Indholdsfortegnelse for June 1985 i Hot Rod

I’m calling a good divorce attorney today. It pays to plan ahead, you know. It’s not that things haven’t been going well on the home front; there is no question of incompatibility or infidelity. But my wife, Cheri, just may plead wife abuse. Why? The incredible HOT ROD Magazine “Victory Tour” is only a couple of weeks away and I’ve told her that this rod run to the HOT ROD Super Nationals would take the place of a typical “nice” summer vacation. She thinks we’re taking this 2000-mile jaunt in an ’85 ’Vette. Little does she know that it will be her first cross-country trip in a topless roadster with a chopped windshield. Our marriage has been tested many times before—like the time she stayed up all night in the…

The time is high noon at Dick’s Shop (7630 Alabama Ave., #2, Canoga Park, CA 91304, 818/340-8640), with Dick, Zip, and kit only a few seconds away from bolt-off. Kit includes everything you see on Magoo’s floor except the windshield glass, paint, and plating. If don’t own a drill press, much less a bench grinder, belt sander, or band saw. My carport doesn’t contain an arc welder, nor does it house an air compressor or lathe. The only mill in sight rumbles inside my roadster. So when someone casually mentions rods and kits in the same breath, I get nervous. My idea of what constitutes a real kit runs along the lines of an Erector set or a Lionel layout. Screwdrivers and sockets suffice. And any kit which cannot be…

It’s a tough job, but somebody’s got to do it. Once in a while we get a really juicy assignment that makes up for the marginal ones. This was the game plan: Tech Editor Marian Davis, Attorney Chris Scott, and I were to take HOT ROD’S Supercharged Dodge Mini Ram van on the Uniroyal Cannonball One Lap of America. We had to equip it with a CB, an electronic odometer/chronometer for calculating time and distance to the nearest hundredth of a second and mile, dig up a couple radar detectors, collect some safety and cold weather gear, install a pair of fog lights, a third seat, and a decent set of shocks. Lastly, we had to drive it to Detroit, the starting point for the event. We had a week,…

We’ve all heard about the old “switcheroo”—Man Bites Dog. But how about “Lady Owns Willys”? Switcheroo or not, Celeste DeMilt, the long-legged lady in the photo, actually owns and drives this 44-year-old veteran of the drag racing wars. According to Celeste’s husband, Bob, it all started back in the late ’50s when their ’41 Willys was part of the West Coast gasser attack. The old quarter-miler was eventually retired, sold, and ultimately ended up on the DeMilt’s doorstep. So the DeMilts—along with fabricator Randy Kraft, trimmer Dan Royce, and painter Butch Nievis—completely “R ’n’ R’ed” the coupe, a revival that featured reworking and narrowing the stock frame, laying on the new Ai ’glass front end and rear fenders, repainting its bod with ’76 Ford Tangerine Orange paint and eye poppin’…

BONNEVILLE PONTIAC This wouldn’t be news except for several unusual twists. To begin with, the very fact that people are building brand-new, high-dollar cars specifically to race at the Bonneville salt flats is newsworthy. The car in question is a new Pontiac Firebird recently built by Don Hardy Race Cars for Roy Fjastad, owner of the Deuce Factory in Santa Ana, California. What’s unusual? First, Fjastad’s well-established parts business builds street rod stuff, primarily for ’32 Fords (he was the first to make repro Deuce frame rails). If he’s building a Bonneville car, we’d expect it to be a ’32 roadster, not a Trans Am. “I was going to do that,” said Roy. “In fact, I started to build one to run at the Nostalgia Drags and at the lakes.…

EDITOR’S NOTE: The lowest feeling on the hot rodder’s totem pole is a defeatest attitude. It’s what kills most rod-building projects and is the reason why these same projects never get completed. So with this in mind, Li? John has a few words on how he’s brought 200-plus projects to 20 years’ worth of successful conclusions. Well, we just finished my son Chris’ Nova. Yet it seems like it’s getting harder and harder to get a car finished anymore. For me, finishing a hot rod, or any car for that matter, isn’t really a problem of getting or making parts. It’s more of a problem with attitude. And if it weren’t for Chris’ positive attitude, we would still be six months away from completing his Nova. I started building my…

