Register now to get rid of these ads!

Customs What car first got you excited about customs or rods as a kid?

Discussion in 'The Hokey Ass Message Board' started by patrick66, Oct 27, 2009.

  1. I've searched, and found nothing, so I'm asking the masses - What car do you remember as being your first inspiration about customs OR rods? How old were you? What was it about that car that really grabbed you?

    I wish I had some pics! My bro-in-law's '56 Chevy BelAir hardtop was the car for me, in 1971. He had the car painted two-tone blue, with Marana pearl added for that color-change-at-any view look, and with the cobwebbed effect on the fenders, all done in Denver. The car looked damn near two-tone silver in the light! He and my sister then drove it to see friends in San Diego. While there, he got the interior panels and headliner done in TJ in classic black roll and pleat, to match the seats he had done in Denver. I was damn near out of grade school then, and seriously dug that '56! I've yet to see another just like it, anywhere. It was a gasser-style, with a lifted front end and air shocks on the rear. It sat on four Cragar SS wheels and Goodyear Polyglas GT tires. It had a very healthy, loud and strong 265 automatic. Hooker headers, old-style Thrush mufflers, and megaphone tips made that sound like no other I've heard since!

    OK, that is my car that got me excited about hot rods in general. How about you?
     
    Last edited: Oct 28, 2009
  2. oilslinger53
    Joined: Apr 17, 2007
    Posts: 2,500

    oilslinger53
    Member
    from covina CA

    Airplanes. WWII airplanes...
     
  3. ol'chevy
    Joined: Nov 1, 2005
    Posts: 1,283

    ol'chevy
    Member

  4. hotrod-Linkin
    Joined: Feb 7, 2007
    Posts: 3,382

    hotrod-Linkin
    Member

    my uncles 51 vickie. i finally got one but it took me 50 or more years.
     

  5. freeze plug
    Joined: Dec 11, 2006
    Posts: 208

    freeze plug
    Member
    from Canton, CT

    cant really pick a specific one. my dad has had hot rods/classics since 20 years before i was born. it was only natural for me, its what i grew up with
     
  6. outlawsteel
    Joined: Feb 19, 2009
    Posts: 360

    outlawsteel
    Member

    For me it was mt dads 55 chevy.I was probaly around 5 the first time i remember it.I thought it was the fastest thing in the world cause it was so loud,he liked running open headers,i remember going around the block standing up holding the roll bar.It was no slouch either he still has some time slips and run a 10.92 fastest e.t. I'll have to dig in some old pics and scan them and post them up. That was the first car that got me wanting to go fast
     
  7. lowelife
    Joined: Aug 30, 2007
    Posts: 399

    lowelife
    Member


    Same story for me, but if I had to choose one probably '38 chevy coupe or maybe '48 Anglia.
     
  8. az67goat
    Joined: Aug 17, 2009
    Posts: 40

    az67goat
    Member
    from Mesa, AZ

    The Mysterion...
     

    Attached Files:

  9. speedtool
    Joined: Oct 15, 2005
    Posts: 2,540

    speedtool
    BANNED

    As for basic stock cars, it was the neighbors' blue '50 bulletnose Studebaker...
    As for kustomized or rodded stuff - both found their zenith in Stuckey's "Lil Coffin".
    This would have been in the 60's.
     
  10. inliner54
    Joined: Feb 9, 2007
    Posts: 411

    inliner54
    Member

    when i was a kid my parents had a small farm my dad was really into classic cars and so was my grandpa. at one time we had close to 50 cars in our field. Packards pierce-arrows, a nomads, mercs, buick convertibles 57 chevy convertible 58 chevys the list goes on and on but my two favorite were my dads 41 gmc coe and my grandpas 41 chevy coupe. i used to play in them and wish i could have one some day.
     
  11. Pinstriper40
    Joined: Sep 24, 2007
    Posts: 3,602

    Pinstriper40
    Member

    Hotwheels, model cars, and Chuck De Heras' '40. I'm a young gun.
     

    Attached Files:

  12. Derek Mitchell
    Joined: Nov 22, 2004
    Posts: 1,817

    Derek Mitchell
    Member

    My uncle taking me for a ride in his 396 68 Camaro drag car. It scared the hell out of me, but I was so happy to go. Then the ZZ Top and other videos with rods in them.
     
  13. It was a car that no one would know....Number two was a Trend Automotive built '56 Lincoln with Orange Scallops over White. There were so many nice local customs in the upper Midwest that the magazine Feature cars were just icing on the cake.....Time was about 1957........Centurion9
     
  14. unclebubba
    Joined: May 3, 2009
    Posts: 26

    unclebubba
    Member
    from fla

    My Dads 72 Nova SS or my Grandmothers 70 chevelle SS 396
     
  15. Paul Brenners '49 Meteor convertible in the early seventies. He was at the Barrie Flea Market and started muffler rappin', this is when I started to go downhill, been a slide ever since. Won a few muffler raps myself over the years since as well.
     
  16. lostforawhile
    Joined: Mar 23, 2008
    Posts: 4,160

    lostforawhile
    Member

    It would have to be growing up around a garage and yard full of rusty cars.
     
