The Oldsmobile Toronado was produced between 1965 and 1992 over four generations, eventually replaced by the Oldsmobile Aurora. Now, however, one digital artist is resurrecting the Toronado with a modernized powertrain, infusing the two-door luxury coupe with all-electric motivation.
Coming to us from Abimelec Arellano on social media (@abimelecdesign), the artist was inspired by the plethora of all-electric restomod builds that showed up at the 2021 SEMA Show in Las Vegas. Indeed, the annual custom show was swimming with old-school metal propelled by electrons – just a few examples would include the Tesla-powered Chevy C10, and Project X, a 1957 Chevy 210 with a 340-horsepower Cadillac Lyriq powertrain.
This 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado continues the tradition with its own all-electric swap, placing new EV components under the hood. The new electric motors up front are cooled by a dual fan setup inspired by Icon’s Derelict EV restomods. The components are added in the rear as well to give this two-door some all-wheel-drive grip, while also providing some improvements with regard to handling and weight distribution.
To note, the original 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado stuffed a V8 engine and front-wheel-drive drivetrain under the hood, making for a rather unusual setup. As such, an AWD EV swap may not be all that out of the ordinary, at least relatively speaking.
Further upgrades include some subtle exterior modifications, including a set of new Rotiform KPS wheels in the corners. These split-spoke rollers get a silver finish for the inner design with a carbon fiber barrel and lip, with a riveted inner design and red center caps. The whole thing is also lowered over the new Rotiform rollers to give it a modern vibe in line with the all-electric powertrain.
Also check the carbon fiber front spoiler lip, plus the upturned spoiler on the trunk. Inside the cabin, we spot black-and-red upholstery to finish it off.
You can browse the full set of rendering images below:
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Comments
Notice they don’t give ranges on these conversions.
Also not Ford claims it sold out the EV crate motor. But they never say how many they sold,
Any vehicle not designed from the start to be electric is just a half A$$ EV.
“Rendering”
“digital artist”
This isn’t real. It doesn’t exist.
If you’d like, I’ll go ahead and give it an estimated range of zero miles per charge. Fully recharges in zero minutes.
Interesting there are no pictures of the powertrain.
Always thought the ’66 Tornado and ’67 Eldorado set GM light-years ahead in automotive design.
Should mention ’63 C2 and ’63 Riviera. Anticipating very robust commentary regarding historic automotive design.
I had a 1995 Buick Riviera which was a beautiful car, but really wanted a Toronado, that, like this fake representation – no longer existed…But I sure wouldn’t mind if Buick brought that Gorgeous Riviera back – hopefully with ‘unbastardized’ styling as an EV or (after Machete Mary gets her golden parachute), a PHEV.
My Beautiful Car? It died at 74,000 miles (just out of warranty) due to a bang in the torque converter….. Traded it in for a 2004 Kia Amante, a BARGAIN at the time.
What I SHOULD have done is to have a friend weld a closure plate over the exploded hole (the car ran still until the transmission fluid ran out), fill it up with xmission fluid, and keep driving it… Ah, hindsight is always 20/20.
I hate resto-mods, particularly electric ones and we can all be grateful that no actual vintage Toronados were destroyed here except in theory.
I owned a 1993 Toronado Broughm & drove it 5 Yrs, by far that was the mosr comfortable can I have ever driven….I understand regrets when I wish that I’d kept that car. When I wasn’t using that car, I kept it in an air conditioned garage…it
was kept in mint condition & I sold it to a buddy
who bought it for his wife..
1992 was last year for Toronado
Be nice if they actually built an electric car that had the style of some of the classics.
NO, NO, NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I hate to be a stickler but the Toronado was not made in 1965. 1966 was the first year. I’m only saying this because the author said the Toronado was produced in 1965-1992.