Bubble Top Cars

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Since the introduction of plastic, creative minds have been dreaming about bubble-topped automobiles. This is a rear-engined bubble top car that Greek-American industrial designer Alex Tremulis drew in February of 1936. A decade later Preston Tucker hired Alex to design the 1948 Tucker Sedan, and he told his nephew Steve Tremulis that he actually used this design to inspire the design for the Tucker 48. Photo courtesy of Steve Tremulis.
This sporty Delahaye featured a coachbuilt body by Oblin in Brussels. Built on a 1947 Delahaye 148L chassis, it received full fadeaway fenders, fenderskirts and a plastic roof that looked like the canopy of a submarine. Built in 1947, it was commissioned by the commander of one of the so-called Congo boats – ships on the line between Antwerp and Matadi, a port in the former Belgian colony. The canopy protected the driver and passenger from wind and rain. Photo courtesy of Willem Alink.
Already in the 1940s, production cars with removable Plexiglas tops started popping up. A Plexiglas topped 1941 Cadillac is the earliest example automotive historian Glenn Brummer has found. The owner had fabricated that top himself. Famed automobile designer Vincent E. Gardner of South Bend, Indiana, designed this 1947 Studebaker while working under famous industrial designer Raymond Loewy. Completed in 1949, the build became known as the Gardner Special. In 1950 it won theMost Magnificent Custom Roadster Award at the National Roadster Show featuring a removable Plexiglas top. It is also one of the early customs that made it into Dan Post's Original Blue Book of Custom Restyling and Trend Book 101 Custom Cars. Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Hacker - Forgotten Fiberglass.
This is Ralph Lysell's original design for the futuristic Rally sports car. Born in Stockholm, Sweden, Ralph studied design and engineering at Columbia University in New York, becoming a master with the airbrush. He moved to Oslo, Norway, in 1949, where he set out to build what was meant to be the first Norwegian produced sports car of the 1950s. Ralph's Rally is one of the first attempts we have found of someone actually trying to build a bubble-topped automobile. Photo courtesy of Terry Haaseth.
Ralph Lysell did only build one prototype of the Norwegian Rally sports car before he abandoned the project in 1951. Only production photos of the Rally without the bubble top have surfaced so far, and nobody knows if he made a bubble for the car. It is also unknown how long he came in the process of constructing one. Photo from the Eirik Bøle Collection.
In 1953 Eugene Kettering, a chief engineer at GM's Electro-Motive Division, commissioned the company Model Builders to build a plexiglass top for his 1954 Chevrolet Corvette. Model Builders made a couple of dozens of tops, and one even made it into GM for testing. Offered for the aftermarket, at least two more companies in addition to Model Builders made and sold plexiglass tops for the popular Corvette. Photo courtesy of RM Sotheby’s.
In 1953 Ford Motor Company debuted their Lincoln XL-500 concept car. Presented as a look into the near future, one of the most striking features of the XL-500 was a Plexiglas bubble canopy roof. The press loved it, and they predicted that all cars soon would have a transparent Plexiglas bubble roof for all-around driver visibility. Photo courtesy of Ford Motor Company.
The same year as the 1953 Lincoln XL-500 concept car made its debut, Barris Kustoms were busy restyling a 1953 Lincoln for Jim Skonzakes. Named the Golden Sahara, the first incarnation of this famous show car featured a lift-off transparent roof with hinged panels above each door. A tinted T-bar kept it from becoming a full bubble top, and from the side, the roof reminds about the roof on the XL-500. The Golden Sahara made its debut at the 1954 Petersen Motorama in Los Angeles, and it appeared on the cover of the May 1955 issue of Motor Trend as "The $25,000 car." Motor Trend showed photos of the car to a group of people, and about half of them guessed that it was built by a Detroit manufacturer.
The 1954 Pontiac Bonneville Special concept car was unveiled at the General Motors Motorama in 1954. The Bonneville Special was the first 2-seat sports car prototype produced by the division. Conceived by renowned designer Harley J. Earl, it was hand built by Homer C. LaGassey Jr. and Paul Gilland. It incorporated innovative styling like a Plexiglas canopy with gull-wing windows on a sleek fiberglass body.[1] Photo courtesy of General Motors.
The Astra-Gnome "Time and Space Car" by Richard Arbib Company. The Astra-Gnome was a concept car by industrial designer Richard Arbib. Built using a 1955 Nash Metropolitan chassis, it featured themes influenced by space travels. Built in four months, it was featured on the 3 September 1956 cover of Newsweek magazine. It was also a highlight at the 1956 New York International Auto Show. The car featured full hemispherical vision in all directions and a walk-in entrance and exit by raised bubble canopy and retractable running boards.
In 1956 Jim Skonzakes had Indiana customizer Bob Metz and Ohio’s Delphos Machine and Tool modify the Golden Sahara further, turning it into the Golden Sahara II. This incarnation featured a custom half-bubble top. Photo courtesy of Jim Skonzakes.
While attending Alexander Hamilton High School in Los Angeles, Howard Miereanu received two summer scholarships to ArtCenter that sent him in the direction of the auto design field. This futuristic dual bubble top vehicle was one of Howard's designs that they printed in an ACS Catalog as samples of students' work. "It was done sometime in 1958-1959 as a student project," Howard told Kustomrama in 2022. Photo from The Howard Miereanu Collection.
"More Power to You!" The future as envisioned by America's Independent Electric Light and Power Companies in 1959.
