Beck 550 Spyder

Description

OFFERED WITHOUT RESERVE

Hagerty Marketplace is honored to offer another selection of vehicles from The SugarCreek Collection. This private collection in southwestern Ohio is supported by its own in-house restoration and maintenance shop, with a full-time staff of craftsmen. The garage is a true spectrum of car enthusiast dreams, ranging from unfinished restorations to the most recent sale of the SEMA-exhibited 1,000 HP 1962 Dodge Power Wagon, supporting the Mike Rowe WORKS Foundation. Thirty select cars from the collection are being offered just in time for spring. Whether awaiting restoration, preserved showroom stock, restored to like-new, or tastefully modified, these cars and trucks are truly SugarCreek quality. 

*  *  *

Few cars have the timeless look and nimble performance of the 1950s Porsche 550 Spyder. But since those original Porsches come with multi-million-dollar price tags, the Beck Spyder was created to provide the same thrilling driving experience—at a fraction of the price.

Based on a tube-frame chassis mated to a handmade fiberglass body, the Beck Spyder is a truly analog sports car. The driver slides down into a tan leather bucket seat and straps into a race harness, admiring the view of the body-color dashboard, wood-trimmed steering wheel, and period-look circular gauges. The shift handle falls easily to hand, and revving the air-cooled flat four quickly gets the 1,300-pound droptop moving. The handling is light and neutral, with course corrections handled by breathtakingly fun throttle-down steering. A Motor Trend test of a 155-hp Beck Spyder revealed, “Light weight is the Beck Spyder’s trump card—one of the reasons the original was such a successful racer, often against much more powerful competition. A 0-60 time of 5.3 seconds is impressive, no matter what era a car was born in.”

This Beck Spyder is finished in red with white stripes, and is ready to provide exhilarating, top-down driving.

Highlights 

• Offered from The SugarCreek Collection  

• Iconic Spyder look and driving experience without the original Spyder price tag 

• Rear-mounted, air-cooled VW flat-four engine 

• Four-speed manual transaxle  

• Finished in Red with White stripes, with a Tan leather interior 

• Hand-laid fiberglass body over a tubular frame 

• Dual carburetors 

Features 

• Chrome wheel covers 

• Circular speedometer, tachometer, temperature, and fuel level gauges 

• Wood-rimmed steering wheel with Porsche center cap 

• Windshield-mounted rearview mirror 

• Racing lap seat belts 

Known Imperfections 

• Paint chips on front end, on bottom of driver side door, beside passenger side taillight, below engine cover vent, on top of instrument panel, and on metal bulkhead in front of seats   

• Pitting on chrome wheel covers  

• Imperfections on left side of speedometer lens  

• Some discoloration of panel behind seats  

 Included 

• Keys 

• Tan snap-on cover 

Ownership History

This Beck Spyder is estimated to be an early Gen 1 car from the 1980s. It wears an Assigned Identification Number from the state of California, and its Beck Development body tag shows a serial number of 043, making it one of the early models from the Upland, California facility.

Additional Notes

A Broad Arrow Auctions Specialist is working as an agent on behalf of the owner of this vehicle. Broad Arrow Auctions is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hagerty.

Contact: Matt Lowney Phone: 623.308.2640 email: mlowney@hagerty.com