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“I found it on Salt Spring Island about three years before the start of the project. It was sitting under this shelter and it didn’t have any valve covers. The guy said I could just have the motor and transmission but he wanted to keep the valve covers. I ended up getting the motor for free and paying $150 for the valve covers,” says Schneider. During the rebuild Schneider discovered that the intake from the ’49 wouldn’t fit the ’55 motor so he found a Weiand unit to perch the Strombergs on. The transmission he mated to the ’55 Olds is a Borg-Warner Super T-10, 4-speed but the 1955 Chevy swing pedal remains.

Schneider says the past kept popping up during the rebuild. When he was looking for a place to get a cam ground for the ’55 Olds he called Shadvolt Cams in Vancouver, a business founded in 1954 by Roy Shadvolt. “I was talking to Barry Rutherford (primary owner of Shadvolt since 1984 but co-owner since 1969) one night and when I mentioned what I wanted it clicked with him and he remembered grinding the cam for El Torro’s’49 Olds when he was a Shadvolt employee in 1958.” Mid-Island Engine and Machine (Duncan, BC) built the ’55 Olds with mostly stock parts, though the adjustable pushrods (necessary to use hydraulic lifters) were made by a couple in Oregon. An NOS water pump came out of Ontario. The headers don’t resemble the original but do suit the car and were fabricated, with baffles inside to tame the roar of the beast a bit, by Lawrence Vino out of Duncan, BC. The price for nostalgia is high, says Schneider. “I could have built two small-block Chevys for what it cost me to build this motor.”

The original chrome work on the car was done by Victoria Plating and when it came time to rechrome some of the pieces Schneider took the parts to the same place, still in business more than 50 years later. “They did it all in less than three weeks to help us meet our Deuce Day goal,” says Schneider.

For final colour Schneider thought it would be cool to go with something close to the Robin’s Egg blue Walker had originally sprayed on the roadster. A satin blue colour was chosen and applied but when it went blotchy Walker sanded it off and suggested they just stick with the greeny-blue primer, which is what they did. Abby Aspin of Chemainus applied the El Torro moniker and pinstripes. Schneider even kept the stainless steel firewall insert, though initially he didn’t want to. “Then I thought, no, it came with the car and it’s going back on.”

The original seat was gone when Schneider bought the car so a modified Dodge Caravan rear bench seat was installed and Geoff Horsfall of Duncan, BC stitched a sweet white vinyl tuck & roll interior. The original 1956 MG hand brake remains.

The car was finished Friday night before the main 2010 Northwest Deuce Days event in downtown Victoria. Since then, Schneider has rolled up close to 2,000 miles on the roadster and is proud he was able to be a part of preserving a piece of Vancouver Island hot rod history.

But nostalgia is a fickle emotion. Schneider has owned ’56-57 Chevy Nomads and always loved the style. He says there is one out there calling his name but first El Torro will have to find a new home. He hopes it’s on Vancouver Island but wherever El Torro roams it’s going to continue to be a very cool, rip-snorting ’50s hot rod.

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