In 1959 Barris Kustoms debuted the futuristic XPAK 400, and according to George Barris, space styled customs was the latest rage of the year. Supposedly translated from Martian, the name meant air car, and that’s what it was. It had no wheels, transmission or rear end, but it moved on a five-inch cushion of air, and it was driveable on both land and water. In addition to huge fins and a groundbreaking sparkling Metalflake paint job, the XPAK 400 did also feature a plastic bubble top that had been vacuum formed over a male mold. A soft introduction, and a hint about what the future held.
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In February of 1960 Wichita, Kansas customizer Darryl Starbird introduced the full bubble top to the custom car industry, as he debuted his Predicta at the prestigious National Roadster Show in Oakland, California. Starbird was only 26 years old at the time and his futuristic bubble top creations helped him become the most influential customizer in the midwest during the 1960s. The Predicta won “The Car of the Future Award” at the Oakland show, and Motor Life magazine picked it as their Top Custom of the year in 1960. Photo provided by Richard Fuerholze.
A company called Lustre Craft fabricated the bubble top for Darryl Starbird's Predicta in 1960. Not able to get it done before Darryl had to leave for the National Roadster Show, Lustre Craft shipped it directly to California. Darryl displayed the top next to the car at the show. After the show, he brought the Predicta directly to Peterson Publishing, who photographed it for a feature in the August 1960 issue of Car Craft. If you look closely at the cover photo, you can see that Darryl and Car Craft Editor Dick Day are holding the top in place.
4 engines, 6 wheels, 1280 horses, and an off-set cockpit. Paul Wirt's Experimental Car was featured on the cover of the August 1960 issue of Rodding and Re-styling magazine. Wirt was a pipeline contractor from Wooster, Ohio, and his multi-engined bubble-topped roadster was actually built for driving on the street. It looks more like a Bonneville record-chaser, but it is, in fact, one of the earliest street driven asymmetrical custom builds we have been able to find on print. Photo from The Ray Soff Photo Collection.
A photo of Ron Aguirre's X-Sonic taken by Ed Roth in May of 1961. A year earlier, the year Darryl Starbird's Predicta won "The Car of the Future Award," Ron showed a version of the X-Sonic without the bubble top at the National Roadster Show. After the show, Ron and his good friend Ed Roth decided that they wanted to build "Feature" cars and get paid to show them, not just win trophies. Ron had already installed hydraulic lifts on the Corvette, and now he wanted to go futuristic, replacing the stock top with a plastic bubble top.
The Beatnik Bandit was Ed Roth's first bubble top show rod. In 1960 Ed and Darryl Starbird toured together. Starbird had the Predicta, and Ed had the Outlaw. Starbird remembers that they often discussed building bubble top cars, and he told Ed about how they made the top for the Predicta. Built by Roth and Dirty Doug Kinney, the Beatnik Bandit was Roth's second fiberglass build. He sculptured the body over a shortened 1950 Oldsmobile chassis, and it featured a blown and chromed Oldsmobile engine. Roth completed the build in 1961, around the same time as Ron Aguirre's X-Sonic.
Wanting to show the world that the Predicta was no fluke, Darryl Starbird immediately set out to build another bubble top custom. Built for Chuck Miller of Columbus, Ohio, the Forcasta was Starbird's second coming. He wanted a car with a low hood, so the build was based on a rear-engined 1960 Chevrolet Corvair Monza chassis. Being a four-seater car, he made a one of a kind bubble that covered all passengers. Completed in 1962, George Barris named the Forcasta one of the best customs of the year, and "a forecast-a for the future."
After the Beatnik Bandit, Ed Roth decided to challenge George Barris, building his own bubble-topped air car. While the Barris’ air car was well built, Roth’s Rotar was a little rougher. The XPAK 400 featured no frictional moving parts at all, and power came from two jet aircraft starter motors. Roths Air Car, on the other hand, was powered by two Triumph engines that he had turned on their sides and fitted with high-pressure propellers. The build was completed in 1962 featuring a patriotic red white and blue paint job by Larry Watson.
Darryl Starbird's third bubble top build is a less-radical, sectioned, 1958 Chevrolet Biscayne named the Fantabula. Completed late in 1962, the build made the cover of Car Craft January 1963. The interior carried the Starbird trademark stick steering and TV set.
After completing the Rotar, Roth returned to his shop to build the Mysterion. He got the idea for the Mysterion from the dragsters that started popping up with two, three, and four engines. Completed in 1963, hydraulics were used to open and close the bubble top and to adjust the height of the rear suspension.
In 1963 Darryl Starbird debuted the Futurista at the Oakland Roadster Show. The three-wheeled build was Starbird's 6th bubble top custom, and he sold it to Monogram after the show. Unfortunately, it fell off a transporter and was destroyed. Fifteen years later, Starbird turned the remains of the car into the Star Trek Coupe.
Bill Cushenbery of Monterey, California, built the Silhouette. In 1962 Cushenbery was rated by many as the best new customizer in America. Cushenbery opened up his first body shop in Wichita, Kansas, in 1952. He found out that the custom car market in town already was dominated by Darryl Starbird, so after five years, he decided to move his operations to Monterey. The Silhouette was the first scratch-built custom to roll out of Bill's Monterey shop, and he won the first place in the "Tournament of Fame" contest with the car at the 1963 National Roadster Show, beating Starbird's three-wheeled Futurista.
