All right now for some stop light racing. There's a Honda Odyssey van next to me. but I have an HHR panel SS with launch control and a turbo so we're going to spool this thing up and go. Oh yeah, trip the tires, it's all over the place.

This thing seems to run very, very well. Welcome to Hoopies Garage! It's the dumbest Automotive channel in all of YouTube and this is my latest purchase that I bought at Barrett Jackson actually just before selling my cars, this was on Thursday and it is one of the rarest cars to sell here at Barrett Jackson Las Vegas 2023, but also one of the cheapest at least the second or third cheapest car to sell. I Paid sixty five hundred dollars for this 2009 Chevrolet HHR panel SS This is absolutely a car that nobody wanted that couldn't be sold and they only made 216 of the HHR panel. SS's for the 2009 model year.

That is it. And then these were completely done and thrown away in the recession in General Motors bankruptcy. It's the goofiest weirdest thing that I have bought in a very long time and atop that it has almost 200 000 miles on it so it's actually used as intended. goofy goofy thing.

so just a bit of background. The HHR came out several years after the PT Cruiser when I was working at the Chevrolet dealer around the 2007-2008 timeline and they actually stole away the PT Cruiser designer to make their own with Chevy, but they were way way too late by then the PT Cruiser went from being this very exciting car for my grandparents generation. People were buying them in droves to being sort of a punch line. sort of a very much hated car and so to have a competition to that? Well, it was definitely too late so nobody bought them.

But to get more excitement they made the SS version which got a really nice motor. As far as performance was not too much in the durability departments which we'll get into that in a little bit but also to do something different. they came out with this panel version which is like the old panel Vans back in the day which sort of made sense. You got a four-cylinder van if you will that had much better gas mileage than a Ford Econoline or Chevy Express which gas prices were very very AI at this point, but obviously a very very goofy thing.

No windows here at all, no rear seats I'll show you in the tour in a little bit, but then, well, why not option it with the SS which absolutely nobody bought like I said 216 of these in existence and I own one. it is the automatic. Sadly, there are some manual ones out there, but it's still an absolute unicorn that I got for, well, peanuts when it comes to Modern General Motors Performance Vehicles This is probably the rarest of the last 15 20 here. So yeah.

I I'm giddy. So let's start the tour of this ridiculous, ridiculous, thing which this is the morning of. Saturday So my three big cars have not sold yet. You'll see the video before where they've all sold.

I Don't know what they brought yet so I'm still in a good mood or who knows. I may be in a great mood tonight with the cars doing well or may not if they don't but we'll see. they're in great spots, but most certainly in a good mood with this crazy thing thing. There is the SS badge turbo charged on this goofy goofy panel van with the alloy wheels and the body kit.

It just looks so dang neat. Something out of the 40s and 50s and I just can imagine putting Hoovie's garage down the side of this thing or something the Top Gear would do where it turns into penis or something when you open the door. haven't figured that out quite yet, but overall in really nice shape. the paint could certainly use a deep correction and it's definitely had some paint work done before.

but no accidents on the vehicle history reports and you know overall really nice. which considering this thing has almost 200 000 miles on it, that is really impressive. Now when you go into the interior of this ridiculous thing, well, we have an interesting combination. here.

In the seats, you have sort of a red vinyl or leather. you have a mesh here and then you have kind of a suede which is held up really well actually the armrest I believe have blown out a little bit. but back here there is no rear seat whatsoever and you saw there's no exterior door handles. The key fob will have a key to pop it.

But also here are the poppers for the rear doors which we can open but also the interior door handles. They wanted this to be a cargo van, a work van and when I was working at the Chevrolet dealer they brought these out. We had a couple of them come in not the SS models of course and uh, we didn't get it. I mean it was very very hard to sell.

