This Car Was Built to Piss You Off - The Million Dollar Scirocco

**The Ultimate Driving Machine: A Rotaform-Decorated Scirocco**

The Alcantara Sparco wheel provides a place to put your hands, and the shift knob is simply awesome. The seats are designed to keep you in place, while the sparkle belt and six-point roll cage offer added security. If this interior wants me to do anything, it makes me want to go fast – to hell with the speed limit!

Looking around, you can see that this isn't some pristine show car. You can see the seams where the floorboards meet the firewall, and the floor itself has strips of grip tape on it. There are so few things in this interior that I can probably name them all on two hands: steering wheel, stack display, switches, shifter, shift knob, seats, roll cage, electric steering, fuel pump, fuel cell, pedals.

The most eye-catching part of this entire build is the paint. The artwork was done by Los Angeles-based artist Niko's Cleaner, aka Ornamental Conifer. He's created everything from fancy gallery work to helmets for Daniel Ricciardo and Ryan Tuerck, and he's also the art director of Rotaform. Jason originally approached Niko in hopes of commissioning a skateboard with the Rotaform logo on it, but Niko wasn't interested in something small-scale at the time.

Once they started talking, things grew, and Niko told Jason that he used to drive a Volkswagen Caddy when he lived back in England. Jason mentioned the Scirocco, and showed Niko some pictures – Niko knew immediately that he wanted to paint that car. Conifer asked for full creative control when it came to the scheme, and Jason gave it to him. This was the result – a vibrant and mesmerizing cacophony of rainbow gradients, tape masks, gridlines, and half-pane lettering.

The wheel arches feature a simple yet powerful message: "The future is our fault." A reminder that both action and inaction have consequences – pretty heavy stuff for a car as built as this one. The blur effect is meant to make people stop and think – maybe believe that their phone is taking too long to load a picture. These are not phrases you see painted on race cars if you see phrases at all.

Seeing this car in person is a totally different experience than seeing it in pictures. In person, you can see brushstrokes in the paint – there was always going to be imperfections, and that's what makes it human. Niko didn't even clearcoat it, but that's part of its charm.

**About This Build**

I was talking on the phone with Jason, and he said something that really resonated with me – this world we're living in where every SEMA build has to be perfect and pristine is dumb. He's right – if everything is perfect, then it loses what makes it unique. Look at the door handles on this car; they have visible screws – I think they might even be original.

This car wasn't restored; it was built how Jason wanted it, not how he thought other people would want it. Thanks to Fixd for sponsoring this episode of Bumper to Bumper! Fixd is an onboard diagnostic reader for your car that translates complex car issues into easy-to-understand info sent straight to an app on your phone.

**Sponsor: Fixd**

With Fixd, you get live data and in-depth diagnostics sent right to your phone without all the hassle of going to a mechanic. It even reminds you when your car is due for maintenance – thanks again, Fixd!

**Thanks for Watching!**

I'm grateful that you guys like these videos – we're almost at two million subscribers, which is bonkers! Follow me on Instagram at @JS_pump_freefall, and Donut Media at @donut.media. I'll be making this show every Tuesday until the day I die.

Every Thursday, check out an episode of my other show, Up to Speed! Check out an episode of my son Nolan's show, Wheelhouse – big thanks to Jason from Rotaform for letting us borrow his car and for Niko AKA Ornamental Conifer for talking to us on the phone. This is really great – I love you!

WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enholy schnikeys what in the heck and world do we have here it's a 1980 Scirocco it's got big old leaks on it a body kit from a hillclimb series got squiggly words all over it with a motor from a formula car the whole car just screams hey I do what I want today we are going bumper-to-bumper on the million dollar Scirocco this is a 1980 Volkswagen Scirocco and it might honestly be my favorite car I'm a Volkswagen guy to the core one might call me a double I've owned tons of them but of all the bolts wagons that I have seen on Instagram on the streets at car shows on VW vortex I have never seen anything like this every aspect of this build from the engine to the hand-painted livery unites to serve the same purpose and that purpose is to break convention to make you think how often does a car do that it was built by Jason Whipple one of the cofounders of row to form wheels and fellow Volkswagen super nerd he actually bought a Scirocco for me last year it's in much better hands Jason bought this car nine years ago with the intention of turning it into a fun chat car in fact when he bought it he was already a pretty capable track car it was originally built by Mike Potter Minh otter the owner of parts for VW's comm if you're a Volkswagen nerd you know that site and it was featured in European car magazine in 1989 that's six years before posts Malone was even born when Jason got the car it was running an 8 valve 4-cylinder ABA motor that you find in a third gen golf it has some goodies on it and made a totally respectable 140 her Spurs which in a car that basically weighs three and a half pounds is plenty of power the previous owner has done a bunch of suspension parts at it and Jason says that it was pretty sweet so naturally he did what any of us would do he immediately ripped it apart and ruined it he spent the next nine years chipping away at this build whenever he could the more jason started working on the Scirocco the more he wanted to do to it all those little tweaks and changes and plans added up to this thing a car that I believed to be a legitimate work of art to me the engine is almost as wild as the paint and the reason that I got so excited about it when Jason first posted this car on VW vortex like nine years ago what you see here is a motor from a u.s. f3 formula car us f3 was a short-lived open-wheel racing series that used a special spec engine now Jason knew if that these were based on Volkswagen motors and when the series went under he scoured the classifieds and found two of them collecting dust in the back of a warehouse somewhere the block is from a very low volume out II that was only sold in Europe it's all aluminum then he had custom high-compression pistons made by je and they produce an impressive 14 to 1 compression ratio in short that means that this thing sounds crispy especially when you factor in the fact that it revs to 8500 rpm now here's where things get a little crazy and where the motor reflects the theme of the rest of the car yes it is insane to take a motor out of an open-wheel race car and shove it into 35-year old Volkswagen but since this engine was designed to sit in the back of said formula car it wasn't expected to have one of these a hood as it stood the intake would have stuck out six inches from the top of the hood now most of us would say oh cool let's do that it would look sick but Jason is not like the rest of us he cut it up Jason had to cut reposition and weld this very rare intake back together what's he gonna do got a hole in his hood no what might seem wrong or a pain in the ass at first sometimes ends up being the right path the intake is topped with a custom carbon fiber plenum which pressurizes the air entering the motor improving air flow and performance Jason estimates that this engine makes around 100 80 Hertz purrs which ain't bad and it sounds sick as I mentioned before Jason is like peak car nerd and possibly the nerdiest car nerd thing in the world is the burg Cup Hill Climb series in Europe they race everything from X DTM cars to open wheelers Jason spent many a night watching Hill Climb clips on the youtubes he knew that his car had to look like the ones on his computer screen the one characteristic that all bird Cup cars share is huge fender flares to accommodate the fat meats underneath when he got the fenders he color matched him to the Scirocco took the bumpers off painted his side markers and threw the kid on the arches fit perfect around the tires and wheels the process for choosing the wheels was an arduous one until one day he remembered hey I own a wheel company duh now Jason has fitted a number of wheel sets over the years including row deform SJ sees they all looked good but they didn't quite suit the car just right eventually he landed on the fully polished 15-inch wrote a Form B u sees they round off the theme well they have old-school motorsport influence but they're shiny this whole car is such a beautiful contradiction hey I'm a race car I'm painting what am i screw you dad I wish I was never bored but I do wish I was born because now I get attention and I'm beautiful feels good to be back in a Scirocco the theme of the car continues into the interior now remember Jason didn't intend for this car to end up as an art car it's a fully armed operational battle station it's a track car in every decision in here reflects just that the stack dash display tells you everything you need to know just like up to speed this Alcantara Sparco wheel gives you a place to put your hands this shift knob is awesome I ordered one for my car the seats are there to keep you in place in the sparkle belt in six-point roll cage keep you a lot if this interior wants me to do anything it makes me want to go fast to hell with the speed limit if you looking around you can start to see that this isn't some pristine show car you can see the seams where the floorboards meet the firewall the floor itself has strips of grip tape on it there's so few things in this interior that I can probably name them all on two hints let's do this okay steering wheel - stack display I'll say switches are one shifter shift knob seats roll cage electric steering fuel pump fuel cell pedals almost obviously the most eye-catching part of this entire build is the paint the artwork was done