Five months ago it was a pile of parts lying around my garage. Last night we cruised “The Valley” in one bad, supercharged, channeled ’32 Ford roadster. To anyone who saw it there was no question what this car is all about… it’s a hot rod. Nice looking one at that. Does all the things a real hot rod is supposed to do. Show and go! Better not be racing this little sweetheart for pink slips—or you just might be walking home. It puts the wind in your face and pumps the adrenalin into your veins. Squeeze the throttle and it squirts forward like it was shot out of a cannon. ease off the pedal and you’re instantly in a high-style cruise, it’s no longer a “kit rod” or “low-buck…

There are at least three good reasons to lower your car. It’ll lower the center of gravity, and often increase spring stiffness, which improves cornering ability. It’ll reduce wind resistance by effectively decreasing frontal area and under-car turbulence, thus increasing both performance and fuel economy. (Race cars sit a lot lower than family cars, don’t they?) But the main reason, the real reason we lower our cars is ’cause it looks so good. The history of hot rodding can be plotted by the relative angles and elevations of our cars over the years. We’ve gone from raked roadsters and taildraggin’ customs to jacked-up Gassers and musclecars to hopping lowriders and high-stepping four-bys. But the current trend is definitely in the weeds. Actually, most cars were designed to sit low and…

1985 marked the 37th year of the Oakland Roadster Show. Like a number of car shows across the country it offers many of the participants a chance to show off their recently completed project. Oftentimes the car show dates are firmly etched in a hot rodder’s brain as his target completion date. The last-minute pieces to be painted, polished, plated, upholstered, detailed, and asembled are, more likely than not, performed within a few days or even hours before the show’s set-up date. The car show world is one of candy colors, chrome and gold plating, and anodized, etched, and engraved metal. The cars are tilted, partially disassembled, and displayed on turntables that rest on luscious carpet with Teddy bears, mannequins, and statues of every type standing guard. It’s fantasyland!…

During the 1984 HOT ROD Super Nationals we gave away a perfectly restored dual-quad ’57 Chevy. Lucky winner Steve Crocker is a street rodder—which was kind of a twist, because ’84 was the first year we had opened the event up for street rods and street machines. This year the show format will be the same, but we’re going one step further with the gift car. In keeping with our “Milestone Musclecar” features we’re giving away a ’64 Pontiac GTO, the premier musclecar that opened the door for a long line of intermediates stuffed with maximum-impact V8’s. The GTO was originally available with either a single 4-barrel or tripower 389, an automatic or 4-speed, and a variety of rear-axle ratios. Our Goat is built in the true tradition of hot…

PROFILIN’ Bonneville has seen its share of four-wheel-driven rods, but they have been streamliners. Glenn and Nancy Deeds’ ’29 highboy roadster, however, is the first of this ancient breed to employ this attractive arrangement. On first thought one would ask, “Why bother?” I mean, all highboy roadsters are about as slick as a falling brick. But that’s precisely the reason behind the Deeds’ deed. Because highboys are so aerodynamically “dirty,” they need all the traction they can get. What happens is this. When at speed, air begins to pile up against the highboy’s exposed tires and rectangular body shape. As the roadster’s speed builds, it becomes harder and harder for it to slice through the air, and the rear tires begin to break loose with very unattractive results. To restore…

DISC JOCKEYING Q I’ve had my ’67 Fairlane GT since 1968. Two years ago I broke the passenger side spindle and, in the process, the Kelsey-Hayes caliper and mounting stand was trashed. Unsuccessfully, I’ve tried Ford dealers and wreckers. I would like to obtain stock replacement parts, but if not, could you give me advice on a disc brake swap from another year and/or model? Phil Jones Calgary, Alberta, Canada A While it’s true most parts have been discontinued from Ford, Stainless Steel Brakes Corp. (11470 Main Rd., Clarence, NY 14031, toll-free 800/448-7722, except in New York, 716/759-8666) has an exclusive agreement with Ford and is now reproducing virtually all parts of the ’64½-’67 Mustang/Cougar/Fairlane/Falcon/Comet brake system—except for the spindle. But that piece isn’t as scarce as you might think—it…

