Hot Rods Goofy Comments From the General Public

Agreed,sometimes we take this stuff way to serious! HRP

 

"are you going to paint it" when it is obviously in primer
"is that a big block" when it's a 350 chevy
"Is that a ford?" When it says in plain sight Chevrolet on the grill and tail gate

 

Years ago my daughter was having some head work done on her '90 Caviler. When we went to pick it up I noticed the owner of the shop was working on his really nice '66 Chevy II, so we talked about it a bit and he asked what car I had.

I politely said, "A '32 Tudor..." and he interupted me and said, "Oh, you're one of those '32 guys!"
I replied, "What's a '32 guy?" And he refused to talk to me after that..

 

I was asked if my 37 Ford was a PT Cruiser.......
What's it worth?
Wanna trade for a 94 Vette?
You DROVE that here?
Once I came back to my car at a run to find a guy sitting in my car,he thought it was the norm.
Your car is not a 40, it's a 39.

 

Get the "what year is it" a lot on the 40. One day I pulled into a very busy Gas station and one lane over 3 guys got out of a new Bentley. They looked like Rocker guys. Two were younger and one a little older-maybe 50. Here he came and started asking questions- I thought here we go again. He asked many detailed questions and obviously knew 40's front to back and all the little details. Another time I pulled my 57 Fuely into a parking place at the grocery store. An elderly fellow (mid 80's) with a walker came over my way. Said he knew exactly what it was by the sound when I pulled in and knew every detail about 57 Fuelys. He came to my house sometime later with pics of one he bought new and raced all around California in 57-58-59. He was a wealth of knowledge but has since passed away.

 

The kid wanted some dorky ass 20s

 

very entertaining thread. i've owned a few shoebox fords, and have been asked if its a studebaker. many times, older guys reminisce about courting their future wife in one, but what burns me is the ones who tell me i shouldn't have done something this way--they would do it that way. i reply, "you're lucky, then." "why?" "because it's not your car!"

 

I put a license frame on the rear plate of my '53 that says "home built custom 1953 Chevrolet " because I was tired of answering the same three questions over and over: "what year is that?", "is that a Mercury?" and "did you build that yourself?"
Then a guy stood right behind my car in a parking lot and asked me all three questions! Guess I'll put the plain chrome frame back on...

 

Oh,I have experienced that in the past,I also had a 40 Ford Deluxe sedan at a locale car show to benefit a children's home and the wind got a little gusty so while I went to get something for lunch I closed the hood,when we returned the hood was open that the hood latch was laying on the ground...

It seems some one decided they wanted to look at the engine and tried to raise the hood holding the hood latch and snapped it off....you 40 guys know you don't do that. HRP

 

i was at a local cruise nite and a Ferrari parked just a few inches from the back of my bumperless 30 ford coupe. there was no reason he had to park that close to me. i thought about telling him to move it back a bit. he did not know that the coupe was mine. i walked up to him as he was wiping down his Ferrari. i asked him if his car was one of those kit car Pontiac fiero bodies on a VW bug chassis. that really ticked him off. then i went around recruiting my friends at the cruise nite to go up to him and ask him such moronic questions that his car was anything but a real Ferrari. after about 20 minutes of this the guy lost it and yelled, " some people just can't stand someone having enough money to buy a car like this". I don't know if if it taught him a lesson but it was sure was funny. sometimes those stupid car questions can be put to good use.

 

Nice Muntz Lincoln or Caddy powered?

 

If you guys don't want your shoebox mistaken for a Studebaker, get a '51; eliminates the confusion.

 

I WAS SITTING BEHIND MY 40 DELIVERY AT A CAR SHOW AND TWO LITTLE OLD LADIES LOOKED AT THE DELIVERY AND SAID" LOOK SOMEBODY MADE A OLD CAR LOOK LIKE A PT CRUIZER"

 

My '36 Ford again. It has the GRAYHOUND grill/hood ornament. An original Henry accessory piece.
Numerous time, more than I cant count back on, grown men, women and many children would ask.... Is this car a Jaguar?

 

Everybody knows the sound of his car door opening.

One day we were at a cruise-in and I heard someone open my door. I turned around to look and this village idiot was climbing right in! With out saying a word, I put my hand under his arm to assist him out and he got all twisted off shouting , "It's just and old car!" I said, "Yes it is, but it's MY old car!"

(If he would have just asked, I probably would let him.)

 

Car pulls up beside me in my 33 at a Red Light,Older passenger asks " How Fast will it Go ? "
I smile and Say"A Thousand miles an Hour "

 

At a show with a chopped and slammed oval window bug, a guy walks up
And asks how much it was stretched?

 

I dont know how many times I have been asked if my model a crank starts. I also get alot of questions about the light bulbs on my OT 1910 Overland. People are always amazed when I say the sidelights and tail lights are kerosene and the headlights are acetyline.