by los angeles-based artist Niko's cleaner aka ornamental conifer he's done everything from fancy gallery work to helmets for Daniel Ricciardo and Ryan Tuerck and he's the art director of race service Jason originally approached Niko in hope of commissioning a skateboard with the rota form logo on it but Niko wasn't interested in doing something on a small scale at the time once they got to talk it you know like grows do Niko told Jason that he used to drive the Volkswagen Caddy when he lived back in Englund Jason mentioned the Scirocco and showed Niko some pictures Niko knew immediately that he wanted to paint that car conifer asked for full creative control when it came to the scheme and Jason gave it to him this was the result it's a vibrant and mesmerizing cacophony of rainbow gradients tape masks gridlines and half pane and lettering scroll it on the wheel arches is a simple and powerful message the future is our fault a simple reminder that both action and inaction have consequences that's pretty heavy especially for a car as built as this one the blur effect is meant to make people stop maybe believe that their phone is taking too long to load a picture these are not phrases you see painted on race cars if you see phrases at all but that's how conifer does things seeing this car in person is a totally different experience than seeing it in pictures in person you can see brushstrokes in the paint there was always gonna be imperfections and that's what makes it human Niko didn't even clearcoat it but that's part of it I was talking on the phone with Jason you know because we're friends and he said something that really resonated with me that this world we're living in where every SEMA build has to be perfect and pristine is dumb and he's right if everything is perfect then it loses what makes it unique look at the door handles on this car they have visible where it I think they're original but we don't know because there's no records of it this car wasn't restored and it was built how Jason wanted it not how he thought other people would want it thanks to fixed for sponsoring this episode of bumper to bumper fix is an onboard diagnostic reader for your car it translates complex car issues into easy-to-understand info that is sent straight to an app on your phone it's an affordable alternative to other more expensive obd2 readers which can give you less information for more money with Vicks you get live data and in-depth diagnostics sent right to your phone without all the hassle of going to a mechanic and it reminds you when your car is due for maintenance thanks again fixed thanks for watching donut media I cannot tell you guys how grateful I am that you like these videos we're almost at two million subscribers I cannot believe that that is bonkers follow me on instagram at JS pump freefall donut on instagram at dona media I'm gonna make this show every Tuesday till the day I die every Thursday check out this episode of my other show up to speed check out this episode of my son Nolan show wheel house big thanks to Jason from rotifer for letting us borrow his car and for nico AKA ornamental conifer for talking to us on the phone this is really great i love youholy schnikeys what in the heck and world do we have here it's a 1980 Scirocco it's got big old leaks on it a body kit from a hillclimb series got squiggly words all over it with a motor from a formula car the whole car just screams hey I do what I want today we are going bumper-to-bumper on the million dollar Scirocco this is a 1980 Volkswagen Scirocco and it might honestly be my favorite car I'm a Volkswagen guy to the core one might call me a double I've owned tons of them but of all the bolts wagons that I have seen on Instagram on the streets at car shows on VW vortex I have never seen anything like this every aspect of this build from the engine to the hand-painted livery unites to serve the same purpose and that purpose is to break convention to make you think how often does a car do that it was built by Jason Whipple one of the cofounders of row to form wheels and fellow Volkswagen super nerd he actually bought a Scirocco for me last year it's in much better hands Jason bought this car nine years ago with the intention of turning it into a fun chat car in fact when he bought it he was already a pretty capable track car it was originally built by Mike Potter Minh otter the owner of parts for VW's comm if you're a Volkswagen nerd you know that site and it was featured in European car magazine in 1989 that's six years before posts Malone was even born when Jason got the car it was running an 8 valve 4-cylinder ABA motor that you find in a third gen golf it has some goodies on it and made a totally respectable 140 her Spurs which in a car that basically weighs three and a half pounds is plenty of power the previous owner has done a bunch of suspension parts at it and Jason says that it was pretty sweet so naturally he did what any of us would do he immediately ripped it apart and ruined it he spent the next nine years chipping away at this build whenever he could the more jason started working on the Scirocco the more he wanted to do to it all those little tweaks and changes and plans added up to this thing a car that I believed to be a legitimate work of art to me the engine is almost as wild as the paint and the reason that I got so excited about it when Jason first posted this car on VW vortex like nine years ago what you see here is a motor from a u.s. f3 formula car us f3 was a short-lived open-wheel racing series that used a special spec engine now Jason knew if that these were based on Volkswagen motors and when the series went under he scoured the classifieds and found two of them collecting dust in the back of a warehouse somewhere the block is from a very low volume out II that was only sold in Europe it's all aluminum then he had custom high-compression pistons made by je and they produce an impressive 14 to 1 compression ratio in short that means that this thing sounds crispy especially when you factor in the fact that it revs to 8500 rpm now here's where things get a little crazy and where the motor reflects the theme of the rest of the car yes it is insane to take a motor out of an open-wheel race car and shove it into 35-year old Volkswagen but since this engine was designed to sit in the