[Hugh R]

I work on motion picture and television production for one of the major studios, and we almost never use fiberglassed mockups of cars, too expensive to fabricate. We'll crash/blowup/burn whatever the Director/Producers want, although we try and get the cheapest thing that is closest to what they want. If we're blowing up a car, we may buy a car with a shot motor or a salvage vehicle. If we're crashing the car we may pull the fuel tank and replace it with a one gallon reinforced fuel cell, a four or five point harness and remove the air bags. If we're flipping the vehicle it usually gets a roll cage as well. A typical one hour TV action series costs over $2 million per episode to produce, so they buy pretty much whatever they want. The key question is what does it cost to get the vehicle to the point where the Director is happy. If you have to buy a six cylinder hardtop camaro and spend more time (Union workers) to modify it to look like a Z-28 convertible, than it costs to buy the Z-28 convertible in the first place, they will almost always take the cheaper option (time permitting).