By 1961 the Bubble Top fever had crossed the border to Canada, and Ron Kozak of Calgary, Alberta set out to build a futuristic Studebaker. The build was completed in 1963. Photo courtesy of Pat O’Connor - Canadian Hot Rod History.
After debuting the Silhouette in 1963, Bill Cushenbery went back to the drawing board and designed another bubble top custom named the Silhouette II Space Coupe. He began building the car the same year. In 1964 he moved to a new shop in North Hollywood, bringing the project along. Toward the end of 1964, Bill had a dispute with his financiers. He took elements of the car with him and moved to a new shop. Cushenbery's planned to get the rest of the vehicle back after settling the dispute. He did not, and the car went missing. In 1999 the remains were found. The build hadn't been completed by then, and it is still in works.
Tom Holden’s 1959 Chevrolet El Camino was a radical bubble-top custom from Detroit, Michigan. Named Ultimus, the build made its debut at the 1963 Detroit Autorama. The Ultimus featured two hydraulically operated vacuum-formed canopies from Cadillac Plastics Company. Photo courtesy of Carscoops.
In 1963 Dick “Korky” Korkes built a bubble-topped 1962 Jaguar XK-E for Bobby Freedman. Bobby’s Jaguar featured a double bubble that was split by a center panel with chrome bands across the roof. When George Barris saw the car, he offered Korky a position as shop foreman Barris Kustoms. Korky took the offer and solicited Freedman to pay his way out to California. Freedman agreed and Korky packed up, installed a tow hitch on the Parisian, rented a uhaul, loaded on the Jaguar and headed out West. Never to look back again.
Irvin Kirschner's 1955 Chevrolet of Westwood, New Jersey. Known as The Pirate, the car was the second East Coast bubble-top custom that made its debut in 1963. Restyled by Tony Bruskivage for Irvin Kirschner, the 1955 Chevrolet custom featured a huge plastic bubble that enclosed the entire four-place cockpit on the car. Photo from The Brian Frederick Photo Collection.
Darryl Starbird’s fifth bubble top custom was a 1958 Ford Thunderbird that he built for Dick Scully of Chicago, Illinois. Completed in 1963, Dick’s Thunderbird was given the name Electra. The Electra featured one of Starbird’s largest bubbles, as it covered all four passengers and most of the trunk.
In 1963 custom painter and pinstriper Dean Jeffries wanted to prove that he was capable of competing head to head with top customizers such as George Barris and Gene Winfield, so he set out to build a scratch built bubble top car dubbed the Mantaray. The entire chassis of the vehicle came from a pre-war Grand Prix Maserati. The asymmetrical body was hand-formed in aluminum. A radio control system could operate the bubble top, lights, and engine on the car, and the Mantaray put Jeffries in the winner's circle at the 1964 National Roadster Show in Oakland, where he won the prestigious "Tournament of Fame" award.
Ed Roth’s fourth bubble top build started out as a project car for Rod & Custom Magazine. A Corvair engine and rear suspension allowed a low-slung hood. Named "The Road Agent," the build was finished early in 1964, and it featured a bubble in fluorescent plastic, made in the pizza oven at Furt’s sign shop.
The Orbitron was Ed Roth's fifth and final bubble top show car in the 1960s. It featured three headlights in primary colors, and Roth's idea was that when the three lights hit the road, they would form a white beam. Completed in 1964, the Orbitron was a failure at the shows. It ran a hidden engine, and Roth believed that was the reason why it failed. He sold the show rod to Texas, and it eventually went missing. Luckily someone found it in front of a porn shop in Mexico years later. It ended up in the collection of Beau Boeckmann at Galpin Auto Sports, who orchestrated a restoration of the car.
Jerry Greenwade's 1964 Chevrolet Corvette received a bubble top and custom bodywork by Darryl Starbird in 1964. Barris Kustoms restyled it sometime after that and gave it a new paint job.
In 1965 show promoter Bob Larivee commissioned Gene Baker to design him a crowd-pleasing bubble car top he could use to attract ticket buyers. Gene teamed up with Buffalo, New York builder Ron Gerstner and built The Stiletto. The team completed the build in time for the 1966 Detroit Autorama, making it one of the last bubble top builds before the bubble burst in the 1960s.
The Roach Coach was a bubble top show rod built by Don, Dan Woods, and Jim Jacobs for Roach, Inc. Designed by Ed Newton, the build was completed in 1978.
In 1995 Ed Roth built the Beatnik Bandit II as a tribute to the original Beatnik Bandit. This was Roth’s last bubble top build, and it shared many styling cues with his first bubble top, the original Beatnik Bandit. Photo by Sondre Kvipt - Kustomrama.
In the late 1990s, a show rod renaissance was underway, and one of the pioneers leading the way was Shifters car club member Anthony Castaneda. With roots going back to 1992, the Shifters of Southern California are known as the first nostalgia hot rod club for the younger guys being at the forefront of the revived traditional hot rod and custom car movement. Anthony’s contribution to the renaissance was a green Metalflaked homage to Ed Roth called the Brown Neck Bandito. The Brown Neck Bandito ignited a spark amongst a brand new generation of bubble top fans, fans that just knew Ed Roth’s wild builds through magazines and old photos. The car was shown partially completed at the 2nd annual Anti-Blessing in 2000.
After restoring the Rotar and the Road Agent, Mark Moriarity figured he would try his hand at a show car of his own in 1998. Named Futurian, the sensational build was completed in 2001, making way for a handful of other self-penned Roth fiberglass tribute builds.
In 2005 Fritz Schenck debuted a fiberglass bubble top show rod called the Roswell Rod at the Detroit Autorama. At the show, the Roswell Rod was shown next to a clone of the Mysterion that Dave Shuten had just completed.
