This is an original Indy Car-style go-kart built by the Bird Corporation and finished in an eye-catching yellow #25 Cummins livery, likely based on Al Unser’s 1987 Indy 500 winning car.
These karts are popular with collectors for obvious reasons – they look just as good on static display as they do lapping a kart track. This one is powered by a more modern pull-start Predator OHV single-cylinder engine linked to a centrifugal clutch and chain drive.
This is an original Indy Car-style go-kart built by the Bird Corporation and finished in an eye-catching yellow #25 Cummins livery, likely based on Al Unser’s 1987 Indy 500 winning car.
History Speedrun: Bird Corporation
Bird Engineering was a Nebraska-based manufacturer of go-karts, minibikes, and three-wheelers, founded in 1959 – right near the beginning of the go kart boom that exploded across the USA. The company was initially based in Omaha, Nebraska, though by the mid-to-late 1960s it had relocated to Fremont, Nebraska.
Bird built a huge range of smaller-sized recreational vehicles from the late 1950s through into the 1970s, most following a bird-themed naming convention. Go-kart models included the Hawk, Eagle, Starbird, Baja, Baja Magnum, and Funderbird, while the minibike lineup included the Wren, Lark, Duck, and Falcon, alongside a Mini MX motocross-style machine. Interestingly, Bird also made three-wheelers and offered T-Bucket roadster kits.
Bird products were sold directly and through major catalog retailers including Sears, JC Penney, and Montgomery Ward, often under the retailer’s own branding. A Sears-specification Starbird, for example, was stripped of the rubber pedal pads, aluminium split rims, hand-brake lever, and bodywork that came standard on the direct-sale version.
Mechanically, the karts were typical of their era. Tubular steel frames carried small Briggs & Stratton or Tecumseh flathead engines offering modest power, driving the rear axle through a centrifugal clutch and chain. Earlier 1960s models used scrub brakes, while later karts from the 1980s onward had either scrub or drum brakes.
Bird Engineering was bought out by Phoenix Engineering in the early 1980s. By the mid-to-late 1980s there were a bunch of entities operating under names like Bird Corporation, Bird USA Inc, and Bird Mini-Wheels – all based in Elkhorn, a small town west of Omaha. The exact corporate relationships between these names are seemingly lost to history, though they do appear to represent a continuation of the original Bird brand.
Under this later incarnation, the company shifted its focus toward fiberglass-bodied go-karts styled as miniature replicas of real racing cars. These included IndyCar-style open-wheelers, NASCAR-style stock cars wearing Ford Thunderbird and Buick bodywork with period sponsor liveries, Formula 1 replicas, and designs modeled on machines like the March 86C in which Al Unser Sr. won the 1987 Indianapolis 500.
The seller bought this kart in 2023, its fiberglass body is finished in a yellow #25 Cummins livery with black and blue stripes, and it sits on a black-finished steel frame and floor pan. The bodywork has body-color front and rear wings, winglets ahead of the rear wheels, a chrome front roll hoop, and sponsor decals including Bud Light, Holset, Hertz, Penske, Boss, and Goodyear.
A 1994 Ford Mustang Indianapolis 500 Pace Car replica was also produced in a limited run. Some of these later karts were built as promotional tools for automotive dealerships and gas station giveaways rather than standard retail products, though they remained fully functional machines built on tubular steel frames with Briggs & Stratton or Tecumseh engines.
Surviving Bird karts from both eras have become hugely collectible. Early Bird Engineering models like the Starbird are genuinely rare – one dedicated collector counted only 14 known examples in 2019 – while later fiberglass-bodied replicas surface periodically through specialist dealers and auction platforms, always generating plenty of interest.
The Indy Car Replica Go-Kart Shown Here
This is an Indy Car-style go kart, built by the Bird Corporation of Elkhorn, Nebraska. We’ve written about these karts before, and we featured a “Burger King” liveried example here a while back.
The seller bought this kart in 2023, its fiberglass body is finished in a yellow #25 Cummins livery with black and blue stripes, and it sits on a black-finished steel frame and floor pan. The bodywork has body-color front and rear wings, winglets ahead of the rear wheels, a chrome front roll hoop, and sponsor decals including Bud Light, Holset, Hertz, Penske, Boss, and Goodyear.
These karts are popular with collectors for obvious reasons – they look just as good on static display as they do lapping a kart track. This one is powered by a more modern pull-start Predator OHV single-cylinder engine linked to a centrifugal clutch and chain drive.
The kart rolls on 6 inch wheels fitted with Cheng Shin bias-ply slick tires and is slowed by a drum brake on the rear axle. The cockpit holds a single black vinyl-trimmed seat positioned behind a steering yoke and pedals mounted above the front axle. Power comes from a pull-start Predator OHV single-cylinder engine linked to a centrifugal clutch and chain drive.
It’s now being offered for sale out of Newbury Park, California on Bring a Trailer on a bill of sale. If you’d like to read more about it or place a bid you can visit the listing here.
Images courtesy of Bring a Trailer
Articles that Ben Branch has written have been covered on CNN, Popular Mechanics, Smithsonian Magazine, Road & Track Magazine, the official Pinterest blog, the official eBay Motors blog, BuzzFeed, Autoweek Magazine, Wired Magazine, Autoblog, Gear Patrol, Jalopnik, The Verge, and many more.
Silodrome was founded by Ben back in 2010, in the years since the site has grown to become a world leader in the alternative and vintage motoring sector, with well over a million monthly readers from around the world and many hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
