When I first got on here, somone ask for pics of my first RPU. Well, it's been a while, but I think I've about got pic posting figured out. (much help from daughter #2!) So here's the Jan 62 Hot Rod cover. I'll post more scrap book pics later. Then I'll start on my Dad's midget scrap book.
Have had one, just got some training! This is Pomona, early 63. Hugh Osterman, Don Nicholson's assistant at Service Chevrolet is in the seat, and the two guys on either side of me are two of my best friends to this day. I was not yet driving after just getting out of a 1/2 body cast a month earlier.
One of my ALL TIME favorite hot rods!!! Dean, I know you have the bitchin yellow RPU- but what's the story on the current state of the red one? Does it still exist? Gotta know!!!
Yes it does! It is currently in England, and according to Limey Steve it's in a rod shop over there. The current owner has owned it for 10 years, but is finally getting around to a restoration. I'm not sure which version he's going for. I gave Steve tons of copies of stuff from my scrap book, and he's sent it to the guy for referance. And we'll not talk about the dumb ass move that let it go.
That's awesome. I was just reading an issue of Popular Hot Rodding (from '63 I think) the other day that had your old RPU in it, and I was thinking I had seen your name on here before. More photos from the scrapbook would be great...that RPU is one of my favorites.
I guess I didnt relize you were that Dean Lowe! I've talked about you're RPU with flaw'd on here a bunch of times. I'de love to see more pics. Here are some pics I have scanned in from magazines. Gus
Hey Dean, loved the pix and history. Keep them coming. Man, they are a long way from sooty Mikados to me! Gary in Tampa
i believe my dad or my uncle still have that issue of hot hod , thats one very cool RPU .. thats one bitchin ride!!
At the end of the 67 season the car was parked. NHRA rules had all but rendered the car obsolete. Without completely rebuilding the car, it would have been way to heavy for "street roadster" classes. (Wonder how many good cars have been taken off the strip for that reason?) The car was dis assembled with the thought of freshing it up and putting it on the street full time. A new house, new daughter, and learning the screw machine business got in the way. The car sat apart in the back of the shop untill 1986. I had thought about getting back to it in 72, but with two daughters by then, I decided to build a 28 sedan so the family could go on rod runs. Over the years Bruce Giesler had asked about buying the car. He had long admired it, and even built a semi clone. In 86 I finally relented, and let Bruce have the car. In 95 I found the RPU I currently have. A year later I heard that Bruce had let the red car sit in his warehouse for 10 years, and never touched it, and he had sold it to the guy in England. What Bruce got was the complete body with the Schifano interior and top, fenders, the Kurtis frame and complete front axle assembly, and the original T 10 trans, and the original 283 long block. From what Limey Steve tells me, the English guy got everything except the engine and trans. The current owner had no idea what he had until fairly recently stumbling across an old Jan. 62 Hot Rod mag! We may someday see the car in print again. Pat Ganhal is looking into the possibility of doing a history/restoration article on the car for RJ. He has sources in England that could shoot pics of the work, and he, of course, would have access to my scrap book. We'll have to wait and see.................................... And incase you were wondering, YES, I feel like the dumbest shit on earth!!
That article is from a 65 issue of Popular Hot Rodding. Believe it or not, that is the only color pic I have of the casr with the Junior paint. The pic you posted nails the color dead on. Thanks for posting it, saves me scanning it. The article pics were shot at Glendora high school in 64, where my future wife was a senior. The Pomona track shot was taken by Kaye Trapp (think Winkle & Trapp, Magicar). To my knoledge it was never published. How did you get a print of it?
Holy Cow! Now I recognize your name! That car has actually been stuck in my head since I bought that HRM on the newsstand. I would have been 13. Did R&C cover it too??
Great stuff Dean, thanks for posting. I have always admired that truck. I hope the current owner does it justice.
What made it stand out was detail...it was surely one of the most carefully built and detailed rods of its time. It was just so sharp it stood out from the crowd even to my ignorant young eyes looking at those old HRM pictures with about 3 pixels per fender.
R&C rod test, April 62. Best pics, and worst write up in Popular Hot Rodding Vol. 1. #1 mid 62. I like the pics because they were taken at the Riverside 1/2 mile. Don Tuttle's tape "Hot rodding Potpouri" has the shot leaving the line in motion. The car was in Popular Hot Rodding 3 times, and I never thought the stories were worth a shit in any of them. Too many errors, and false info. Must have made it up as they went???? The coolest mag guy I ever dealt with was Mike Lamb from R&C. After the Rod test shoot at Lions, he actually drove out to the house on Christmas day to give me some unused shots, and a letter thanking my Dad and I for our cooperation!!
That's interesting because I always thought the info in those early PHR's was terrible compared to the same era Hot Rod & R&C. Guess the same thing still exists with varying quality of magazine information.
The rod test was what I remembered...anybody out there capable of posting that for the crowd?? I always bought R&C and HRM, always wanted PHR and various others but those were frequently beyond available funding... I actually built a 1/25 red roadster pickup model largely based on this car, sawing off the roadster body that came in the '29 Ford/AlaKart double kit and using the bed from the '25 T kit. I agree about PHR in general...whoever did their photos understood the need to show the car from all angles and shoe mechanicals, while Petersen pubs often showed three shots from essentially the same angle and ignored the works. PHR had the best photos of the McMullen car as well...PHR writers, though, were all '55 Chevy types who didn't understand early cars nohow.
I just figured out where you got the Pomona shot. You must have the Gordon White book on Frank Kurtis! I had forgotten that I loaned Gordon a bunch of of family pics for the book.
Another very cool feature for the time was the two sets of mag wheels and various other bolt on changes for street/strip, astounding to me when I had trouble coming up with $2 for another '50 Merc wheel...everything about that car was done like jewelry.
The problem with PHR was, at least in the 60's, all the features were done by freelance guys that shot good photos, but took terrible notes. I think the one that I laughed the most at was in the first edition of PHR. by a close up of the engine part of the caption reads "A vertex mag, and Spaulding igniton are used". Don't know how that worked. Never ran twin plug heads!! A Spaulding Flamethrower is in the pic, and some time later it was changed for the mag, but unless the journalist had mystic powers, he couldn't have known that.
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