Dave Shuten's New Mysterion, a clone of Ed Roth's Mysterion, was completed around the same time as Fritz Schenck's Roswell Rod.
The Beatnik was built by Gary “Chopit” Fioto of Long Island, New York. As a kid growing up, Fioto was fascinated with bubble tops, particularly those of Darryl Starbird. When he decided to finally build his own bubble top he decided to base it on a 1955 Ford custom. The body was heavily massaged before Fioto fit it with a large blown bubble. The build was completed in 2005, and in 2006 Fito’s Beatnik won the coveted $20,000 Grand Prize at Darryl Starbird’s National Rod and Custom Car Show in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
After building a clone of the Mysterion, Dave Shuten decided to build an Ed Roth inspired build after his own design. Dave spent ten months in 2007 building the Astrosled in his Michigan home garage.
In 2008 Aaron Grote debuted the Atomic Punk. Built from a cut-down and narrowed 1959 Plymouth, the Atomic Punk didn’t follow the old rulebook, and it was a fresh blend between traditional 1960s show rods and Ed Roth’s famous bubble top builds. It inspired a new generation of show car builders, and a small army of Atomic Punk inspired cars, both with and without bubble tops, were built the following decade.
The Busch Light Bubble is an example of a post-Atomic Punk bubble top show rod. Builds like this started popping up all over the world after 2008, and this one was built by Cody Burghdorf of Marshall, Michigan. The build was completed in 2011.
In 2011 Eirik Bøle of Asker, Norway completed a restoration of the Ralph Lysell Rally sports car. During the restoration, he decided to have a bubble top similar to the one found on the 1954 Pontiac Bonneville concept car made for the Norwegian sports car. Photo courtesy of Eirik Bøle.
“Bubble made of rubble.” The Cosmotron was supposedly the first bubble top build in the UK, and according to an article printed in The SUN, Paul Bacon spent 18 months turning a load of old rubbish into a supercar. Built in a shed in Paul’s garden, the body was formed over an old BMW Z3 chassis. The build was started in 2011 and completed in 2013.
Luke Ennion's Little Menace is a bubble top show rod from New Zealand. The build was started in 2010 and completed in 2014. Ennion wanted to build something that stood out and brought back that 1960s show car style rather than build something with off-the-shelf parts.
Scott Wiley’s 1960 Ford Fairlane is another bubble top custom by Cody Burghdorf. Scott originally tried to buy Cody’s show rod but lost out on the eBay auction. Scott and Cody stayed in touch, and Scott eventually commissioned Cody to build the Spaceliner. Built in the spirits of Darryl Starbird, Scott wanted a mix between a factory-style concept car and a custom show car. The build was completed mid-summer 2015.
Budget bubble. The Iron Lung was built by Eric “Eerie Eric” Goodrich of Buffalo, New York. Eric was never really into bubble tops, he just set out to build the hardest thing he could think of. Built from a pile of 1965 Ford Thunderbird parts, the build was started in 2011 and completed in 2015.
The Space Junkie 2.0 is a bubble top show rod built by Ian Roussel of Full Custom Garage. Completed in 2016 it was the result of a collaboration of several artists. The build was documented on season 3 of Ian's show Full Custom Garage.
Darryl Starbird's 1961 Ford Thunderbird of Wichita, Kansas. Out of the 200 or 300 cars Darryl Starbird has built in his lifetime, 16 have had bubble tops. The "Starbird 2000" is a bubble-topped 1961 Ford Thunderbird that he completed in 2018.
Colin Hillier-Daines' Agent Thor of Weston-Super-Mare, UK. Built as a tribute to Ed Roth's Road Agent, the name Thor is an anagram of Roth. The build was started on the 18th of March 2018 and completed on the 18th of June 2019.
Don Boeke's 1961 Chevrolet Corvette. Boeke bought the car in 1961 and started restyling it immediately after he got it. He parked the car after opening up his own business, and he took it out many years later and turned it into the bubbletopped Ramses II. Inspired by Ron Aguirre's X-Sonic, the build was completed in 2020. Photo courtesy of Shutterfuel.
Everett Reynolds' Forcasta Tribute is a tribute to the Darryl Starbird built Forcasta. Reynolds, an Oronogo, Missouri citizen, completed the build in 2021. Photo courtesy of Custom Rodder.
Marco Hämäläinen's 1975 Saab 96 of Orimattila, Finland. Known as the "WaSaabi," the bubble topped show car was a father and son project that got out of hand. Honoring crazy customs of the 1950s and the 1960s, the initial plan was to chop the roof and build a traditional custom car. "But when the roof was off, our ideas went flying," Marco told Kustomrama. "That's when the idea of the bubble top came. And after that, the whole build got out of hand." The bubble was cut from a big roof window that is used in factory and big hall roofs, and Marco explains that they have a local factory in town that makes them. Featuring a green sparkling Metalflake paint job with gold details, the build was completed in the spring of 2021.
In Finland, Timo Hersti is currently busy building the first bubble-top show rod of the Nordics. As far as we know at least. It has been a long time coming and we look forward to seeing it make its debut at the show circuit. Photo courtesy of Timo Hersti.
You have to make sure to look shiny and good if you build a show car. Just like many of the famous bubble top cars seen here, you can use a set of chromed wheels to make a statement. These could be an option for your next build as well. Check price and availability on Amazon.com.
If you've got the right wheel, you have to cap it off in style. Check price and availability on Bullet-Style Spider Cap Wheel Hub Covers on Amazon.com.
Not everyone can afford to take the car to the upholstery shop, but if you're handy enough you can make dreams come true at home. Click here to check the price, colors, and availability for diamond-stitched vinyl on Amazon.com.

