Check this out... think I'll build one someday

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Really sweet. At first when i looked at the pic i thought DeTomaso Mangusta because of the side window shapes. Monteverdi also made gussied up FMJ bodied cars thru the 70s then their mopar , connection dried up.

What a shame they didnt produce more of this particular car with the Hemi in it. I bet if they made em for export to the US like Ford and DeTomaso did with the pantera, but mebbe sold it thru chrysler dealers as a high line sports car it would have done rather well.

The pantera sold thru lincoln mercury dealers had a 351 V8. Not sure if it was the cleveland, or the lighter windsor variant. The early panteras were plagued with a variety of quality control issues. Apparantly hand building low volume sports cars at a faster rate for the larger american market caused some of this.

I think its an interesting thing to banter about. Could monteverdi have produced enough of these to satisfy the american market at that time. Also would there have been enough well healed folks in the US that would have visited a chrysler dealer back then and plunked $12k for a Hemi powered 2 seat wonder such as the Monteverdi Hai.

Old history. We will never know since it never played out. Thanks for sharing

Matt

BTW. I know this isnt mopar related but look up Jim Hall, and Chapparal cars. This guy was a genius and transformed motor car racing. He took on europes finest and beat them at their own game with his chevrolet V8 powered chapparal race cars. Whats interesting to note is all this work was done in permian basin Texas about 4 hour drive from where i live. No race tracks there to test cars. Mr Hall put licence plates on these things and ran them on the street LOL. My favorite is the chapparal 2G series car. Big canilevered wing on the back, and an automatic transaxle. What looked like a clutch pedal in the car was actually a pedal so the driver could adjust the bite on the wing as the car was going. This car had many other innovations. The 2J (sucker car) was outlawed as it was designed to increase aerodynamic downforce by channeling air thru the underside of the car. The faster you went the more vacuum was created causing the car to suck down to the track. All this stuff is common stuff today, but back in the 60s it was revolutionary.
 
I bet that is a blast! I've never herd of that one. Thanks for sharing. That definitely makes the bucket list. Lol
 
Not to hijack this thread, but Jim Halls Chapparal race cars are now housed at the Permian Basin oil museum in their dedicated wing. He had been approached by the smithsonian about them, however he wants them maintained in running condition, and said they belong here in Texas. On nice days his cars are regularly started up and driven outside to be parked in front of the museum.

Mr. Hall made his money as an oil geologist, but was a college study in applied aerodynamics, and used this to his advantage designing race cars. I believe he even had his own small scale wind tunnel for testing his ideas as well.
 
I had a friend who's Dad was in the military and he came back to the states with some pictures of their car sometime in the early 70s. It was a Monteverdi too. An International Scout that Monteverdi put a 440 Chrysler engine in!!
 
Moparmat2000 that Jim Hall sounds like a cool guy i'll definitely keep him in mind if/when i'm in texas. I'm pretty sure the DeTomaso had the Cleveland engine the windsor wouldn't have been powerful or "exotic" enough. The thing that cracks me up about these cars they sold only a handful for several times what a Hemi mopar cost but nowadays Hemi cars go for 2-3 times as much as a Monteverdi or Jensen. those guys were definitely on to something putting massive Mopar power into a sleek European body with proper suspension. I've always loved the shelby cobra/daytona coupes and the GT40 but naturally i'd rather have one with a Hemi under the hood than a "cookie-cutter" 289 or 427. Just need to find out how to recreate the body of this Monteverdi Hai and i would totally build one to crush all the Ford and Chevy classic circuit cars.
 
That car ,is sweet. I thought "Pantera", as well. Not with an 426 on board, just damn....
 
Another fun fact about Jim Hall's "ingenuity" with his Chapparals...as a young teen "car nut" back then I remember reading that he installed mercury switches on his Chapparals. Every time the driver went over a slight bump on the race track, the mercury switch would trip and flash the brake lights. The Chapparal race car never slowed down but the guy in the car behind him must have been freaked out by the suddenly flashing brake light.
 
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