Deora (custom car)

The Deora is a one-off custom vehicle built on a 1965 Dodge A100 compact pickup truck. Mike and Larry Alexander of Detroit rebuilt the truck for the 1967 Detroit Autorama, working from a design by Harry Bentley Bradley. The body was chopped, sectioned and channelled, the back hatch of a 1960 Ford station wagon was used as the windshield, and the slant six engine and three-speed manual gearbox were moved rearward out of the cab and into the bed under a hard tonneau. The driver enters by lifting the windshield and swivelling the lower gate. The gold-painted truck won nine awards at its debut, including the Ridler Award, and Chrysler leased it for two years to show beside its factory concept cars. It was restored after 1998, shown again in 2002, sold at auction in 2009, and became the model for a Hot Wheels toy car and a plastic kit.