Since the introduction of plastic, creative minds have been dreaming about bubble-topped automobiles. In the 1950s futuristic dream cars swept the nation, and cars with Plexiglas domes in different shapes and variations were all the rage in the design studios of Detroit. In 1960 the trend reached the custom car scene, and every known and unknown customizer started building his or her own version of these futuristic rides. If you built one, they would come, and you were almost guaranteed at least one magazine cover shot and plenty of promotion for your shop.

Ralph Lysell's Rally

One of the first attempts of actually producing a bubble-topped car can be traced back to Oslo, Norway where Ralph Lysell in the early 1950s was busy building his Rally sports car. Lysell was an eccentric industrial designer born in Stockholm, Sweden. He had studied design and engineering at Columbia University in New York, and in 1949 he decided to move to Oslo. In his luggage, he had some sketches of a futuristic bubble-topped automobile named Rally. Lysell’s vision was to build what was meant to be the first Norwegian produced sports car of the 1950s. Unfortunately, only one prototype was built before the project was abandoned in 1951. So far, only production photos of the Rally-prototype without the bubble has surfaced, and nobody knows if Ralph made the bubble top for the car, or how long he came in the process of actually constructing a bubble.[2]


Detroit and Barris

Across the pond, Ford Motor Company did also have radical visions for the future, and in 1953 they debuted their Lincoln XL-500 concept car. The Lincoln XL-500 was presented to the public as a look into the near future, and one of the most striking features of the car was a tinted glass, glare-proof and heat-resistant, that topped the entire passenger compartment. In reality, it was a Plexiglas bubble canopy roof. The press loved it, and they predicted that all cars soon would have transparent Plexiglas bubble roof for all-around driver visibility. Around the same time, George Barris, always an innovator and a visionary custom car builder, was working on a futuristic 1953 Lincoln for Jim Skonzkes of Dayton, Ohio. Named the Golden Sahara, the first incarnation of Jim’s Lincoln featured a lift-off transparent roof with hinged panels above each door. A tinted T-bar kept it from becoming a full bubble top, and from the side, the design of the roof reminded about the roof on the XL-500. The Golden Sahara made its debut at the 1954 Petersen Motorama in Los Angeles, and it appeared on the cover of the May 1955 issue of Motor Trend as “The $25,000 car.” A year later Skonzakes had Indiana customizer Bob Metz and Ohio’s Delphos Machine and Tool modify the Golden Sahara further, turning it into the Golden Sahara II. This incarnation featured a custom half-bubble top.[2]


The same year as Barris Kustoms debuted the Golden Sahara, GM unveiled their first bubble top concept car; a sporty two-seater named the Pontiac Bonneville Special. The Bonneville Special featured a Plexiglass canopy with gull-wing doors. Ford Motor Company was on a roll, and they returned with the bubble-topped Ford FX-Atmos in 1954. Several Detroit-built bubble-topped dream cars followed in the coming years, such as the 1955 Lincoln Futura, that Barris turned into the Batmobile in 1966.[2]


The X-PAK 400

Enter the Space Age! In 1957 the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the world’s first artificial satellite. In 1958 President Dwight Eisenhower signed a public order creating NASA, and in 1959 George Barris announced that space styled customs was the latest rage; “From the drawing board to the torch, customizers build for the future. Incorporating the most recent concepts of special automotive styling and techniques, these radical custom cars are the epitome of the country’s top coach work.” The top customizers in the country where now ready to take over where Detroit left off, with George Barris leading the race. The same year Barris Kustoms debuted the futuristic XPAK 400. Supposedly translated from Martian, the name meant air car, and that’s what it was. It had no wheels, transmission or rear end, but it moved on a five-inch cushion of air, and it was driveable on both land and water. In addition to huge fins and a groundbreaking sparkling Metalflake paint job, the XPAK 400 did also feature a plastic bubble top that had been vacuum formed over a male mold. A soft introduction, and a hint about what the future held. Motor Trend magazine lauded the XPAK 400 as “The most valuable contribution to the automotive industry of the year.”[2]


Darryl Starbird's Predicta

In February of 1960 Wichita, Kansas customizer Darryl Starbird introduced the bubble top to the custom car world for real, as he debuted his Predicta at the prestigious National Roadster Show in Oakland, California. Starbird was only 26 years old at the time, and he had just won the Sweepstakes and the Top Custom Shop Achievement Awards at the NHRA National Championship Custom Car Show in Detroit with Bob Turgeon’s 1957 Ford Thunderbird. Starbird was a rising star on the scene, and the Predicta was his first full-blown show car. Built in 11 weeks, it looked like nothing else at the show, with its custom-built body, a clear lucite plastic dome top, stick steering, and a cockpit-designed interior. The car arrived in Oakland without the top. The top was fabricated by a company called Lustre Craft. Lustre Craft and Starbird had a hard time getting the bubble to blow into the right dimensions for the car. Before they could take on the project, Lustre Craft had to fabricate an oven big enough to hold the 6x8-foot sheet of Lucite plastic to heat it, and after numerous attempts, and a great deal of experimenting, it was finally achieved, but not in time for Darryl to put it on the car before it left for Oakland. Once completed, the top was shipped directly to the show, where it was displayed beside the car.


