Thread: Old cars are so cool

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Was looking at a build on another site and the guy was talking about various parts being so detailed and how the craftsmanship being so cool. Sure don't see that any more. A guy I know has a bunch of old cars, 63 chev convertible, 409, 4 spd, Hudson hornet, and several others that haven't been touched. Won't sell anything of course. He has a 34 Plymouth that is a solid old car, gauges in it look awesome. four door with the vent windows that open, or you can roll the window down vent and all or just the window itself. Would make a real cool street rod with that long chrome grille. Cars used to have class, and things that made them stand out, now they are all starting to look the same. The guy I mentioned still has the 66 vette he bought when he was 16. No real reason for this post, not telling anybody what they don't already know, just venting I guess.

Nothing wrong with venting................some of us do it a lot...........................don't want to explode into a meat mess ya know..........

Meat mess! ROFLMFAO!

We all take turns at venting.. like me and red steelies and wide whites!

Don't even get me started!

OK, my turn - - - - louvered hood and rear deck YUCK OUCH PUKE GAG - - - whew I feel so much better now.
VHT should mean "Venting Happy Therapist"

All the new stuff looks like a used bar of soap, you can't tell one make from another. Well, at least I can't. I remember sitting on the front porch with my maternal grandfather and him teaching me what make, year and model of car and truck was going past the house. He lived right on the main drag of China Grove, North Carolina, so there was plenty of traffic hahahahahaha. I must have been about 6 years old (this was in ~1948) and he was about 66, just having retired as Postmaster at the local Post Office. I have to believe that's where my love of the automobile began. Pretty soon, I could identify everything on the road.

I had a little yellow bicycle that drove the rear wheel with a fan belt instead of a chain and used to ride it on the sidewalks down to the Duke Power office in downtown China Grove to see my Uncle Reed, grandpa's youngest child of 8. Reed had been a Chief Electrician's Mate in the Navy during WWII and continued his career path after the war. He had been a submariner and had some of the greatest stories you ever heard. I remember him telling of one time when they sat on the bottom of the Atlantic ocean for 3 days while Nazi destroyers pummeled them with depth charges. That was a time when boys were forged into men.

Reed had a Plymouth with the 6-banger and a 3-speed and used to take me for rides. There was one long hill right outside town where he would let off the gas and switch the ignition key on and off to make the motor backfire over and over. I would jump up and down on the seat and shriek with delight. Reed would be laughing out loud. Of the few memories I have of my childhood, that one will be with me forever.

As far as stuff I hate, chopped tops are in the lead. Holy Moses, gag and puke on my shoes. There is only one car on the planet that looks better with a chopped top, a '49/'50 Mercury done in the Barris style. Everything else just looks ignorant. Well, with the possible exception of the Pierson Brothers coupe.....
Here is Sam Barris' car....
http://www.kustomrama.com/images/c/c...9-mercury1.jpg
Here is the Pierson Brothers coupe....
http://www.kustomrama.com/images/e/e...os-coupe14.jpg
Here's an example of a POS that should be sent to the crusher....
http://www.2040-cars.com/_content/ca...464827/002.jpg
And another....
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com...6ad0b9a4bd.jpg

I ran across this one, described as chopped and couped, that I actually would be proud to own. Somebody has some real talent for seeing a design that is pleasing to the eye.....
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com...6a6e7a8bb3.jpg

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OMG, you mean I'm older than Tech??????

Originally Posted by MelloYello

OMG, you mean I'm older than Tech??????

If you were born before April 7, 1942, you are.

.

Tech, do you remember the chopped 33 or 34 coupe that used to run at Dahio? It was mid engined and a real drastic chop and I hated that car. The driver set where the engine would normally be and he sat low and and up against the firewall and I couldn't see him, made it a real PITA to flag.

Originally Posted by NTFDAY

Tech, do you remember the chopped 33 or 34 coupe that used to run at Dahio? It was mid engined and a real drastic chop and I hated that car. The driver set where the engine would normally be and he sat low and and up against the firewall and I couldn't see him, made it a real PITA to flag.

I have a very foggy memory of it Ken. I guess my most vivid memory of those times would be Ohio George Montgomery's baby blue '33 Willys hitting a pothole in the strip surface. Can't remember if he broke an axle, but I do remember that I have never seen anybody that mad, before or since.

Hey, look at that, I just passed 11,000 posts.

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Originally Posted by techinspector1

I have a very foggy memory of it Ken. I guess my most vivid memory of those times would be Ohio George Montgomery's baby blue '33 Willys hitting a pothole in the strip surface. Can't remember if he broke an axle, but I do remember that I have never seen anybody that mad, before or since.

Hey, look at that, I just passed 11,000 posts.

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He was an arrogant SOB and I don't think I ever say him smile or say a kind word to anyone. I'll never forget time time he unloaded and was getting ready to make a run when Jeg Sr showed up with his A/A and George put the Willy's back on the trailer and left in a huff.

Congrats on the milestone.

Louvers? Hood, roof and tailgate. Done that.



Chopped top? Two of those.





Different horses for different courses, I guess.

Originally Posted by techinspector1

If you were born before April 7, 1942, you are.

3 months before Pearl Harbor - -

Originally Posted by vht

. Cars used to have class, and things that made them stand out, now they are all starting to look the same..

Anyone wonder if our fathers said the same in '32 with the Ford, Chevys & Plymouths? How about the 33-34's? Throw a Ford grill on anyone of 'em and it takes a extra look for even a hot rodder to tell 'em apart.

Originally Posted by Matthyj

Anyone wonder if our fathers said the same in '32 with the Ford, Chevys & Plymouths? How about the 33-34's? Throw a Ford grill on anyone of 'em and it takes a extra look for even a hot rodder to tell 'em apart.

"You can have any color, as long as it's Black!" -- - - Henry Ford

I suspect a lot of it is driven by what interests you as an individual. One of the things to understand is to roughly 80% of the people out there a car is just another appliance in their life. They have no more emotional attachment to it than to the clothes dryer or can opener. For the nut jobs like us who get all wrapped up in these things it's incomprehensible.

As a kid on the long drives from Chicago to central Kansas each summer I'd play the "name that car game" to pass the time, as some of you probably did too. This sickness we have is apparently born into us. We notice what interests us and file it in the grey matter computer for recovery later.

Even within the hobby you can experience it. I often hear or read someone say......."yeah, '32 roadsters are all the same, they're really boring, blah blah blah...". The same for other year/models, especially if they tend to be out of the commentators price range. But how much different is that from the neighbor gal upon seeing a black '32 roadster in my garage and saying "I thought you sold that car last summer."? "That car" was actually a Model A roadster on '32 rails. Yeah, they are both black, both without hoods, are shaped like a brick with the fenderless wheels sticking out, but to the aficionado there are a lot of differences. Hmmmmm, those "rodders" who rail on the deuce roadster have exactly the same appreciation as the gal who couldn't care less about cars, and rods in particular. If you build a style of car, spend hours, days, weeks, maybe even years, planning, contemplating, redesigning, doing and redoing, bruising knuckles, cursing a ton, and the rest that goes with the process, you have a deeper appreciation for nuance when comparing one car/model to another.

Then again, there are darn few vehicles produced after 1972 that I much care about..........other than as an appliance in my life.