If you could color dèjàvu silver, purple, and metallic charcoal, then you’d know what I experienced the other night. There I was, riding shotgun strapped in next to Chris Buttera, the son of our very own Lil’ John Buttera. (Please don’t hold that fact against Chris—or his Novette. Chris’ dad did good on both counts.) Anyhow, we were slowly strokin’ down Sunset Boulevard on our way to the old Hollywood Freeway when a guy in a Mercedes Benz pulls up alongside and makes the roll-down-the-window motion. He then proceeds to ask us, “Who painted the car?” Now that hasn’t happened to me since the days when both Sunset and Hollywood Boulevards vied for top cruising honors. But there we were, and all we could say was, “Fat Jack.” “Oh,” came…

To an outsider the Chrysler/Shelby alliance would appear to be a flop, at best a marketing venture that has been long on hype and short on product. But then with Carroll Shelby involved, expectations run high. Carroll’s last foray with a major automobile manufacturer was nothing short of meteoric … hot cars for the masses, a racing Manufacturer’s World Championship for Ford, and an image for Shelby/Ford cars that grows with time even though his last car rolled out of Shelby American in ’68. Now they are all collectibles, an image to preserve, money in the bank. It’s been a couple of years now since Carroll tied the knot with Chrysler. And like everyone else, I too have been waiting for him to reinvent the Cobra. The latest car to…

Auto painting is a science. A lot of people will try to tell you it’s an art, or to give you their philosophies about it. But it’s just science. You put certain chemicals on top of other chemicals, and they react in a certain way. Actually, I often think painting is a black’ science—voodoo, witchcraft—where things happen for seemingly totally unexplainable reasons. You lay paint over a prepared surface (employing an artist’s touch, to be sure), and then if the stars are aligned properly, your karma is good, and your biorhythms are harmonious … your paint job will come out smooth and glossy and beautiful. I’m not trying to scare you off. I’m trying to impress upon you that auto painting should be approached as a science. If you apply…

It’s astounding. Just when we thought the motorcycle builders had hit their limits with DOHC, four-valve, liquid-cooled pavement rippers like the Kawasaki 900 Ninja, along comes something like the new FZ750. The Ninja set the standard last year for power-per-unit displacement—it cranked out enough power from 903cc’s to humble all but a couple of its 1000, 1100, and 1150cc competition. The Ninja was a giant killer that we thought would be hard to beat—but now the FZ750 from Yamaha, with its incredible five-valve cylinder head, has gone and squeezed almost as much power out of 152 fewer cubic centimeters. Even Formula 1 cars, with their power-at-any-price level of sophistication, are stuck with only four valves per pot; they’re going to have to talk to Yamaha if they want to get…

PROFILIN’ The owner/builder is Gary Case, a 35-year-old mechanical engineer from Brecksville, Ohio. The car is a Firecracker Red ’34 Ford three-window coupe. slick. Here’s the details: Progressive Automotive frame rails, shortened front and rear; tom X-member and front crossmember; Super Bell axle; Mustang disc brakes; owner-It four-bar; ’78 Versailles rearend (with disc brakes); ’78 Chevy four-bolt 350 with Crane n, Edelbrock intake, Holley 600, Sanderson headers, modified Chevy valve covers and cleaner; chopped top; rear fenders and gas tank apron shortened 5½ inches; grille raked ch; solid hood sides molded to the body; painted grille shell, no filler neck; custom dash; panasonic roof console and stereo; power windows, locks, door latches; custom seat two ’76 Chevy buckets; ’84 Corvette silver/gray upholstery by Pro Trim of Akron; lacer paint by…