Kyle Moody

Kyle Moody of Overland Park thinks of his 1965 Chevrolet Impala like an artist does a canvas. He wants his car to be a creation.

"I can't have a run-of-the-mill car,"he said. "It can't be normal. I want it to be out of this world."

To that end, his car is quite a creation. At first glance, you would think it is a mildly customized hardtop, but once Moody puts his car into one of its more exotic "poses,"you can see that it changes shape almost as dramatically as a Transformer toy. The entire front end ó meaning fenders, grille and bumper ó slide forward and tilt down. The passenger door is hinged at the bottom and opens out like a drawbridge. The trunk lid is hinged at the back and opens as if it were a rumble seat. Sixteen switches and four hydraulic cylinders enable the car to raise, squat or lift one wheel like a cat pawing the air. It can be manipulated side to side and front-to-back.

This car truly is an amazing combination of imagination and hard work. The metal flake paint sparkles in the sunlight as if diamonds were hiding under the surface. "I like the challenge of creating something new," Moody said.

Moody, a graphic designer, spent countless hours working nights and weekends on his car. It has taken him about five or six years of working in his spare time to get it to this state. The car he started with was not much more than a hulk that his dad, Don, found sitting in a field near his hometown of Parsons, Kan.

Moody and his dad share an interest in cars, and his dad helped him with a lot of the work before Moody moved here in 2000.

The interior is an example of Moodyís persistence. This is the third time he has redesigned it so it flows thematically with the exterior of the car. He crafted the seats from parts of stools and sheets of Masonite. He cut the foam pads and his mom, Debra, taught him to sew the upholstery on her sewing machine. "We finally bought him a button machine,î his dad said, ìso he could install the buttons easily."

Moody enjoys driving older cars. His everyday car is a 1953 Chevy, and his next project is to restore and mildly customize his great uncleís 1948 Chevy. But he still likes to fire up his 65 Chevy and "roll."

"That's what it should be about," he said, "driving your car."