Built by Aliens

Lenny Macchiarella attended the show with his brother Phil. Phil had his 1950 Plymouth on display three rows over, and in 2020 Lenny told Kustomrama that they thought the Predicta was built by Aliens![3] It won “The Car of the Future Award” at the Oakland show, and Motor Life magazine picked it as their Top Custom of the year in 1960. After the show, Darryl took the car directly to Peterson Publishing, where it was photographed for a featured story in the August 1960 issue of Car Craft. If you look closely at the cover photo you can see that the bubble is held in place by Darryl and Dick Day. Dick Day, the Editor of Car Craft, described the build as a “Dream Custom.”[4]


15 states in 17 weeks

After its debut in Oakland, the Predicta was sent on a 17 weeks tour in 15 states. It won major prizes everywhere it was exhibited, establishing Starbird as a respected custom and show car builder. Starbird and his companion Jerry Titus, toured caravan style with Ed Roth and the Outlaw that year. Starbird and Titus were pulling the Predicta with Starbird’s 1959 Buick, while Ed was pulling the Outlaw with a 1959 Cadillac Coupe DeVille. Ed was only getting $250 a show for featuring the Outlaw, while Starbird received $500. In his book, ”Darryl Starbird - The Bubble Top King,” Starbird explains how he thought he was king of the hill until he realized that Ed was selling 12-dozen, hand-painted t-shirts at each show for $5 each; “He was sending home nearly a $1,000 a week, where I was sending only $250. My bubble was soon busted; Ed was a real merchandiser and a seasoned traveler. He survived in a trailer during this time, took few baths, and lived on beanie weenies out of a can he cooked over a Coleman stove in his trailer. He was fascinated with the Predicta’s bubble. We spent many hours talking about the mechanics of doing one and he went back and built the Beatnik Bandit after the tour.[4]


I suffer from severe nightmares

In the early 1960s, Popular Customs magazine asked Darryl where he got the ideas for his wild creations. “I suffer from severe nightmares,” he told jokingly before he continued; “Actually, though, my ideas don’t come in one fell swoop. When we’re working on one car, we continually think of ways to do the same job a little differently. I do some sketching at home, gathering ideas from here and there, magazines, and the futuristic ideas of other designers, including those who work entirely outside the automotive field. And we experiment-when we have the time-using 1/2 -inch conduit tubing we lay out full-size shapes of styling ideas.” In the same interview, Darryl was asked if he foresees the day when anyone with a convertible could buy an accessory bubble top and clip it right to his car. He did not; “A true bubble top requires the windshield be entirely removed. The present manufacture of bubbles demands the lower edge be on a plane; that is, we can’t blow up a bubble with one open end to match precisely the outline of a windshield frame. Bubbles are free blown, which means a piece of heated plastic is clamped on a jig and air pressure is admitted which swells the center portion of the bubble upward. Size is determined by the amount of pressure admitted to the jig and the shape is dictated by the outline of the jig. If restrictions were used, as would be the case were the bubble blown up into a female die, its optics would be ruined. Too, the bubble itself has to be reinforced around its lower edge, as does the body of the car where it attaches. So their installation on a car will always require extensive customizing. Another problem to be solved before the bubble becomes universally acceptable; the car gets unbearably hot when driven in the sun, Air conditioning helps solve this, of course. But I have heard Detroit is experimenting with minute flakes of aluminum mixed with the plastic before the sheets are rolled. The supposedlysupposdely reflect the heat away and do not interfere visibility. Until something like this is perfected, though, the only practical thing is a color-tinted bubble.


Ron Aguirre's X-Sonic

Another well-known custom present at the 1960 National Roadster Show was Ron Aguirre’s X-Sonic Corvette. After the show, Ron and his good friend Ed Roth decided that they wanted to build “Feature” cars and get paid to show them, not just win trophies. Ron had already installed hydraulic lifts on the Corvette, and now he wanted to go futuristic, replacing the stock top with a plastic bubble. He tried using airplane canopies from aircraft surplus yards first, but they were cracked and split and foggy, and they weren't the right shape. Ron had previously made a set of red bubble taillight lenses for the X-Sonic by clamping heated plastic between two pieces of plywood. The top one had been cut out to the perimeter shape, and by blowing air through a hole in the lower piece the taillights had taken the right shape. These had been done at House of Plastics in San Bernardino, but as the House of Plastics didn't have a big enough oven for the top, he found a place in El Monte that had a big enough oven. Ron and his dad made a big plywood platform. They then put a tube in the middle with an air chuck and a shut-off valve. Ron's father had made a metal ring to Ron's pattern for the top. Armed with 40 to 50 C-clamps, and seven or eight assistants the plastic was heated in the oven. It was put on the base before the ring was put over and the plastic clamped down. After clamping it down, Ron started to pump air into it, a little at a time until he got the height he wanted. He then shut the air valve to keep it there until it cooled. Thanks to good planning and preparation the top was done on the first try. After Ron had explained how he made his top, Ed had a bubble top installed on his Beatnik Bandit.[5]


Ed Roth's Beatnik Bandit

As a concept, the Beatnik Bandit was first revealed to the public in the June 1960 issue of Rod & Custom magazine. Sketched by Joe Henning, the first incarnation of the Beatnik Bandit featured a Model T top. Surprisingly enough, Ed claimed that the idea for the bubble top on his car came from the Clarkaiser built Bobby Darrin’s Dream Car. According to the book “Hot Rods by Ed “Big Daddy” Roth” by Ed Roth and Tony Hacker, Ed called Detroit to find out what a bubble top would cost; “they’d tell me thousands o’ bucks so that I got this idea from Louie Aguirre to put some regular plastic in a pizza oven and then blow it up like a balloon while it was still hot.[5] After touring the country with Darryl Starbird and the Predicta, it sounds strange that it was the Bobby Darrin Dream Car that inspired Roth to put a bubble dome on the Beatnik Bandit. According to Ed Roth authority Dave Shuten, the thing about Ed is, “Every time he’d tell a story...it’d be completely different… he liked to keep people guessing.[2]


