Spotted: A fake Ferrari made from a Nissan

Appearances can be deceiving. At first glance, this looks like a classic Ferrari Spider. On closer inspection, it looks like a kit-car conversion. Over the years, builders have used a long list of donor cars to build faux Ferraris. Don Johnson drove a fake Ferrari made from a Corvette on Miami Vice. Countless more wannabes turned their Miatas into Ferraris with the Italia 250 kit. This one looks like it may have begun life as a Nissan. Kevin Roy spotted it in Toronto’s Little Italy district.

Cruising down College St. on a warm summer night with the top down, this Faux-rari would probably fool more than a few onlookers.

It might not be a real Ferrari, but at least it has a lot of tailpipes.

Kits are almost always based on a cool car that almost no one can afford. One of the more popular subjects is the Porsche 550 Spyder, Originals can sell for more than $4 million thanks to the car’s unique history – it was made by a famous builder, and screen legend James Dean died in one. 550 Spyder kits vary wildly in quality and adherence to the original. The down-and-dirty versions are fiberglass tubs mounted on a cut-down VW Beetle chassis. Kevin Roy spotted this one outside Peter’s Garage, a Toronto shrine for fans of the air-cooled VW.

James Dean owned his Porsche 550 Spyder for only nine days before he died in it. Dean’s was silver. The differences between Dean’s 550 and this VW kit version aren’t limited to colour.

James Dean called his 550 Spyder “Little Bastard,” and had the name painted on Porsche’s tail. This 550 kit is among the countless unofficial replicas of Dean’s iconic death machine.

I spotted this ad for the Aiken D2 sports car body in a 1958 edition of Road & Track magazine. Back in those days - when do-it-yourself was a way of life - there were more than a few enthusiasts who were ready to pick up their wrenches and turn their humble VW Beetle into a sports car (or at least the semblance of one.) You could buy a body like this one for less than $200.

If they didn’t like the looks of the Aiken D2, enthusiasts could go for a body from a company like Sport Car Engineering, which also ran their ad in that 1958 edition of Road & Track.

I spotted this daily-driver monster truck on my last visit to Charlotte, North Carolina. Editor Jordan Chittley and I are heading down to Charlotte next week.

I spotted this bumper sticker near the Charlotte Motor Speedway.