History Grandpas el mirage roadster recreation p.r.c

Paintslinger, I think California restricts you to year of manufacture on the license plates., anybody? The period correct plates would be great for photos and stop light to stop light. Probably would make gramps pretty happy too.

 

YOM plates are legal in CA...extra fees of course.

 

Shitty day in California it's about 90 degrees and the king of Western swing died. Haggard the HAG R.I.P

 

Not to correct you painstslinger but...
Merle Haggard defined the"Bakersfield sound" along with Buck Owens. True Country music, not so much western swing. (Bob Wills...King of western swing)
Anyway, very sad day. Rip Merle.
Johnny

 

Great thread paintslinger, thank you for posting all of this for us.

Question about using a Brookville body, will that cause problems with registering the car, and/or smog equipment regulations? I may be mistaken, but I was under the impression that the value in a registered old car is that it pre-dates any emmisions reg's, and so is grandfathered in without requiring any retrofitting; but a new build would be considered a new car and require current emissions equip and regular inspections. Can anybody clarify that?

 

Just a side note here, but when I saw those timing tags and your G-Pa's name it triggered an old memory from the 80's when I used to play in a classic rock band. We had a regular gig at some bar down somewhere in LA Co, I don't recall where it was. But there was this guy that would come in all the time, he was one of those 1 man band things, played guitar, harmonica, had a drum strapped to him and cymbals and he would come in and play a few songs for "drinks and tips". We loved him. He called himself, "Omo the Hobo", even had business cards. His last name was Omohundro. Like I said, we loved the guy, and we always welcomed him in and gave him some time to do his thing and had drinks and laughs with him. We even wrote a song about him, "Omo the Hobo", I don't recall any of the words except the hook line "Omohundro he's our man". The main riff in the song was something along the lines of Welcome To The Jungle, but was many years before GnR came along. We'd always get a big smile on our faces when playing that song, nobody knew what the hell it was about, but we did.

Anyone in your family play guitar and sing? It's not a common name.

 

I knew someone would correct me. Because bob wills is still the king!!!!!! I feel that Merle took what he heard from wills and made it sound even better so that's why I say haggard is the king. I just seen Merle last year at Chumash casino. He played great and his son plays really well also. Sorry to get off topic but we got to pay are respects to the HAG. Buck Owens radio on pandora is my favorite station.

 

Hey there blues. Body has no vin numbers so as long as your frame has got clean numbers that is what they go off of. That's why there are so many fiberglass cars everywhere in the street rod scene. Plus people like Boyd who built glass car and just stamped numbers in the frame in the lines of Henry numbers. Cal. Now knows the game so you have to have an original frame with clear numbers.

 

That's a good story I would Of loved to heard that song. I don't have anyone in the family that plays but I have heard of this guy before as I work with a guy that played a ton of gigs in the l.a.area as well. We have talked about it a few times. It a small world. You might of even played with my buddy.

 

LOL, that's awesome that you've even heard of him! The name of the band was Rockslide, of the 4 members I lost track of the drummer, the other guitarist Matt died unexpectedly last year, and bass player Keith is still alive and kicking. He's also a car guy, but not traditional hot rods, he's got an MGA w/ blown SBC, very nicely done and win's a lot of "best of show" awards, but not HAMB friendly.

 

Thaeion village in Downey. Is where rick played with Jim seal. He says omo was more of a comedy gig then playing real good music. Same as you say he was fun to hang out with. Says he was real nasty with his jokes. I'm talking to rick about him right now as we work with each other on Thursdays.

 

Bruce,
Ya must be talking about this once fine and now lost establishment. It was a pretty kick ass place and the Tiki Motif was the largest of it's kind save for the Tiki's Caves in Monterey Park.

 

Here's the hobo now...

 

Ok now we can get back to some hot rodding. We got alittle out there woooo it's easy to get lost. Check out these programs. You can see with in one month he built a hole new motor and went out and ran it.in July he ran a 1936 motor at 242 cubic inches with ford filled heads edelbrock intake Winfield cam and a Mallory ignition. Then just one month later he had a 41 ford motor at 238 cubic inches with ford heads edelbrock intake Harmon cam and Spaulding ignition.