In April of 1961 Yuri Gagarin became the first person to orbit Earth, a month later Roth photographed the first bubble-topped incarnation of the X-Sonic for Rod & Custom Magazine. It was painted by Larry Watson, and it featured his first fade paint job. The bubble-top was hinged in the rear, and entry from the outside, by raising and lowering the top, was operated through pushbuttons found under the gas filler flap. Inside, a console between the front seats contained remote control buttons that operated the electrical steering, the doors, the bubble top, ignition, lights, and front suspension clearance. The Beatnik Bandit was completed around the same time, and also Roth’s build received one of Larry Watson’s premier paint jobs. Ed didn't have the money required to paint the car, so he made a deal with Watson that he could take all the time he needed on the car and that he got paid in Rat Fink T-Shirts. The top on the Beatnik Bandit was hinged in front, and it was operated by a fender mounted antenna. After the Beatnik Bandit, Roth’s show commitments got bigger and bigger, and show promoters all over the US wanted to display his radical builds. The Beatnik Bandit became the first show car that he hauled on a trailer 100% of the time.[5]


Starbird Resturns with the Forcasta

After successfully touring the Predicta all over the continent, Starbird shut down Star Kustom Shop and built a 7,500 square foot shop north of Wichita called Starbird Custom Auto Creations. He wanted to show the world that the Predicta was no fluke, so he immediately set out to build another bubble top car. Called the Forcasta, Starbird’s second coming was built for Chuck Miller of Columbus, Ohio. Chuck’s car was built on a 1960 Chevrolet Corvair Monza chassis. Starbird wanted a car with a very low hood, and he was actually looking into using a rear-engined Wolksvagen before he landed on the Corvair. The Forcasta was a four-seater, so an enormous bubble was blown to cover all heads of the passengers. It was split at the door line, and the front half was raised hydraulically for entry and exit. In February 1962 John Glenn became the first American to orbit Earth. The same month the Forcasta made its debut at the 1962 Oakland Roadster Show, and it was introduced to readers all over the world through the cover of Car Craft and Kart Magazine March 1962. Always trying new things, Starbird had now built the first known four-seater bubble top custom.[4]


Ed Roth Takes Off

After the Beatnik Bandit, Ed Roth decided to challenge George Barris, building a bubble-topped air car on his own. While the Barris’ air car was well built, Roth’s Rotar was a little rougher. The XPAK 400 featured no frictional moving parts at all, and power came from two jet aircraft starter motors. Roths Air Car, on the other hand, was powered by two Triumph engines that he had turned on their sides and fitted with high-pressure propellers. Roth’s air car was completed in 1962, and in his book, Roth shares some memories about how he and George used to battle at the shows with their aircars; “The biggest battle of all at the car shows was with George Barris. It was too serious to be funny. I mean he was the head man. Numero Uno. The guy was out front. We had both built air cars & at first we’d just set ‘em in the shows & not demonstrate ‘em but the hear from the public put us both on the spot. Whenever I’d unload “Rotar” at the shows & the newspapers reporters were there I’d make a big point out of telling them that I’d demo Rotar & it would lift higher than the Barris air car. It got hot at times ‘ cause Barris I were miles apart in our thinkin’ in those years. It was a unfriendly feud that stopped when Rotar blew up & scattered parts into the crowd as Ron Aguirre was doing the demo at Cobo Hall in Detroit in ‘62. Barris won! My eternal apologies to those people, especially an unnamed lady who suffered for many years after.[5]


Bill Cushenbery's Silhouette

A couple of years after the Predicta had taken the nation by storm, there was still just a handful of bubble-topped hot rods and customs around. But the foundation had been laid, and bubble top builds slowly started to pop up all over the US. By then, Darryl Starbird had become the most influential customizer in the midwest, and according to Car Craft magazine, he played a major role in setting the custom trends in the Midwest. In 1962 Car Craft magazine asked Starbird about his custom forecasts for 1962, and Starbird answered that 1962 would see a move toward the full radical custom; “Not customs as we have known them in the past few years, but customs as they were thirty years ago: hand built from the chassis up.Gene Winfield forecasted the same; “An important item this year will be radical show cars - more radical than you have seen in the past. We used to have five or six kinds of customs - radical, semi-radical, medium, semi-medium, mild: now we will have two or three classes and the radical cars will be designed strictly for shows.” In Monterey, California Bill Cushenbery was busy building space-type rods, as he called them. “Wild, rocket-like rods designed for shows.” Cushenbery was rated by many as the best new customizer in America in 1962, and one of the cars he was working on at the time was a futuristic show car called the Silhouette. Cushenbery opened up his first body shop in Wichita, Kansas in 1952. After five years in business he found out that the custom car market in town was dominated by Starbird, so he decided to move his operations out West. The Silhouette was the first scratch built custom to roll out of Bill’s Monterey shop, and he won the first place in the “Tournament of Fame” contest with the car at the 1963 National Roadster Show, beating Darryl Starbird’s three-wheeled Futurista.[2]


Holden and Korky

The same year as Cushenbery took Oakland by storm, Detroit, Michigan customizer Tom Holden flabbergasted the visitors at the 1963 Detroit Autorama with a twin-bubble-topped 1959 Chevrolet El Camino called the Ultimus, and even farther East Dick “Korky” Korkes was busy building a bubble-topped 1962 Jaguar XK-E for Bobby Freedman. Built out of a fastback coupe, Bobby’s Jaguar featured a double bubble that was split by a center panel with chrome bands across the roof. When George Barris saw the car, he offered Korky a position as shop foreman at Barris Kustoms. Korky took the offer and solicited Freedman to pay his way out to California. Freedman agreed and Korky packed up, installed a tow hitch on the Parisian, rented an U-Haul, loaded on the Jaguar and headed out West. Never to look back again.[2]


