Boyd Coddington, the hot-rod innovator whose creations won the coveted Grand National Roadster Show’s America’s Most Beautiful Roadster (AMBR) trophy a record six times, died Wednesday morning of undisclosed causes. He was 63.

Coddington was raised in rural Idaho but moved to Southern California as soon as he could to pursue his dream of building hot rods. He quickly earned a reputation for subtle, stylistic innovations on what had been an almost overdone theme–the ‘32 Ford roadster. That branched out to ’33s, ’34s and then all manner of surprising twists on iconic themes. Names such as Boydster, Smoothster, Alumacoupe and Chezoom redefined what a rod could be.

His wheels were equally well known, particularly those shaved from billet aluminum. He soon earned the nickname “Billet Boyd” for his techniques machining aluminum.

At first I have heard rumors that he fell at his So Cal home this morning and was hospitalised, however later reports confirmed that he died. His cars were one of few “hot rods” that I liked. RIP Boyd.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 27th, 2008 at 5:22 pm and is filed under Auto, Cars, Trucks, Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.