This is the Plymouth Fireball 500 by Barris Kustom, it was built as Frankie Avalon’s character’s hero car for the 1966 film also named “Fireball 500.”
The car wasn’t just a show pony, when new it was said to be powered by a 426 cubic inch (7.0 liter) Hemi V8 mated to a 4-speed manual gearbox, and it had a reported top speed of over 160 mph – a highly-respectable achievement in the mid-1960s.
Fast Facts: The 1965 Plymouth Barracuda “Fireball 500”
- The Fireball 500 was built by George Barris for the 1966 film of the same name, starring Frankie Avalon. Based on a 1966 Plymouth Barracuda supplied by Chrysler, it has twin open cockpits, individual curved windshields, rear fins, custom bodywork, and a 40-coat “Fireheat” paint scheme.
- At the time of the film’s release, publicity material claimed the Fireball 500 had a 426 cubic inch (7.0 liter) Hemi V8 producing 425 bhp, paired with a 4-speed manual transmission. However, the surviving car has a 273 cubic inch V8 and automatic transmission. Whether the Hemi was originally installed or simply a promotional claim remains uncertain.
- The Fireball 500 appeared as the personal vehicle of Frankie Avalon’s character, Dave “Fireball” Owens, and towed his number 43 Plymouth race car in the film. Following its release, the custom Barracuda toured promotional events before entering storage, eventually deteriorating considerably through neglect, exposure to the elements, and parts being pilfered.
- Al Macdonald bought the neglected car in 1981 for $1,500 and completed a three-year restoration. It subsequently passed through several collections and sold for $137,500 at Barrett-Jackson in 2015. Now part of Beau Boeckmann’s collection, it will be auctioned without reserve by RM Sotheby’s on January 28, 2027, with a $100,000 to $125,000 estimate.
History Speedrun: The Fireball 500 By Barris Kustom
When it was first built by George Barris, the Fireball 500 was powered by a 426 cubic inch (7.0 liter) Hemi V8, with a 4-speed manual transmission. The car was essentially a heavily-rebuilt 1966 Plymouth Barracuda that had been ordered by American International Pictures from Barris in late 1965 and Chrysler supplied the donor car. Interestingly, Barris was turning a Lincoln Futura concept car into the Batmobile at the same time in the same garage.
This is the “Fireball 500” by Barris Kustom, it was built for Frankie Avalon as the hero car for the 1966 film also named “Fireball 500.”
Building The Fireball
The first-gen Barracuda was a fastback version of the Plymouth Valiant, launched in April of 1964 with a curved 14.4 square foot rear window. As cool as that rear screen might have been, Barris didn’t need it, so he removed it, along with the roof.
In their place his team built two separate cockpits, each had its own cowl hand-formed from metal and a curved windshield made from butyrate plastic. Flared headrests were added around each cockpit opening and ran back into the rear bodywork. There, four razor-edged fins were molded as a single metal section covering what had been the rear seat and trunk lid. It was a wild looking car, even before the paintwork was applied.
The rear fenders were extended and the vertical taillights were lengthened by four inches, rectangular headlights imported from France sat in a reworked grille up front. The wheel wells were enlarged for 700/12.50-13 Firestone tires on 13-inch spoked alloy wheels, side exhausts built from Reynolds aluminum extrusions ran along the rockers, and eight air-intake tubes sat in the hood. Inside, a 13-inch deep-dish steering wheel was fitted as it suited the tight dimensions of the cockpit.
The paint was called Fireheat, it required 40 coats of hand-rubbed lacquer shaded from pearl white through to gold and tangerine to candy red and finally burgundy. It’s said that four men spent six days spraying it, layer after layer.
It’s worth noting that the surviving car differs from the one seen on screen in the shape of its windshields and the division between its two seats. It’s not known whether Barris altered the original film car afterward or built a separate car for promotional purposes, however only this car survives, and the modifications from original do appear relatively minor and may have been made when the car was later restored.