 

I pulled into a gas station on Pima Rd, No. Scottsdale, on a very quiet Sunday afternoon. This station has the extremely high octane stuff for the hi compression fans.
While gassing this up a Generation X type pulls in behind me. Might have been a Lamborghini, a Maserati, I'm really not sure and wasn't really paying him and his shit box a lot of my mind.
I'm more busy watching the $7.00 per gallon numbers move upward on the pump for mental numbers octane stuff.
As he straightens his foolish red ascot and flashy white leather pants he ask me "Is that a kit car?"
I was absolutely speechless!

 

Not really sure how many comments I headed off when I hand-painted this on the trunk lid of my old '39...

 

One more story involving my wife's '36 Ford 5w.
She and I were at a roast beef joint hosting a Saturday night cruise night a few years ago. It was the place to be, people from all over attended it.
Her '36, you would classify as a "newstalgia" car. Had all its bumps, hinges and chrome, even the tire on the back. A classy looking ladies car.
Interior had a shocking resemblance to a bordello or maybe a coffin.
She's standing near the open driver's side window when 2 very elderly and very properly dressed women saunter up to the open right hand window and both peer inside. One of them, the oldest, probably in her late 80's is mesmerized by the seats and fondly stoking the material.
She turns to her partner with a huge grin and says ....
"I always loved the feeling" of that soft material against my backside back then."
ooooh if these old cars could talk.

 

I have a 62 Lancer GT. Mostly I get "nice Dart!" or "my dad had a Valiant just like that". Close enough I guess. I always politely inform them of the difference. A lot of times people ask "Is that a Studebaker?" They're not too common around here. The only other one I've seen is my parts car so I don't take it too personally.
Once upon a time I was checking out an E-type jag that was parked on the street. Another guy was looking at it and told his friend it was a Ferrari. I said no It's a Jaguar. He pointed to the prancing pony on the aftermarket exhaust that was on it. "See, that's a Ferrari logo". I pointed to the steering wheel. "See that's a Jaguar logo". "well, they must have put a Jaguar steering wheel on it, but it's a Ferrari". Yep. They must have done just that. And also a jaguar body and jaguar wheels, but you saw right through their ruse, you genius.

 

Before dads 57 was "de" gasser'd. It was always ......" Is that thing a four wheel drive?" ...... Sheesh! Flux

 

I get is that a Studebaker a lot, or where did get that Tucker.

 

Having a non mainstream car, I always get the "What kind of car is that?" Mine's been called a Studebaker, a Hudson, a Dodge, a Ford, a Chevy, everything but a Lincoln. Always get the "What year is that?" too, even though there is a 1947 license plate on the front. Also get a lot of "Where's the door handles?" {stock Lincoln pushbuttons}. One elderly gent knew what it was and told me how many jars of moonshine you could get under the rear seat, obviously from experience!

 

My buddy and I had our rides parked on the street and we were sitting on the porch enjoying some adult beverages. Mine was a 36 panel truck with a 1936 plate on the front, his was a 32 Plymouth coupe - but since he had sent the Plymouth grill emblem out for restoration, he stuck a small blue VW emblem in it's place to see if anybody would notice.

A really old couple walked past mine without saying anything but when they got to his, the wife asks what kind of car it is. In his best know-it-all voice, the husband says "that's a 1936 Volkswagen"!!!

Imagine all the bullshit he fed that woman over the years.

 

The definition of ignorant is lack of knowledge about a subject. We cannot expect people who do not associate with old cars to know diddly about them.

How many of us could walk into an operating room or a research lab at NASA and know much about the process that goes on there?
The difference is most of us would not ask stupid questions if we knew they were stupid because we were ignorant about the subject matter.
Some of these comments outsiders have made defy comprehension about their common sense though.

 

Years ago I had my 55 Chrysler at a car show and a couple of people asked is that a Chevy? I later realized most people had never seen a 55 Chrysler and I guess they thought it was some kind of custom car. The times I've heard "that thing got a hemi in it?" uncountable. At a car show in Steamboat Springs a guy walks up with his 12 year old son and the kid asks "what's a hemi Dad?" the Dad then proceeds with the best description of an early hemi's mechanical function I've ever heard. I've also had people say things like our neighbor has a motor like that he wants to sell for a hundred bucks. The problem will be when people stop commenting at all.

 

It's not just non car people that can ask the goofy questions but ever the car guys can come up with zingers.

On our recent trip to the '54 Ford Club of America convention in Novi,Michigan in our wagon some guys that live less than a hundred miles from the show and didn't bring there car asked did I actually drive the wagon for South Carolina.

Some people seem to be afraid to drive their cars. HRP

 

VW Bugs, Lambos, shrunken penises, muscle cars, and the sexual exploits of old ladies. In one thread. Wow. At this point, a crybaby reference would be icing on the cake...(and there it is).

IMO, the last 2 posts by @56don and @foolthrottle hit the nail on the head and may end up being the saving grace of this thread.

For the record, I'm all for having fun with it behind closed doors, but I do pray that our response would be one that educates....If only we were as passionate about the latter as we were the former, there'd be no end to our hobby.