'91 Cadillac FWD Fleetwood Victoria Hearse conv. to coolest Woody Wagon EVER!

Cadillac Fleetwood 1991 Description

This "project" was actually the first on my bucket list, back when I was only 70 and still in good health...
Seems that our family name is Newcomb, and we arrived here nearly 400 Years ago, spawning astronomers, authors, artists, actors...as well as our share of bandits, deserters and other miscreants. I've spent years gathering an archive of books, objects and whatever other stuff I could find to pass on down to my progeny.
Along the way, I learned a couple of trivial tidbits: One is that the actual terminus of Route 66 is the Santa Monica Pier in LA; the other is that the pier's actual name is the "Newcomb Pier"!
A life-long car nut, with a special love of woody wagons, I could not fail to dream of covering all that's left of Route 66 in as cool a woody as I could come up with, complete with surf boards, etc., ending up, of course, at the Newcomb Pier! One big enough to sleep in would be coolest, so I went to work to find the right platform. I spent months looking for the right one, but nearly every commercial hearse had been built with a much higher roof than would look right, at least in my vision.
And then I found Otto, and Otto's roof - though higher than the factory roof - was at least several inches lower than any other Superior Coach I'd ever seen, and really made Otto look like a giant station wagon! Uniquely, as well, it is a FWD Fleetwood instead of the usual RWD chassis used as hearses, with the great, simple 4.9 liter V-8.
So, I took the train to Newark and simply got into it and drove it home....with no issues whatsoever! It ran well, shifted well, didn't seem to leak anything. I made it home with nothing more than odd looks from other drivers!
The previous owner had a couple of small family restaurants, "The Laughing Burrito", for the obvious, and "Chief's Chicken" whose appeal was "Chicken to die for!".......so half the car was orange and the other half was robin's egg blue. Apparently, the hearse didn't create the necessary excitement, and was too big to deliver meals.....and then he had a minor fender-bender and messed up the left front fender and hood a bit...but not enough to affect the car's safety or operation. Then I showed up.
I got such a great deal on a perfect used fender and hood that the originals weren't worth fixing, and simply put the replacements on - it had to be completely repainted, anyway. (My choice: 2004 Thunderbird pale blue, under the wood grain.)
Both opera lights and landau bars were removed and sold. The interior is excellent, except for the usual tear on the driver side armrest.
I built a perfect roof rack (from 3 Lincoln Navigator racks) to hold a pair of old 9-foot surfboards (boards I bought for it have been stolen).
I've included a factory cutaway drawing to show how the structure lends itself to this - particularly the side window openings, for which most any RV manufacturer can make windows.
I also made a couple big photo blow-ups that I colored in with some sharpies, shown at the end of the photos, so you can see how easily the wood grain film will go on.
I also bought a beautiful set of genuine chrome wire wheels for it...VERY rare, with offsets and bolt holes to fit large FWD GM vehicles, but they are NOT included in this sale as they are probably worth several times the car's value! Boy, would they look good with a nice set of Cokers!
Not much more of any consequence was done before the cancer put a kink in my plans, and the car was stored away until I got better. But I didn't get better, and I've 'bout used up the "4-6 months" they gave me, so it's now another loose end that needs to be tied up.
All are welcome to come and check Otto out for yourselves. It's in secure storage so we'll have to have some notice via email. Include a phone number so we can confirm.
Shipping, of course, is your responsibility and cost, but we'll be able provide some loading help. It will fit most any rollback or dual axle car trailer, so there should be no significant problems.

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