Racecar Backwards Is Mirage: 1970ish Manta Mirage
There are only a handful of cars out there that’ll make a Porsche 356 look “tall” in a photo, but a Manta Mirage is one of them. Never heard of it? Yeah, you are certainly in the majority of people, but don’t fret, because here at DT we are obsessed with everything Manta and will post each one that we find. Why? Because they are all questionably built kit cars with styling based on a McLaren race car and are almost all powered by big V8s and hit the scales around 1900 lbs. The Mirage is as close as you’ll come to racing a 70s Can-Am car for the street, do I need to say any more? Find this 1970ish Manta Mirage offered for $21,000 in Morgan Hill, CA via craigslist.
From the seller:
2000 Manta mirage
fuel: gas
odometer: 1100
title status: clean
transmission: manual
I have a mirage built by a Indy/formula race car builder. She’s been very sorted out and rips down the road. She’s running a built Lt1 Chevy 350 backed by a rebuilt corvair rearend. Body is ready for your paint work. But looks killer the way she is. Interior is carpet and vinyl seats. Doors open great. Removable steering wheel for easier entry of the cockpit. All lights work as designed. Headlights are on a lift system. She’s a badass little replica. Titled and registered. To many projects to keep her around.
See a better way to drive something fast and fun? tips@dailyturismo.com
Great car, but those wheels spoil everything.
More importantly, what’s that M6 looking thing in the background?
Hey Hugh,
It’s a Manta Montage. Molds were reportedly taken directly off Bruce McLaren’s original M6-GT (aka “the OBH”) by the LoVettes when it was shipped back to New Zealand after he died.
The LoVette brothers modified the headlights and tail lamps to make it less costly, but there are some enterprising souls who have cut that part out and re-fitted the original style covers. They’ve also built full racing frames and fitted serious brakes and big old-style 8 bangers into them. They are bloody fast.
Fun fact: The actual OBH-500H had non-motorized lamps. They were engaged by the driver stepping out of the car and pulling them up. Later copies had the plexi covers with recessed lamps. The car in the video is a copy, but might actually be one of the few dozen Trojan cars that Bruce first commissioned back when he was going to homologate it.
The replica for sale does not have the back window glass. It apparently was a pain to keep on because of the negative pressure coming off the tail, so many of the current running examples (including the Hardcastle and McCormick Coyote) had the back glass removed.
WIth the back glass in place, I still consider this one of the most beautiful cars ever designed. The fact that it has such amazing road view out the front– and the design is now 50 years old– is to me, a perfect example of Bruce McLaren’s genius.
Some more info, if you’re interested:
https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/profiles/a30587/bruce-mclaren-would-have-turned-79-today/
The official McLaren site. If you mouse through the images near the bottom, you’ll see the original OBH with those funky headlamp pulls:
https://cars.mclaren.com/us-en/legacy/m6gt
-Stan
I remember for a few years in the 70s there was a street-driven M6GT advertised for sale in the want ads in the back of Road&Track and around 2000? or so I saw that car converted for track use at the Monterey historics. I think the only other race car as pretty as that is the 412 P. Well, maybe Dan Gurney’s F1 Eagle but that’s a whole other thing.
Are those… studded snow tires?
I know both of those cars… very well.
(they both were mine, once). Great cars.
-Stan (who had to sell them when I moved cross country, and needed to lighten my load)
Those actual cars were yours? Tell us more!
Hey Kaibeezy. I did, a bit.
“Posts awaiting moderation”
-Stan
Sorry- didn’t see the request for approval. More than two links flags automatic approval from an admin.
Hey Vince,
I left you another long-winded post with too many links.
Love,
-Stan
I want the Hardcastle and McCormick Coyote X in the background.
The Coyote was originally a modified Montage, but later switched to a Delorean (heavily modified) so Brian Keith could get in and out of it (the Montage is REALLY low to the ground). If you watch the opening credits of Hardcastle and McCormick (Season 1), you’ll see the stunt version of this car with HUGE shock struts poking out of the front of the car.
If the current owner hasn’t made changes, this Montage is actually an electric car, called the Ion One– built in the 1980s by Steven Slough, former President of the Seattle chapter of the Electric Vehicle Association. One of America’s first max-miler electric cars. It even won the Gasless in Seattle competition, long ago.
Car weighs 2800 lbs– 1300 lbs of which are deep cycle Marine batteries. I’d always planned on replacing them with Lith-Ion cells. Potential major weight reduction and performance increase.
-Stan
That’s awesome info on these….thanks for sharing!!!
Very cool. I have an aversion to kit cars but this one stands out. I never knew of the Bruce McClaren connection despite seeing several years of Can-Am including when the 917 killed it.
Lithium batteries aren’t much more expensive than equal usable capacity marine batteries if you can take a few hours to bolt them together yourself. 40kwh would give 150 miles- more than I’d want to drive this in a day- would weigh less than 600lbs and outrun just about anything.
This is Ken Wallis’ personal road car.
Who is Ken Wallis, you ask?
From the guy I bought it from:
“Ken Wallis had a long history in Motorsports and hand built his personal Mirage to Indy Car Standards.
He was the engineer that built Andy Granatelli’s STP #40 Indy Turbine Car (driven by Parnelli Jones at Indy).
Except for a five dollar bearing failing, in today’s money, it would have won Indy that year:
https://www.eclassicautos.com/the-shelby-turbine-indy-car-too-quiet-for-the-brickyard-775/
Ken Wallis also worked with Caroll Shelby on a car test driven by Bruce McLaren:
https://www.mecum.com/lots/CA0814-191280/1968-shelby-turbine-indy-car/
“Ken’s Mirage was built to the same standards and is a 1900# beast with with an Fuel Injected LT-1 Corvette 350 in a mid engine configuration.
This is a street legal race car with insurance and registration.”
It was a blast to drive.
But with my wonky (ie, non working, disconnected) left foot, it was not a practical car for me.
-Stan (the not-gonna-ever-be-able-to-drive-a-stick-again Stan)