We did get some orders and they were sold that way. but as far as the ones sitting on the lot, they sat for a very long time and didn't sell. But I mean it kind of made sense. You had this very flat hard plastic cargo area.

this one has the mats and you have these storage Cubbies for your tools in the front and the back. open the hatch. It is quite spacious. I mean very practical for these purposes and save a lot of gas mileage if you don't need the big giant van.

So it did make sense a very European type of thing even though it's sort of a tribute to the Retro cars but obviously didn't sell very well. and GM when they did go bankrupt, they got rid of anything that was sort of weird and frilly and haven't done anything that wild since. Of course the Corvette There's some exceptions, but as far as these retro Throwbacks they were stopped hard. the HHR, the SSR and of course Pontiac and Saturn went away as well.

which this one shares the drivetrain with the hot Saturn Sky Redline and the Pontiac Solstice GXP. So we'll look under the hood here. you can see I have that boost cage here and the tachometer. All right, let's take a look under the hood here.

the legendary or inFAMOUS 2-liter Ecotec turbo. So this power plant shared with some of the hot GM cars of the day but also got loaned out to cars like the Fisker Karma. There's actually a Fisker Karma here. a 2012.

The crazy hybrid car sold for only 21 000 so quite a bit of depreciation. It was a nice car 30 000 miles too, but uh yeah, the HHR got it as well I say Infamous because they were pretty fragile. This is GM's first attempt at doing a high strung turbo four-cylinder 260 horsepower. Pretty good for the time, but uh yeah, they had a tendency to pop I believe it's timing chain failures and the engines would just completely grenade and apparently that has happened on this car.

I Do see some remnants of a very angry mechanic here trying to change something and banging up the radiator support but in the vehicle description it does say it has a replace 2-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine which is very very common because the early ones these 2009s they would love to pop. How recent I don't know, it doesn't look like it's that recent. Uh, they at least swapped over the intake but the bottom end doesn't look that fresh now. I Have very low expectations on this car because it was so cheap and it has so high mileage.

You know you're buying an auction you don't know what you're going to get versus test driving it so you have to sort of keep that in mind when it comes to issues. but to also well, there is a dried puddle of probably antifreeze right here, which yeah, I'm guessing we have a leak somewhere around the water pump or one of the radiator hoses or something. So yeah, that'll be interesting. but I'm not going to take it out just yet.

There's my cars to sell here at Bear Jackson One More Day of live TV coverage and then I get to take my prize out and cruise the Las Vegas Strip and then bring it back to Kansas What a stupid car! but before the auction starts Super Saturday Let me take you around and show you some of the best buys and the cheapest cars at Fair Jackson There really is something for everybody here and you can get something. There's some great deals, some incredible deals that across the block uh like the HHR well I really I don't know because there's never one that's been sold as far as I can tell, especially with the miles on it. but uh yeah. I think the cheapest car at the auction in general that's not like a go-kart or something was this BMW 733i really nice clean car.

actually 161 000 miles. These are really solid simple vehicles and well guess what it's sold for? You won't believe it. Only 3 300 dollars. So I believe that was the cheapest car to sell.

It was a few cars after the HHR panel and then the next cheapest probably was this this Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham which a very nice interior showing only 65 000 miles. this one only five thousand dollars which is a great buy most certainly Carmen Gia with no rust, twelve thousand dollars or the Intimidator Monte Carlo SS this was sold through Dale Earnhardt dealerships after his death of 2004. Supercharged 3800 under the hood. this one 4500 bucks.

I mean the paint is a little baked on the hood, but that is stupendously cheap. I'll show you a few more including one that I would have bought, but I was too busy with the TV coverage yesterday. I'm going to kick myself on this car for the rest of my life and then well, I'll start doing my actual work here at the auction. But yeah, this one a major major deal right here.

a Bentley Turbo R with nice paint, low mileage uh, the white wall tires not my favorite thing in the world, but way way nicer than my old turbo are showing 37 000 miles and guess what? Sold for only 10 000 for a 90? Bentley Turbo R Incredible buy I mean even if it needed ten thousand dollars worth of work, you're still under the money now. There are plenty of cars that bring a lot and I'm very surprised by those numbers, but with an auction, you never know and there are some real deal Bargains here on the early days at Barry Jackson and this is the one where I'll be kicking myself for the rest of my life because I've been looking for one of these. a 2002 Trans Am Commemorative Edition the end of the line for the Trans Am period with the LS1 motor the six-speed manual, but this one even more special. It's one of two of the Daytona 500 pace cars this was driven by Jay Leno in 2002.