Dean Jeffries' Mantaray

1963 was also the year Dean Jeffries set out to build a bubble top show car. Jeffries wanted to prove that he was capable of competing head to head with top customizers such as George Barris and Gene Winfield. The entire chassis on the Mantaray came from a pre-war Grand Prix Maserati. Incorporating asymmetrical design, the body was hand-formed in aluminum by Jeffries and helper Jim Burrell. The bubble top, lights, and engine on the car could be operated by a radio control system, and the Mantaray put Jeffries in the winner’s circle at the 1964 National Roadster Show in Oakland where he won the prestigious Tournament of Fame award.[2]


The Bubble Bursts

The bubble top craze was a shortlived fad. A bubble that would eventually burst in the mid 1960s. Ed Roth had a short and intense affair with bubble top cars, and from 1961 to 1964 he built five in total. Darryl Starbird never stopped, and he is still building them today. In 2018 Darryl told Sondre Kvipt of Kustomrama that out of the 200 or 300 cars he has built in his lifetime, 16 have had bubble tops. He has won “The Car of the Future Award” four times with four different bubble top builds, and he will always be remembered as “The Bubble Top King.”[2]


The Second Wave

There weren’t many bubble tops built after Apollo 11 landed on the moon’s surface in July of 1969. America had won the space race, and bubble top cars eventually became relics of our past, only to be seen in magazines, old books and in museums. Then, in the late 1990s, a show rod renaissance was underway. One of the pioneers leading the way was Shifters of So. Cal. car club member Anthony Castaneda. With roots going back to 1992, the Shifters of Southern California are known as the first nostalgia hot rod club for the younger guys being at the forefront of the revived traditional hot rod and custom car movement. Anthony’s contribution to the renaissance was a green Metalflaked homage to Ed Roth called the Brown Neck Bandito. Sporting a 1959 Chevrolet deck lid, a Plexiglas bubble top, and Radir wheels, the Brown Neck Bandito was shown partially completed at the 2nd annual Anti-Blessing in 2000. It caught everyone’s attention at the show, and it went on to ignite a spark amongst a new generation of bubble top fans and creators. Fans that just knew Ed Roth’s wild builds through magazines and old photos. Part of the same movement was also Mark Moriarity, who around the same time was working on a bubble top show rod called the Futurian in Minnesota. After restoring the Rotar and the Road Agent, Mark figured he would try his hand at an Ed Roth inspired show car of his own. The build was started in 1998 and completed in 2001. Fritz Schenck followed, and in 2005 he debuted a fiberglass bubble top show rod called the Roswell Rod at the Detroit Autorama. Just as the Futurian, the Roswell Rod was a tribute to Ed Roth, and it made its public debut next to a clone of the Mysterion that Dave Shuten just had completed. Two years later, Shuten returned with another build, this time a fiberglass self-penned bubble top creation named the Astrosled. A movement was on the rise, and in 2008, things really took off, when Aron Grote debuted the Atomic Punk. The Atomic Punk didn’t follow the old rulebook, and it looked more like a tribute to the Brown Neck Bandito than any of the Roth cars. Aaron started the build with a 1959 Plymouth that he cut up and narrowed down to form a body. Everything else was then built around the basic shape before Aaron topped it off with Candy Red paint and plenty of chrome. Timing is everything, and the car became an overnight success, inspiring backyard builders all over the world. Suddenly old quarter panels and headlight rings were welded together and turned into the most creative show rods.[2]


Bubble Topped Cars

1947 Delahaye 148L by Oblin
Irvin Kirschner's 1955 Chevrolet Convertible - The Pirate
Gary Fioto's 1955 Ford - The Beatnik
Ron Aguirre's 1956 Chevrolet Corvette - X-Sonic
J.P. Danos' 1958 Chevrolet Biscayne - Fantabula
Dick Scully's 1958 Ford Thunderbird - The Electra
Tom Holden's 1959 Chevrolet El Camino - Ultimus
Scott Wiley’s 1960 Ford Fairlane - The Spaceliner
Don Boeke's 1961 Chevrolet Corvette - Ramses II
Darryl Starbird's 1961 Ford Thundetbird - The Starbird 2000
Bobby Freedman's 1962 Jaguar XK-E
Jerry Greenwade's 1964 Chevrolet Corvette - The Cosma Ray
Marco Hämäläinen's 1975 Saab 96 - WaSaabi
Aaron Grote's Atomic Punk
Anthony Castaneda's Brown Neck Bandito Bill Cushenbery's Silhouette
Bill Cushenbery's Silhouette II Space Coupe
Cody Burghdorf's Busch Light Bubble
Colin Hillier-Daines' Agent Thor
Darryl Starbird's Futurista
Darryl Starbird's Predicta
Dave Shuten's Astrosled
Dave Shuten's New Mysterion
Dean Jeffries' Mantaray
Ed Roth's Beatnik Bandit
Ed Roth's Beatnik Bandit II
Ed Roth's Road Agent
Ed Roth's Mysterion
Ed Roth's Orbitron
Ed Roth's Rotar
Everett Reynolds' Forcasta Tribute
Fritz Schecnk's Roswell Rod
Ian Roussel's Space Junkie 2.0
Luke Ennion's Little Menace
Mark Moriarity's Futurian
Paul Bacon's Cosmotron
Paul Wirt's Experimental Car
The Forcasta
The Stiletto
The Atomic Punk
The Astra-Gnome
Eric Goodrich's Iron Lung
XPAK 400
The Roach Coach


References




 

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