One of these showed up at work today.

One of these dudes showed up at work today. Kinda cool looking. I dont know anything about it.

http://www.qvaleauto.com/home.htm

Looks kinda like a mid 90's maserati. Also, doesn't Mangusta make bikes?

looks like only 276 were built, 18 for the Italian market so 258 made it states side, only other low volume car I know with similar specs would be the Shelby Series 1, so kudos for seeing a rarity...

I think Qvale was an offshoot of DeTomaso, sort of.. IIRC, Qvale was partners with DeTomaso in DeTomaso. They had a fight and went their separate ways, and Qvale started his own company. Somehow in the process he got the Mangusta name from DeTomaso.

Kjell (pronounced Shell) Qvale is a pretty neat guy and a Ford fan. The Mangusto has a 4.6L DOHC Ford engine in it.

mndsm wrote: Also, doesn't Mangusta make bikes?

MV Agusta used to be the motorcycle arm of Agusta, the Italian helicopter company.

There's an awful lot of Mustang in the Qvale. Does this steering wheel / gauge cluster / shifter look familiar?

Raze wrote: only other low volume car I know with similar specs would be the Shelby Series 1, so kudos for seeing a rarity...

Panoz?

I didnt know that few of them were built. I have seen at least 3-4 of them (since they started building them).

pres589 wrote:

mndsm wrote: Also, doesn't Mangusta make bikes?

MV Agusta used to be the motorcycle arm of Agusta, the Italian helicopter company.

THAT'S what it was. I probably could have googled that, but meh. Now I know it was part of helicopters too!

Any relation to Mangusta yachts?

Saw one 2 weeks ago out in Vegas, sorry but what a horrid looking car, especially in person. Looks like a bad kit.

Tom Heath wrote: There's an awful lot of Mustang in the Qvale. Does this steering wheel / gauge cluster / shifter look familiar?

Yeah, there's a whole lotta ford in that picture. Steering wheel, gauge cluster, temp controls, window switches, even the little seat belt holder thingy on the seat. I don't think I'd ever really seen the inside of one before.

The more I think about it, I think they actually raced them as the De Tomaso Mangusta in Trans-Am the first year, then changed them to the Qvale Mangusta after that. I'm pretty sure the production cars were all Qvales.

I've never even heard of it. Not sure what to think of it, but I'm leaning towards ugly in a Platypussian sort of way.

Lesley wrote: I'm leaning towards... in a Platypussian... way.

There is no room on this board for 12 letter words young lady.

Heh. Those are a (far) distant bastard cousin of my Jensen Healey. Kjell Qvale used a lot of the money he made from being the West Coast importer for BMC and Volkswagen along with owning the Britannia Jeans company to buy up Jensen and start producing his own sports car.

Bill Towns (the guy who drew the J-H) obviously had nothing to do with the Mangusta.

There's one of these in my area. A local guy into Fords has it. He was filling up at the local gas station when I pulled in with the Barracuda last summer. We tied up a couple pumps for a while. Even the bunch of Harley guys that rolled in were checking both cars out.

It's the only gas station in town so occasionally we get some interesting stuff there.

Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho wrote:

Lesley wrote: I'm leaning towards... in a Platypussian... way.

There is no room on this board for 12 letter words young lady.

How about a 17 letter word then?

Platybobcostasian.

Yep, I said it.

There is one that tends to show up at the Caffeine and Octane show. Interesting to see one.

Platypussian? Platybobcostasian? What does it all mean?? I'm so confused...

Congrats on some dandy constructs, though!

Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho wrote:

Lesley wrote: I'm leaning towards... in a Platypussian... way.

There is no room on this board for 12 letter words young lady.

Sounds like somebody stepped on a duck.

Really odd looking car... squished is a fitting descriptor. Caught one with my cell phone camera a few years back.

TJ wrote:

Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho wrote:

Lesley wrote: I'm leaning towards... in a Platypussian... way.

There is no room on this board for 12 letter words young lady.

How about a 17 letter word then? Platybobcostasian. Yep, I said it.

I demand with the utmost demostrativeness that you cease flummoxing this dialogue with hippopotomonstrosesquipadelians.

MrBenjamonkey wrote: hippopotomonstrosesquipadelians.

Is that Korean?

The car was build by DeTomaso, of Pantera fame. The car was build by them and imported by Qvale, who named it after himself, where as on the continent it was still a DeTomaso. Side none the Mangusta name comes from their second model