Hard Hit: 1972 De Tomaso Pantera
Here’s the latest “find” from the now famous eBay seller that has amassed the world’s largest collection of vintage wrecked exotics. I fail to see two things: how anyone survived the impact in this destroyed De Tomaso Pantera, and how on earth you can find $16,000 worth of value, per the asking price in this listing here on eBay. Have Panteras entered the realm of being so valuable their VIN plates and engines justify a purchase like this?
This Pantera looks to have been stuffed from every angle, leaving front and back-seat occupants exposed to certain death. Impressively, this seller always seems to know when the vehicle was totaled, which in this case was 1978. I still remain intrigued by the business model that focused on grabbing otherwise destroyed cars and storing them for decades awaiting a potential value surge.
Oof – can you imagine being the one to bend that steering wheel? It looks like the Pantera has already been partially stripped, unless there was also a fire to accompany the impact. I’m not sure how else you explain the missing dashboard, unless it was removed in the process of extracting the occupants. Surprisingly, the console appears relatively straight.
Of course, this could simply be a case of knowing Pantera values have risen enough that one could justify buying this to swap a matching drivetrain and VIN plate into a car missing an engine. Or perhaps like a recent Porsche 356 we featured, the spare engine could accompany an otherwise complete Pantera missing its drivetrain, acting as a sweetner on a deal. What do you think this carcass’ future holds?
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Comments
Back seat occupants, in a Pantera? That’d be pretty unusual, Jeff.
The car?
SCRAP!
Let us drain all the fluids if they weren’t already by the crash, ship the car to Kentucky near the National Corvette Museum and wait for a big sinkhole to open up and claim its prize.
Owner needs an intervention.
Wasn’t this car just featured a week or so ago?
Yes, “De Tomato Panini”…
Is this site that hard up for new material?
Jeeez……
Yes it was; and I laughed at the figure the seller’s trying to get then! There isn’t enough of anything worth saving here. Common sense says it’s scrap. (Big deal; if it means that much to someone, ok pull the engine but I don’t see it being worth the effort. Certainly not mine.)
Yes!
MH, I thought so too. Seems like a whole bunch of us said it wasn’t even worth the scrap metal weight.
Wow is someone flipping this already?
Can I get $16 large for the model cars I melted, to look like wrecks, back in the day?
There a couple good ol boys here in the mountains that say they can make it look just like their moonshin still in less than 2 weeks!
And it can make enough money to buy a new one in about 9 months?
16 large for a parts car? Im sure the ZF transaxle is made of unobtainium. Hopefully someone can use it but I question the pricetag. many Porsches on the rack in back, think we all been down this road before. I Shudder to think of the occupants fate in this ugly POS. Good luck.
Happy Motoring
Cheers
GPC
Hit hard??? Maybe after dropped from a plane from 3000ft
Two words, YARD ART!
How much fir the pallet? 20?
Anything aluminum will be cracked or broke.
My Lotus Esprit, everything aluminum, scrap in 1978
Why do you guys keep featuring junk from this crap hole of a salvage yard? All they have is very poor examples of scrap metal. Not worth the space on your otherwise interesting site.
Looks like it was in a Godzilla movie !!!!!
Well then, if that’s the case, it’s worth every penny!
If it wasn’t for the 1978 accident date, I would have wondered if this was Vince Neil’s car.
https://www.loudersound.com/features/the-car-crash-that-killed-hanoi-rocks-razzle-vince-neil-never-apologised
The only thing worse than seeing this pile is having to see it again 2 weeks later. This wing nut in California is out in Space. Dump hin in it, run it through the shredder and let us get on with some worthwhile content.
This was posted on May 3rd. Same picture, all most the same thing.
https://barnfinds.com/wrecked-exotic-1972-de-tomaso-pantera/
We feature so many cars that this can happen on occasion. Looks like a few people didn’t see it the first time around though.
There’s NO way there can be 2 of these in this shape. LOL
VIN swapping? Yikes. Isn’t this already a branded VIN?
Even if not, it would be a shady and illegal practice that will screw over some poor buyer. Put it into a metal shredder and put it out of its’ misery.
….and it casts the pall of death over its’ remains…ugh.
Re-using what’s left could be the makings of a Twilight Zone episode. lol
Is this guy related to the electric Fairmont guy? Is this car to be used as a scare the teenage drivers or a a 10 cent a head side show.
Patrick, I gotta believe at the very least, they’re next-door neighbors!
How much for the de-tuned Boss 351? The Cleveland. How much for the Cleveland? You can see the number “4” on the corner of the head. Who cares about the Italian gift wrap. The trans axle would be nice but I bet it is scattered around the world by now.
Period correct destruction
Garbage is garbage no matter what the price tag says.
They were an underachieving sport’s car, and overrated for it’s day. Still a nice piece of late muscle car era!
pretty sure they meant to put $1600 buy it now
or maybe $160..
just a few extra zeros by mistake
POS
Does anyone acutally purchase these rusty hunks of crap this seller continously has posted on eBay?
Looks like they are moving a lot of parts and some of the cars have sold too.
Round two or is this another smashed exotic
Coming up next folks,a Porsche Spyder that was “wadded” in 1955
I vote that one of those fake-reality TV car shows buys it, restores it in three days. and sells it to some guy from Estonia for $675,000. Oh yah, they also find it was once owned by James Dean’s second cousin, and was an ex-Pope mobile ! :-) :-)
I actually saw 3 “living” Pantera’s at a cars and coffee last weekend…
In Scottsdale AZ
Just a remnant of a great car. Time for the inferno. RIP.