As with many other cars, the main character of this article was found all of a sudden. The fact is that, among other things, I love graffiti. And if video games sometimes have a chance to color American classics in one of the styles of street art, then I’ve never seen anything like it in my life. Therefore, one fine night, I purposefully wrote something like “graffiti hot rod” in the search engine and, after some additional manipulations, came across this extremely interesting car.
You never know which part of the car will become a sudden rarity. In this case, it was especially difficult to find a photo of the right side of the car. This was extremely necessary for a complete demonstration of the unusual asymmetrical pattern.
It’s not just about the neat and beautiful graffiti on the whole side – although the car already stands out for this alone, since such coloring, if not unique in its kind, is definitely an extremely rare solution. But no, it quickly catches your eye that this hot rod is not a typical Ford. One look at the unusual body was enough to understand that something very peculiar appeared in front of me. And yes, we’ve already written about everything in the title of the article, but that doesn’t make the following fact any less surprising: the photos are nothing but Singer Bantam.
At least one website named the hero of this article as The Rooster Rod. And all because the figure on the hood of the Bantam model is nothing more than such a fancy chrome cuckoo.
I think we should briefly talk about what Singer is in general – and this is nothing more than an English company founded by George Singer in 1874. Specifically, Comrade Singer began producing cars in 1901. By and large, the company was quite well-known, and even quite successful for a while… but, in the end, it’s still not enough. In 1956, Singer was bought by the Rootes Motors group, which in turn was absorbed by the notorious Chrysler in the sixties, and the Americans folded the Singer brand in the 70s. And, since more than 50 years have passed at the time of writing, the name Singer has long been out of earshot. And in general, a car of this brand, converted to a hot rod, is definitely a rarity. Specifically, the Singer Bantam, by the way, was the first model of the company, whose body is entirely made of steel.
And in this set of three photos there is such a thing as a rear view. And yes, there's graffiti on the back, too. Well, and a very luxurious flame - after all, what a hot rod without a flame.
But that’s not all. Continuing to search for information about this car, I came across a single post on some forum that claimed that the engine in this car… diesel engine! It was already a natural jackpot: I had long wanted to admire the diesel hot rod. The fact is that engines of this type are rarely used in sports cars.: they are heavier, and just much more expensive to maintain. Not to mention that it’s harder to get parts for any unpopular motor. And yet, here it is: a diesel hot rod… And, fortunately, in addition to this fact, the aforementioned forum post also reported that Junk magazine had an article about this car in the spring of 2011.
It all started with a search for a hot rod with graffiti on the body, and as a result, the graffiti turned out to be a pleasant bonus: even without painting the body, the unusual power plant in a British pre-war car deserves attention in itself.
Junk itself also deserves a few separate lines, because it is a very interesting beast. To begin with, Junk can be translated as Junk, but it seems to me that in this case it is better to use the word Junk (by analogy with the cult movie Junkman – Junk Dealer). An absolutely fan-friendly British magazine created by fans for fans. The only car magazine I know of that doesn’t have any ads inside. Generally. However, maybe that’s why Junk lived for barely more than a year: it launched in December 2010, was released once a season – and already on the sixth issue, the publisher decided to terminate the contract. And I’m not even sure if the result was actually issue number six, or if it was limited to five. Junk positioned itself as a motorcycle magazine, but as an unexpected turn and friendship of machine peoples, the guys threw in one or two hot rods. Due to the name of one very common word, searching for a magazine can be very problematic, but searching for “junk motorcycle magazine” (this time it’s better to leave quotes for Google) is still quite easy to find lots on eBay.
These two photos are the only ones taken after 2011. One is dated 2013, and the other is dated 2015. So it's safe to say that the car was definitely alive and well for at least 4 years.
In light of all of the above, even holding the second issue of Junk magazine in my hands, I wasn’t sure until the last moment if I would find what I was looking for on its pages. Motorcycles are emblazoned on the cover, but there is no mention of an unusual diesel hot rod. I didn’t have any photos of the contents of the magazine at that time either – just one post from the Internet claiming that everything was inside. And – thank you, the nameless hero from the world Wide Web – did not lie. Four paragraphs from Junk magazine in the spring of 2011 are the largest source of information I know about a very unusual hot rod brand Singer. So let’s finally get down to business.
We also found this set of photos that were tightly Photoshopped. However, only one of them allows you to look through the ajar door and slightly admire the interior of the car.
The owner of the miracle of technology is a certain Rod Starley. The car is called Pearl – that is, Pearl – in honor of the English blues ballad of the 70s “Pearl’s A Singer”. Why is Singer, diesel engine and graffiti on board at all? It’s simple: I wanted something unusual, something different, going beyond the conventional approach. In particular, Comrade Starley immediately firmly decided to build a hot rod out of an English car, so to begin with, Singer Bantam was purchased for the project, the roof of which was already cut down by seven and a half centimeters at the time of purchase.
Rod had an unusual engine from one of his previous projects. The magazine says that the engine is a GMC G2, but I suspect that this is a typo (which, by the way, is enough): there is no such engine. Therefore, purely from my own experience, I would venture to assume that we are referring to the power plant from the Chevrolet G20 van of the third generation (also known as GMC Vandura, the famous van of the A-Team). Junk magazine does not specify which engine is in the hot rod, but we have two options to choose from: either early, with a volume of 6.2 liters, or late, with a volume of 6.5 liters – in any case, we, hot rod lovers, should have enough liters.
Comrade Starley couldn’t afford American gearboxes, so he settled on the five-speed MT75, which was installed in vans called Ford Transit. By making a custom adapter plate, the Ford gearbox was attached to the GMC engine – and everything started spinning! Nodding his head, Rod set to work on the main part – the supercharger. Here the choice fell on 6-71 from GMC, fortunately it turned up on eBay for a good price. Of course, an unusual plate was needed again to screw an ordinary supercharger to an outlandish engine – and Rod Starley also made it with his own hands.
At some point, it suddenly turned out that the transmission was interfering with the installation of the right exhaust manifold – not to mention that the cast manifold ended where the clutch pedal is now located.”No question,” Comrade Starley decided, “I’ll just make a new collector.” Two and a half months and 53 pieces of five-millimeter steel later, Rod Starley felt unprecedented satisfaction from the work he had done, and also decided that he would never make exhaust manifolds on his own again.
All the other details are typical, but no less interesting! – a national hodgepodge. The radiator and suspension with coilovers were ordered from local companies. Due to the heavy diesel engine, Rod decided to install a power steering system, and due to the narrow body, the power steering option had to be discarded. As a result, a very specific design was assembled from a steering column from a Vauxhall Corsa and a rack from a Ford Escort. The 72-liter gas tank was extracted from a Leyland Sherpa pickup truck, the seats from a Suzuki Jimmy, chrome from a Morris Oxford, and brake discs from a third Ford Cortina model. The calipers are suddenly branded – from Wilwood. The old seventies discs were bought online, and the dashboard was made by Rod Starley. And as Comrade Starley himself says:
Everything I forgot about was probably purchased on eBay, including rubber, headlights, sound insulation, and so on. It’s a little sad, but it’s cheap – that’s what I’m all about! Oh yes, I also made the exhaust pipe myself using a Firebird muffler and curved pipes – again – from eBay.
Somewhere on the Internet, I found an entry dated, like, 2021, stating that the car had been repainted. Why this was done, and whether Rod Starley still owns the car, is unknown. Photos of the new appearance could not be found either. One can only hope that the graffiti has been replaced with something equally interesting, and that this amazing Singer has only become an even more unusual car.