  17. houseofhotrods
    Joined: Mar 16, 2005
    Posts: 673

    houseofhotrods
    Member

    A 1955 Chevy that came into town from California. Straight from the shows too. Bright yellow, straight axle, chromed everything, bad ass big block mill, 4 speed, the list goes on. I have no pics. It was 1967, I was 8. The car parked in front of an auto parts store, and I had to sneak across a 'forbidden' hiway to see it time and time again. It was always worth the trouble I could have gotten in had I been caught. I will never forget that car, that stance, that chrome....I think that's the point where I 'snapped'. I loved cars before that, read all the little books and mags my brother threw away, and kept them - til he found them and threw them away again. I built models from his scraps, and extras from the 3 in one kits. I had it bad. I still have it bad. And that's good!! :)
     
  18. RDR
    Joined: May 30, 2009
    Posts: 1,480

    RDR
    Member

    I was 11 years old..1955...working on my bicycle in the front yard when I hear something rumbling up Mill Street and it turns into our driveway...The driver, a young man home on leave from the Navy goes back to our garage to borrow a torque wrench from my dad.....He comes back out steps over the side of the FLAT BLACK shortened bed T-ROADSTER PICKUP, fires up the red & chromed flathead V8 backs out onto Mill Street and fries the big whitewall tires...'cause he could... I had no idea what it was at the time BUT I WAS HOOKED from then on !!...(I hate to admit it but a couple of years earlier I was so happy when my dad got rid of the two old cars taking up room in our garage because I could play in the garage when it rained out....A 1937 Dodge 4dr; and a 1925 FORD ROADSTER PICKUP !!!...)
     
  19. deuceman32
    Joined: Oct 23, 2007
    Posts: 461

    deuceman32
    Member

    I was 7 yrs old in 1959 whe my brother came home with a stone stock 32 5W B. He slowly built it with a 348 3x2 but before it was done his daily became a new 61 Pontiac bubbletop (Canadian now, it was a Laurentien Sport Coupe, mechanically a BelAir). Power pack 283/ 3 speed which got, in short order, a floor shift conversion, strap on tach and an 097 Duntov cam and solids. First time for me hearing a SBC at 7 grand. God I loved that car. But the Deuce thing started in Grade 2 for me.
     
  20. Ed Roth - The Mysterion is the first that comes to mind.
     
  21. partsdawg
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 3,503

    partsdawg
    ALLIANCE MEMBER
    from Minnesota

    1968 I was 9 and the guy across the street had a '55 Chevy drag car.Flip front,BBC w/tunnel ram.Painted grape color.Where I grew up I could see the old North Star Dragstrip and could hear the cars running.I know he raced there and probably at Minnesota Dragways.
     
  22. thesupersized
    Joined: Aug 22, 2004
    Posts: 1,367

    thesupersized
    Member

    while i was in grammer school, CHOPMERC had his radical 51 merc in his driveway, every year he changed something...prolly one of the cars that got my brothers and I into this stuff...he sold it to buy his shoebox back.
     

    Attached Files:

  23. SanDiegoJoe
    Joined: Apr 18, 2004
    Posts: 3,519

    SanDiegoJoe
    Member

  24. The Blown Hemi Model T from England called Andromeda.....

    Saw it at the Alexandra Palace Custom Car show in 1979....It was a life changing moment.

    Pic from Nick Butler's web site


    [​IMG]

    Car is now owned by Edd Brown in the UK, and has been totally restored. It will be featured in the upcoming Rad Rods Vol 4 DVD too.
     
  25. joebuick
    Joined: Nov 9, 2007
    Posts: 584

    joebuick
    Member

    me too
     
  26. DocWatson
    Joined: Mar 24, 2006
    Posts: 10,273

    DocWatson
    ALLIANCE MEMBER

    Same here, never knew any different. So I would have to say the familys 38 coupe did it for me.
    Doc.
     
  27. HeyyCharger
    Joined: Dec 8, 2008
    Posts: 941

    HeyyCharger
    Member

    Now this thing got me really hooked!

    HC.
     

    Attached Files:

  28. bbanks12
    Joined: Sep 3, 2009
    Posts: 131

    bbanks12
    Member

    combination of dads 69 camaro ss, and mom telling me about driving my granddads model a around the farm when they were kids. the same model a i have now :)
     
  29. s55mercury66
    Joined: Jul 6, 2009
    Posts: 4,335

    s55mercury66
    Member
    from SW Wyoming

    I'll have to fess up right here it was the Barris built, Futura based Batmobile from 1966 when I was five years old. Holy tire smoke, Batman!
     
  30. s55mercury66
    Joined: Jul 6, 2009
    Posts: 4,335

    s55mercury66
    Member
    from SW Wyoming

    I'd be quite happy with the race version....
     

Share This Page

Register now to get rid of these ads!

Archive

Copyright © 1995-2021 The Jalopy Journal: Steal our stuff, we'll kick your teeth in. Terms of Service. Privacy Policy.

Atomic Industry
Forum software by XenForo™ ©2010-2014 XenForo Ltd.