Claimed + Actual Specifications
The mechanical claims were less reliable, AIP’s 1966 publicity material for the movie (and Barris’s own words) describe the car as having a 1966 426 Hemi V8 making 425 bhp. It had an Isky camshaft, Jahns domed pistons and twin four-barrel Holley carburetors, with an Ansen 4-speed box, and 3.55:1 rear gears.
In the film, the Barracuda served as Owens’s road car and tow vehicle, it pulled his number 43 Plymouth, a car Richard Petty was said to have raced in 1965.
The car’s VIN tells us that the car is a 1966 Barracuda with Chrysler’s fifth-character engine code “D” identifying it as a 273 V8. The vehicle is now fitted with a 273 “Commando” V8 mated to an automatic transmission, and it seems unclear whether it really had a Hemi in-period or if this was just PR/marketing material that was a little more aspirational, shall we say.
The car did end up in a state of disrepair later in its life, with parts removed, so it seems possible that if it had a 426 Hemi, one of the most desirable American engines of the time, it might have been removed during this period. Mind you, this is all purely conjecture on my part.
The Fireball 500 On Screen
The film Fireball 500 opened in Houston on June the 9th, 1966, and reached Los Angeles that September. William Asher directed it as a stock car racing picture in the beach party mold, with Frankie Avalon, Annette Funicello, and Fabian in the lead roles. Avalon played Dave “Fireball” Owens, a California racer drawn into running moonshine in South Carolina.
In the film, the Barracuda served as Owens’s road car and tow vehicle, it pulled his number 43 Plymouth, a car Richard Petty was said to have raced in 1965. Major racing sequences were filmed at Saugus Speedway in California, and when another character called the Barracuda a “Batmobile,” Avalon’s character answers that his was built first. This was a reference to the fact that the car was built alongside the Batmobile, and had rolled out of the workshop first.
Interestingly, both the 1966 Batmobile and the Fireball 500 have individual wrap-around windscreens, so perhaps they had influenced each other as they were being designed and built.
The Fireball 500 – After The Movie
After the film’s release, the Fireball 500 car toured to promote the movie and Chrysler – by around 1969 it was in storage on the East Coast, and in early-1972, Barris signed the car over to a warehouse in Rutherford, New Jersey, to settle the storage bill.
It then passed through dealers in New York and New Jersey, two of which used it as a promotional piece. One used-car lot in West Nyack, New York, priced it at just $500.
Macdonald bought it from Dom’s Toyota in 1981, for $1,500, with 5,926 miles on the odometer. It had been sitting outdoors, and as a result, parts had been stolen, water had got inside, a sheet of plywood covered the cockpits, and a tree had grown up through the hood louvers. After three years of restoration work he showed it at the Mopar Nationals at Milan Dragway in August of 1985. He then drove it locally under his dealer plate.
In 1988 or 1989 he sold it to Jerry Juenemann’s Wheels & Spokes museum in Hays, Kansas. It was then later displayed at an amusement park in Washington state before moving to Vancouver, British Columbia.
After the film’s release, the Fireball 500 car toured to promote the movie and Chrysler – by around 1969 it was in storage on the East Coast, and in early-1972, Barris signed the car over to a warehouse in Rutherford, New Jersey, to settle the storage bill.
On January the 17th, 2015, it crossed the block at Barrett-Jackson’s Scottsdale auction with no reserve and sold for $137,500 USD. It later belonged to the film-car collector John Sbrigato, then joined the collection of Galpin Motors president Beau Boeckmann in 2023.
The Fireball 500 is now due to roll across the auction block with RM Sotheby’s without reserve at its Arizona auction on January the 28th, 2027, with an estimate of $100,000 to $125,000 USD. If you’d like to read more about it or register to bid you can visit the listing here.
Images: Robin Adams ©2026 Courtesy of RM Sotheby’s
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.
