car was obtained and delivered to Bruns for a ground-up restoration, with the goal of restoring the Ford to its former glory without changing any of the original kustom tricks. A stroked '48 Ford Flathead, stuffed with high-compression pistons and an Isky cam, provides power, while a 4-inch dropped axle gets the nose down where it belongs. Bruns then ground away half a century's worth of wear and tear and began the process of restoring the body to its former glory. Once the panels were smooth, everything was sprayed down with a few coats of '98 Cadillac Cranberry Metallic paint, which is offset by a maroon and pearl white tuck 'n' roll interior.
Total restoration time for this historic ride was one year, a mere flash in the pan compared to the decades it spent in hiding, like a phoenix wallowing in its own ashes, awaiting a spectacular rebirth. So was this car the first '40 Ford kustom in Southern California? We're not exactly sure, but we do know that Bob Creasman had some serious vision and gumption to start cutting panels off his practically new car, and we're glad he did. Now, I wonder what we can do to Editor Rizzo's new Nissan...
Mark DrewsSeal Beach, California'40 Ford Opera Coupe
Drivetrain: A '48 Ford 239 Flathead was bored out to 3 3/16 and stroked 1/4 inch before it was stuffed with 9.5:1 Jahns pistons and capped with Navarro heads. An Isky 400jr race cam makes for a nice, bumpy idle, and Stromberg 97s provide plenty of air and fuel. Machine work was by Red, and assembly occurred at Bruns Kustom City in Chatsworth, California.