The Ferrari Dino 246 GTS is a small car with a seriously big price. Though values might not match the $10m+ asked for some vintage Ferraris, you’ll still need over $450k to grab a really good one, so it’s no surprise people have tried to create their own.
Two of those people were Russ Keller and Randy Markham, who came up with a Dino-inspired kit car called the Kelmark GT in 1974, the year Ferrari pulled its own car from sale. Someone else with a burning ambition to own a Dino but without a half million bucks burning a hole in his pocket is the guy who adapted one of those old Kelmark kits to fit a 1993 Honda Civic Del Sol to make his own Ferrari tribute.
And call us crazy, but the result, which is now up for sale on the Bring-a-Trailer auction website, is almost awesome. The Honda’s wheelbase is only 1.2 inches (30 mm) longer than the Ferrari’s so the proportions aren’t a million miles off despite the Honda being front engined and the Ferrari having its 2.4-liter V6 mounted behind the seats. And of course the Del Sol has a lift-out roof panel, just like the Dino.
The Honda’s engine is only a little 1.6, and this one doesn’t have the full-blown 160 hp (162 PS) DOHC VTEC engine that arrived for 1994. But I’ve driven an original Dino, and sweet as they are, with only 175 hp (177 PS) in U.S. tune, the straight-line go is never the star of the show.
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The big give-away with most new cars made to look old is the interior, and even though this car’s doesn’t look like a Dino’s it does at least look old enough to fool someone not familiar with the model. It’s actually from Saab’s quirky Sonnett sports car and appears to have been merged into the existing Honda dash.
Along with the use of 15-inch wheels from a Fox-body Mustang, that interior mod is another example of some really neat thinking that’s gone into this project. But you need more than great ideas to pull something like this conversion off convincingly. Plenty of man hours have gone into getting it to this state, but there are many more ahead for any buyer hoping to get it finished.
The body joints are cracking, there’s a mountain of body filler that needs sanding, and you’d still be missing the Dino’s rear side widow and characteristic door and quarter panel coving even if you got the rest of the car straight. You could paint them on to create the effect, as if you’re tattooing a six-pack on a flabby torso, but it’d probably best to leave the panels as they are.
This project then, is not for the faint hearted, but there’s the germ of a great concept here. It does make you wish that someone had come up with the idea of offering a proper kit like this when there were still thousands of cheap but solid, rust-free 160-horse VTEC Del Sols in the classified ads. If you think you can turn this one around, however, the auction closes May 30.
