Think those new Greyhound buses they’re running between New York City & Montreal are retro? Have a look at the original gangsters of bussing – rides like the GM Futurliner were hip before the hipsters came around.

From Dark Roasted Blend, a gallery of GM concept-bus designs built for an event called the “Parade of Progress”: “One of twelve beauties built by General Motors, this is a self-contained display and transport vehicle created by the GM design staff under Harley Earl’s direction. Opening side, lighting, retractable stage, distinctive center ‘cupola’ cockpit driving position and dual wheel front axle. Used in the ‘Parade of Progress’ touring exhibit created by ‘Boss’ Kettering that complemented the GM ‘Motoramas’ from 1940 through 1956.”

Sources: Boing | DRB

The Electrobite – This trilobite-shaped DIY vehicle was created by “Oilpunk” enthusiasts Kyrsten Mate & Jon Sarriugarte, with help from fellow makers Amy Jenkins and Tansy Brooks.

via boingboing

Out in Australia they really have it figured out. You gear heads who are always complaining about sharing the road with bicyclist can now have the best of both worlds. Writer Jeroen van Bergeijk has been trekking & blogging down under, and recently came across what has been dubbed the “Mad Max Bicycle.” – a bike retrofitted with a small one-cylinder engine:

Saw this awesome – or I should say grouse – looking bicycle today when I went to Port Adelaide to pick up my stuff coming in from Rotterdam. It’s a Dunlop Bushranger mountain bike with a small, one cylinder engine fitted on to it. The great thing is that all the original bicycle gears still work. I suppose the owner starts the engine when going uphill or something. It has sprockets on both sides of the wheel. On the right side the original bicycle gears, on the left side a sprocket driven by the engine.

The fact that it still runs with gears and makeshift engine combined makes this a fine DIY bike find. Whoever the owner is, they should start selling conversion kids ASAP. So now you can have you fossil fuels and bicycle love too.

via boingboing

When surfing the web for news, there’s no shortage of strange car culture stories around the globe. From car coffins in Guam and the Southland to Big Daddy Roth’s Auto Show – we gathered up a few tales of automotive lust for your reading pleasure. Thanks to Jalopnik and BoingBoing for posting them in the first place.

Somewhere in West Africa, personalized coffins are constructed to fit the lives of those whose remains they contain. This baby-blue tomb is in the shape of a taxi, on its way to be delivered to a former Benin livery driver. Speaking of funerals…

A Mr. James D. Calabrese of Ocean County, California, was laid to rest in a tricked out coffin fitted with parts from his 1958 Chevy Biscayne. His procession was led by a pack of hot rods. Pic via Autoblog

Hot rod funerals are pretty impressive, but how about a DeLorean one? Well, no one has decided they want to put a DMC into the ground, but someone did take their machine back in time and added a little steampunk to quantum leaping with a Victorian time machine – it’s no locomotive, but Doc Brown would approve.

Explosm has given us a heads up – clearing the air as to what auto-eroticism is NOT about.

We end this week with a look back at Ed “Big Daddy” Roth, a pioneer of DIY hot rods and show cars. His ’63 Orbitron project is chronicled on Iowa Hawk’s blog.

The Orbitron is supposedly cursed, and has been responsible for taking the lives (or at least maming) several racers including Roth himself. The vehicle has been in and out of storage for decades to be shown off at varios automotive events – but some still can’t forget the evil legacy this homemade hot rod leaves behind.