Identify this bizarre UK / US retro car?

Spotted today on a bike ride from Osaka to Kobe along the Hanshin expressway.

The front looks british, the sides panels looks decidedly American, vaguely like a cadillac, it has both UK and US badges on the front and the badge seems to say CMC or is it just M with brackets? Google search for that marque is not coming up with anything.

Is this some pre-existing model or is it a custom hotrod from two completely different model cars?

Looks a lot like an Excalibur

ok great thanks, looks likes its an Excalibur Phaeton Mark IV to be precise. Is this really the official website of excalibur:

or is there another site that tells the history behind these cars, my google fu is not finding much.

It looks like a kit car to me. It’s not an Excalibur or one of the many 1928 Mercedes kits out there. Those are usually built on a VW or Ford frame. This is one of the ones where they start with a Lincoln or a Mercury or some similar luxury car. It’s hard to tell what car since they never show the back of it.

It’s not completely custom since the body panels all came as a kit, but it’s not a stock off-the-shelf car either.

CMC is probably Classic Motor Carriages. They used to make a lot of these kinds of kits.

ETA: Put on my glasses. Yep, that’s definitely a Classic Motor Carriages badge on it.

http://priceofhistoys.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/CMC-EMBLEM-1.jpg

I think engineer_comp_geek has got it.

http://mgmagic.intuitwebsites.com/

yeah right so it’s a kit thats meant to look like an Excalibur Phaeton? Its pretty close but the grill is a bit off. From the look of it it hadn’t been driven in quite a while and theres probably a good reason for that.

Are you guys sure, given it was sighted in Japan, that it’s not a Mitsuoka le Seyde?

As for what the hell they’re playing at - that’s what Mitsuoka do.

yeah ok it does look a lot like a Mitsuoka but its not. The grill is wrong, and the CMC marque is definately the one from Classic Motor Carriages. So it’s a kit car from CMC which is something like a excalibur or a mitsuoka.

Kit car made from a Mercury Cougar.

Vauxhall Destrier

I had a chance to poke around a bit on the web, and it is definitely a Classic Motor Carriages, specifically the “Tiffany” or “Classic Tiffany” model.

Here are some other examples:

http://www.bobsclassics.com/88tw.htm
http://www.tedvernon.com/Sold-Classic-Cars/1988-Tiffany-Classic-Motor-Carriage-2dr-305TV.asp

http://bobsclassics.com/sold/88tf.htm

Ad for Classic Tiffany for sale on ebay:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1988-CLASSIC-MOTOR-CARRIAGES-TIFFANY-ORIGINAL-AD-/110887248901

Tiffany Classic owner’s club web site:
http://tiffanyclassic.org/

“This is the last year that Classic Motor Carriages in Miami, built the Tiffany & this one was actually built in 1989, on a brand new Mercury Cougar, so the Vin# is 1988 Mercury & thats how the car is titled.”

http://www.bobsclassics.com/88tw.htm