Today's car of the day is Hot Wheels California Customs' 1988 Pontiac Banshee.
The Pontiac Banshee is a line of concept cars designed by General Motors. Four of these "dream cars" were fabricated as design exercises beginning in 1964. They were intended to establish exterior and interior design themes that would be modified for production versions of Pontiac sports cars.
For more information and pictures of the real car please visit: Pontiac Banshee
This is a recent purchase from Firehawk73 (thanks Paul!). Early examples of this casting (but not this particular variation) have a raised "PONTIAC" cast into the rear fascia. I don't have one of those. I don't have a lot of variations of this car- I refused to add concept cars to my collection until after seeing the movie "Demolition Man" so this was one I passed on as a kid as a result. I've made up for that- I still don't go out of my way for concept cars but if they turn up at a good price I buy them.
Known within GM as the "Banshee IV", this car was unveiled in 1988 the two-door, four-seat Banshee IV had a sleek and sensuous futuristic design. Its fiberglass body was painted bright red, while its triangular hood was matte black. A 230 horsepower fuel-injected, single overhead cam V8 engine powered the rear wheels. A heads-up display system (HUD) projected information about speed, engine RPM, and fuel level on the windshield in the driver's field of vision. The dashboard featured video displays and numerous buttons; the steering wheel alone contained about twenty. The dual rear wings were also adjustable. Like its predecessors, it was intended to establish exterior and interior design themes that would be modified for production versions of the Pontiac Firebird and Pontiac Trans Am sports cars. The Banshee IV successfully influenced the overall appearance for the fourth generation of the Firebird, the Trans Am, as well as extending to the fourth generation of the Chevrolet Camaro. It was 201" long.
I also passed on concepts as a kid but now I like getting them, they are really historic pieces for the Automobile and most of the times they look delightfully anachronistic very soon.
ReplyDeleteThis Hot Wheels makes the Banshee look even more a part to the early 90's with those graphics. Never liked how that era looked but its kinda charming to look at it from 2012.
I have this casting in red and purple. They are very nice and realistic (to HW), you should try and get the red one, that was the colour of the real thing.
I want to get the original with raised lettering, but I did manage to get the red one that was issued in 1995 (after "Demolition Man" came out). So at least I have one red one in my collection.
ReplyDeleteThe '93 Firebird really shows the Banshee influence.
concept cars are cool with me but I don't like it when Hot Wheels makes totally random and nonsense cars like for example snake cars, dragon cars, dinosaur, crazy made up concepts and similar cars... I've written about it at Random Hot Wheels - my kid on the other hand loves them, of course :D
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