He autographed it under the hood and he loved it so much he ended up buying one himself that he still has in his collection to this day. but this is the one that he drove in the Daytona 500s. It is a real deal pace car once again. 5 000 miles on this thing.

six-speed manual Exactly how you would want it. I would have bought this thing I would have paid forty thousand dollars for it if I was there standing on the Block I would have bid it up to there but I was busy filming something on the other side over here. Completely missed it. It sold for twenty two thousand dollars.

Twenty two thousand dollars. All right. I've got the keys to this thing and it does have the awkward poppers for the side doors too. so like an old hot rod I can pop the left door with the fob like that.

What a neat little party trick. Just don't handle on the outside. but uh yeah. okay.

let's see. did I mention that it has almost 200 000 miles on it? 19077 So the original motor uh obviously long gone blown on this thing. but uh yeah, it actually is running really really well. There's no lights, it's cold air every everything's working.

Let's see. I'll let the traction control off and then competitive mode launch control. There it is. This thing has launch control which I will not do here inside.

that would probably get me fired from this. but I'll hit it again and see what that's like. but wow so far driving great. There's Teagan taught him how to drive stick in a video a long time ago now he's interning at Uh Barrett-Jackson from Kansas So anyway, out we go.

You're free! I am officially an HHR SS panel owner and I'm gonna Cruise the strip in this thing. Oh oh you betcha I'm gonna screw this trip in this thing. One thing to see before we go though. look at that 49 Cadillac Now that's the normal coupe.

not the Fastback like mine, but absolutely gorgeous. And that one sold for sixty thousand dollars. A stock motor. so very different from mine but gorgeous all right.

The rarest GM to performance vehicle made in the last 20 years but also the dumbest in launch control. Go! All the torques deer is unbelievable. that is so goofy. 260 horsepower in a little bitty panel van.

That's ridiculous Young Go straight. That's actually pretty darn good power. I am speeding terribly right now towards this trip. How about that and it's 190 000 miles and everything's working.

The air is cool, sunroof's working the suspension. it actually feels well I don't know what they felt like new I guess I drove one 15 years ago, but it feels feels tight. brakes are good. yes, what the heck, that is pretty cool.

pretty pretty darn cool. and now we're pulling out to cruise on. Las Vegas Boulevard in the bell of the ball of the Barrett-Jackson Las Vegas auction. All right now for some stoplight racing.

There's a Honda Odyssey van next to me. but I have an HHR panel SS with launch control and a turbo so we're going to spool this thing up and go. Oh yeah, trip the tires, it's all over the place. This thing seems to run very, very, well.

Wow. Okay, well I guess I'll have this thing shipped back home and the car wizard can look it over. but I'm not noticing any obvious issues. Could it be these things are actually really well-built cars? I Kind of thought that they were junky 2000s GM Products that really don't hold up all that well.

Of course the engines are glass, the engine is blown on this thing once and it's been replaced. so I'm sure that's helping this car and why it runs so well, but everything else feels so tight. and actually I forgot to tell a story which may have something to do with the condition, but actually the person who sold this bought it at Barrett-Jackson in 2016 when it had like 50 or 60 000 miles on it. He paid about 10 grand more for it, used it as his work fan, and then sold it again at Barrett Jackson So what a great way to buy and sell a car.

When you're done with it, just take it to the auction and see what it brings I suppose. but uh yeah, happy as a clam, even with the torque steer he's coming home to. Kansas Thank you so much for watching.