back of said formula car it wasn't expected to have one of these a hood as it stood the intake would have stuck out six inches from the top of the hood now most of us would say oh cool let's do that it would look sick but Jason is not like the rest of us he cut it up Jason had to cut reposition and weld this very rare intake back together what's he gonna do got a hole in his hood no what might seem wrong or a pain in the ass at first sometimes ends up being the right path the intake is topped with a custom carbon fiber plenum which pressurizes the air entering the motor improving air flow and performance Jason estimates that this engine makes around 100 80 Hertz purrs which ain't bad and it sounds sick as I mentioned before Jason is like peak car nerd and possibly the nerdiest car nerd thing in the world is the burg Cup Hill Climb series in Europe they race everything from X DTM cars to open wheelers Jason spent many a night watching Hill Climb clips on the youtubes he knew that his car had to look like the ones on his computer screen the one characteristic that all bird Cup cars share is huge fender flares to accommodate the fat meats underneath when he got the fenders he color matched him to the Scirocco took the bumpers off painted his side markers and threw the kid on the arches fit perfect around the tires and wheels the process for choosing the wheels was an arduous one until one day he remembered hey I own a wheel company duh now Jason has fitted a number of wheel sets over the years including row deform SJ sees they all looked good but they didn't quite suit the car just right eventually he landed on the fully polished 15-inch wrote a Form B u sees they round off the theme well they have old-school motorsport influence but they're shiny this whole car is such a beautiful contradiction hey I'm a race car I'm painting what am i screw you dad I wish I was never bored but I do wish I was born because now I get attention and I'm beautiful feels good to be back in a Scirocco the theme of the car continues into the interior now remember Jason didn't intend for this car to end up as an art car it's a fully armed operational battle station it's a track car in every decision in here reflects just that the stack dash display tells you everything you need to know just like up to speed this Alcantara Sparco wheel gives you a place to put your hands this shift knob is awesome I ordered one for my car the seats are there to keep you in place in the sparkle belt in six-point roll cage keep you a lot if this interior wants me to do anything it makes me want to go fast to hell with the speed limit if you looking around you can start to see that this isn't some pristine show car you can see the seams where the floorboards meet the firewall the floor itself has strips of grip tape on it there's so few things in this interior that I can probably name them all on two hints let's do this okay steering wheel - stack display I'll say switches are one shifter shift knob seats roll cage electric steering fuel pump fuel cell pedals almost obviously the most eye-catching part of this entire build is the paint the artwork was done by los angeles-based artist Niko's cleaner aka ornamental conifer he's done everything from fancy gallery work to helmets for Daniel Ricciardo and Ryan Tuerck and he's the art director of race service Jason originally approached Niko in hope of commissioning a skateboard with the rota form logo on it but Niko wasn't interested in doing something on a small scale at the time once they got to talk it you know like grows do Niko told Jason that he used to drive the Volkswagen Caddy when he lived back in Englund Jason mentioned the Scirocco and showed Niko some pictures Niko knew immediately that he wanted to paint that car conifer asked for full creative control when it came to the scheme and Jason gave it to him this was the result it's a vibrant and mesmerizing cacophony of rainbow gradients tape masks gridlines and half pane and lettering scroll it on the wheel arches is a simple and powerful message the future is our fault a simple reminder that both action and inaction have consequences that's pretty heavy especially for a car as built as this one the blur effect is meant to make people stop maybe believe that their phone is taking too long to load a picture these are not phrases you see painted on race cars if you see phrases at all but that's how conifer does things seeing this car in person is a totally different experience than seeing it in pictures in person you can see brushstrokes in the paint there was always gonna be imperfections and that's what makes it human Niko didn't even clearcoat it but that's part of it I was talking on the phone with Jason you know because we're friends and he said something that really resonated with me that this world we're living in where every SEMA build has to be perfect and pristine is dumb and he's right if everything is perfect then it loses what makes it unique look at the door handles on this car they have visible where it I think they're original but we don't know because there's no records of it this car wasn't restored and it was built how Jason wanted it not how he thought other people would want it thanks to fixed for sponsoring this episode of bumper to bumper fix is an onboard diagnostic reader for your car it translates complex car issues into easy-to-understand info that is sent straight to an app on your phone it's an affordable alternative to other more expensive obd2 readers which can give you less information for more money with Vicks you get live data and in-depth diagnostics sent right to your phone without all the hassle of going to a mechanic and it reminds you when your car is due for maintenance thanks again fixed thanks for watching donut media I cannot tell you guys how grateful I am that you like these videos we're almost at two million subscribers I cannot believe that that is bonkers follow me on instagram at JS pump freefall donut on instagram at dona media I'm gonna make this show every Tuesday till the day I die every Thursday check out this episode of my other show up to speed check out this episode of my son Nolan show wheel house big thanks to Jason from rotifer for letting us borrow his car and for nico AKA ornamental conifer for talking to us on the phone this is really great i love you