TIMID drivers might want to steer clear of ‘Tankenstein’, a hotrod built around a genuine, bullet-riddled World War II tank. Car-crazy customiser Shawn Cormier, from Ontario, Canada, spent five years building the vehicle - whose name is a pun on Frankenstein's monster. The hotrod is constructed around the base of a World War II brand gun cure from 1944, with a Chevy drive train, a small block Chevy turbo 350 trim mission, a standard four gear in the back and the top part of the cab is a 1947 Mercury truck. To Keep up with Tankenstein.
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00:00I'm working on this stuff just for the fun of it, and you know, I share it, I get a kick
00:06out of it, it's a jaw drop, that's what makes it worthwhile.
00:30I built Tankenstein and restored the monster trike.
00:47This is car enthusiast Sean Cormier.
00:50He has spent years building, altering and creating unique and eccentric vehicles.
00:54I don't know if I have a passion for cars, it's kind of a sickness.
00:59I guess I could still say Tankenstein is still the world's only rat-rod tank, right
01:04up until someone says, hey, no, I have another one.
01:09Tankenstein is a mixture of old car parts and different vehicles put together.
01:14It's kind of like Frankenstein, where they took the different body parts from one person
01:18and put it on.
01:19Well, this is the same thing.
01:20So it's just a cobblation of parts stuck together and made to work.
01:29This marvellous car creation is a mixture of many different vehicle parts, dating back
01:33as far as World War II.
01:35So this is Tankenstein, and this is basically a World War II Bren gun carrier chassis.
01:43What we have here is a 47 Mercury tow truck cab.
01:48She's got bullet holes all over the place.
01:51These are 22 holes here, and it's got a shotgun slugged through the door over there.
01:57We've thrown them all together into Tankenstein.
02:00When I pull in with Tankenstein at a car show, people come running over to watch it get unloaded
02:05off the trailer, and there's a lot of people interested in it.
02:08What is it?
02:09I mean, what isn't it?
02:12It's Tankenstein.
02:15And it's not just the vehicle that lends its name to fiction.
02:18Sean also likes to drive in costume.
02:21When you drive Tankenstein, you have to be in character, so that's why you get the helmet
02:27and the Thompson.
02:29Good thing it's not a real one.
02:31I'd be crying right now.
02:32It's full of mud.
02:34For now, Tankenstein's powered by a 305.
02:36It's got roughly about 175 horsepower.
02:40She'll do about 45, 50 mile an hour top end, and that's red line.
02:45Who needs air conditioning or windows when you have original glass?
02:50This is original glass from 47.
02:52Everybody tells me I should take it out because it could get cut, but no, I think it adds
02:57character to it.
02:58I don't use any blueprints or drawings.
03:00It's all done by eye, what looks good.
03:03If you stick to plans, like life, plans change all the time.
03:07So why bother making plans?
03:08Just go with the flow.
03:10The total cost of building Tankenstein, I think, is right around $2,000 or $2,500.
03:14I kind of lost track.
03:15I try to use recycled parts, like old stuff, but it still costs you money to buy it.
03:20I think it's been five or six years now since I started Tankenstein.
03:23When you live in Canada, like I do, and it's minus 30 out and you have the wind chill,
03:28so it's minus 40 something, you don't really want to go outside and work on this stuff.
03:32I keep adding things to it and changing things a little bit, and the cooling system should
03:36be changed soon.
03:37It's never going to be done.
03:39I'll always be adding a little bit more to it.
03:45And it's not just Tankenstein that Sean has been tinkering with.
03:48Now I'm the proud owner of the Black Widow Monster Trike.
03:52I didn't build it.
03:53The Black Widow Monster Trike is a collaboration of different parts, like Tankenstein.
03:58It has an early 80s Chevette 1.6 engine and transmission.
04:03It has a shortened up rear end out of an S10.
04:07The gas tank is custom built.
04:09It's a shock factor from people when they see it.
04:12They say, oh that's cool, but in reality there is a reason why they stopped making
04:16three wheelers, because they're dangerous.
04:30I think my favorite of the build was Tankenstein.
04:32I didn't really build the Black Widow Monster Trike.
04:35I took it and got it fine tuned so it would run and added brakes and stuff.
04:40But I think the favorite by far is Tankenstein, just because of the reaction it gets.
04:44That's my funnest thing to drive right now.
04:47Sean's mechanic hobby has been further documented through his YouTube channel,
04:51which has amassed quite a following, giving Tankenstein a dedicated fan base.
04:58I'd never really probably sell Tankenstein.
05:00I've been offered a lot of money for it before, but I mean there's only one.
05:05So if I sell it, what will I have after that?
05:07I'll have a bunch of money.
05:09What good is that?
05:11There's only one of one thing.
05:13There's only one of me, or one of Tankenstein.
05:16So if I sell it, what am I going to do then?