John Buttera, 68; builder of hot rods
The Wisconsin native, who made his name in Southern California's racing culture, is credited with a key engineering advance that helped him create sleeker, lighter hot rods.
John Buttera, a trendsetting builder of hot rods and race cars whose minimalist designs and mechanical ingenuity influenced racing for decades, has died. He was 68.
Buttera died March 2 of complications from brain cancer at Los Alamitos Medical Center, said his friend Kevin Bell.
Don Prudhomme, a drag-racing legend who won several national events in a Buttera-built car, told the Times, "You couldn't help but admire him. He was the best. Not only was he an innovator, he just did things that other chassis builders didn't do."
Prudhomme recalled how "this guy from Wisconsin" showed up in California -- the hotbed of racing -- with a car he built for Mickey Thompson that was "the coolest thing I'd ever seen."
The engineering and craftsmanship were unmatched, Prudhomme said.
"Everybody we raced wanted to see the Buttera car," he said. "Guys lined up at his door to get one."
Brad Fanshaw, who is president of Bonspeed Wheels, called Buttera "an absolute genius who reinvented whatever he touched. He didn't just make it more beautiful; he revolutionized almost anything he got involved in."
Buttera is credited with being the first to carve customized racing car parts out of aluminum blocks known as billets, an engineering leap that helped him create sleeker, lighter hot rods. A craze for billet parts took off in the 1980s and is still evident in racing today.
In 1976, Buttera built a Model A roadster that was the first hot rod to extensively use machined billet-aluminum components, according to a history of hot rodding on the website How Stuff Works. The car stood out for its suspension components and exterior parts such as side mirrors made from aluminum. It also pushed design forward for another reason -- it was devoid of chrome.
"Billet turned into probably the biggest thing in hot rodding since the tire," the history recounted.
The first billet part Buttera fabricated was a rearview mirror he made for a friend, influential hot rod designer Boyd Coddington, who died,1,2417099.story Feb. 27, four days before Buttera.
When asked how he did it, Buttera reportedly replied: "That's easy -- just cut away everything that doesn't look like a rearview mirror."
The Buttera-Coddington partnership also resulted in a three-piece billet wheel that is credited with launching the big business of aftermarket high-end aluminum wheels. The revolution prompted Coddington to found a company, Boyd Wheels. Coddington, who was the more famous of the pair, was more interested in the business side of racing, Bell said.
