The Man, the Myth, The Darrin Legend.

[boatingbill]

It has been many years since I owned my Darrin (1971). Over the years I have heard many stories about Howard Darrin and the
mystery of 50 surplus fiberglass bodies. I would like to hear from members to answer a few of many questions. Did he sell serial
#'s 386 to 435 or did he start at 436 to 485? How many of the 50 bodies were 6 cyl  and how many were Cadillac V8's ? Do we
have members with verified Howard Darrin sold cars? How many bodies were scrapped ? One rumor was that Darrin would build
a car when a customer ordered it If he didn't sell all 50 bodies were any unfinished chassis sold ? John Haller had a Darrin in the
early 60's and he would talk about this as a Cadillac powered Darrin was of real interest to him. Anyone have knowledge other
than rumor?

[joefrazer]

Here's a link to an older thread about the same topic. In it, I included a picture of a V8 Darrin that was purported to be an installation completed in Dutch's shop.

The general consensus is that only one...maybe...two cars were converted by Dutch to Cad V8 power.

Anything Dutch sold was obtained from stock at the factory and would have been serial numbers in the known range. A former coworker's father was the production manager at Glasspar, the company that made some of the bodies for KF and he told me that bodies were only made when paid for (which says something about KFs finances at the time). The only spares he ever recalled building were doors, hoods and deck lids.

http://kfclub.com/forum/index.php/topic,8583.msg39982.html#msg39982

[boatingbill]

It sounds like the 50 surplus bodies were just a myth then. I saw a video several years ago showing a '54 Darrin with a "54 Cadillac
engine and it had a manual transmission. I wonder if it was a modern restoration or a "Dutch" restoration. The video did not talk
about the origin of the drive line other than to show how great it was on the highway. The driver kept shifting through the gears
saying how quick it was. It was not supercharged as they showed a picture of the engine.

[Gordie]

This has been discussed at length in previous discussions but we know that Dutch did build at least one Cadillac powered Darrin and he still had it advertised for sale in a magazine a year later.   It was priced very high and he probably had a lot of money and time invested in it.