Richard Smeman's 1938 Lincoln Zephyr

When you see how much work went into not only procuring the original vehicle for Richard Smeman’s ’38 Lincoln three-window coupe project, but gathering all the missing parts and turning it all into a first-class street rod, you can only admire the talent and persistence of all involved.

- LARRY O'TOOLE

Richard was inspired by Terry Cook’s “Scrape” project of some years ago from his Deco Rides shop in the USA. Terry’s Lincoln was also a mixture of parts, ’39 main body, ’40/’41 fenders and hood and a mixture of other parts to end up with a wild, out-there final result. When he was finished a fiberglass mould was taken off that car and that is the basis of many of the custom versions we see in the hobby today.

Armed with that inspiration and with a long list of previous projects to give him the confidence to take on a project of this magnitude, Richard set about tracking down a Lincoln coupe project of his own. After two years of searching, and almost giving up hope, a coupe came up for sale in Florida, USA. This one was a ’38 model with a chopped roof that sat in a hot rod shop for nearly 15 years. In that time the removed top had been lost and despite Richard pleading with the owner to look harder for it, no roof was forthcoming.