 

Then he went to a 42 merc motor than a 46 merc motor. Pretty neat I sur hope we can find more programs to tell us more about him. Fingers crossed

 

I get you paintslinger, I appreciate your thoughts for Merle. Thanks.
I played music for a living out of NM for about 30 years, way back when. Mostly Texas swing, roadhouse stuff. That eventually morphed into rockabilly, but I always loved that "Bako sound"!

Didn't mean to pull the thread off track, sorry. I really like your build, and REALLY appreciate your interest and respect for your gramps and the "old ways"! Keep up the good work and I hope we'll meet up on the road with your grandpa some day soon!
Cheers, Johnny

 

Keep in mind, it's possible that motors from friends/car club buddies were swapped in to try different combinations or test modification results. Not saying he didn't build all of those motors himself, just a thought.

 

Well when I talked with him a couple weeks back he said he did all of his own motors one thing I do need to ask him is where did he get them all. It would be neat to see if he was junk yard hoppin or buying the blocks new. It would be cool to hear some junk yard stories.

 

Great thread ....Love the history!!...Thank you

 

So the motor I bought last weekend looks like someone built a nice motor. The flywheel looks to be lightin and the cam looks like a stock cam that has been custom ground. I could not find anything wrong with it bearings and so forth. It was missing one valve and spring but still had all the adjustable lifters. One spring was weak so I'm thinkin maybe the springs couldent hold the pressure and got weak so they took it out. I bought it from a 76 year ol lady who's husband had pasted away a year ago so her and her son have no idea about the motor. I wish I could of looked around for the heads and other missin parts but she didn't think there was any. He was an ol hotrodder so I'm sure the rest is their but I didn't want to presure her into letting me look. I'm gonna call her when I hear back from the machine shop and see if I can talk to her son so we will see. So the cam in the left is the one from the motor. The middle cam is a Howard f10 and the one on the left is stock. You can see the left cam is ground flatter than the others.

 

Speedy, you are absolutely right on this subject. My Dad had said that they would swap engines and even cars to test different things. Apparently it happened quite frequently.

Bruce, making great progress. Hope things keep rolling for you. Hope to see ya at TROG!!

 

Mike good to see you following this thread. I will be in pomona for the Lars. In the swapmeet area of course. Come stop by and see me. Built is going great.

 

Here's my custom engine tear down bench. I custom made it out if a old garage floor.

 

Look at the tops of the lobes!
Crazy duration at peak'ish lift. I want to hear that run.

 

That's what I'm talking about and it's bored to 3-3/8. I bet It crackels like hell plus the lite flywheel. I think they stretched the springs so they pulled the motor as I can't see anything else wrong but machine shop will tell. It's getting cleaned mag'ed and sonic tested. I'm gonna run it if there's at least .100 wall thickness. And if the bores just need a quick hone job. I could save a lot of money if this motor is just a clean and rebuild as to a full machining job. Clean it up new bearing and rings. It's a 3-3/4 stroke and I do have a 4" merc crank so... Do I want 268 cubes or 286 cubes. It also has silvolite pistons with 3 rings. Maybe I'm just lucky or the hotrod gods know it's my time so they just keep throwing good stuff at me.

 

I am sorry if I'm becoming a study in hypocrisy here and posting more than my share but...
Just go the route that gets it done fast already! Me and your Gramps just need to see this thing come together. It looks like you have the makings of trying different combinations possible every month or so just like the original, wink wink.

 

I guess it just runs in the family. Bigger faster but your right plus gramps ran at 248 inches so 20 more cubes is good enough for now. I like to sit back and think what he would of done if he had more money. As a matter of fact I just might tez him and ask what he would of built if he was limit less on money. Would he say he would of went balls out. Or did he only do what was streetable since this was his everyday car to school and work. He's says that's why he stayed with a 3/4 cam because it was the best of both worlds. For the street and dry lakes. I have him recored talking about that subject. He still hasent seen this web site or thread. I think he will be in shock when I reveal it to him. I need to get him on here ASAP. I will be seeing him again next weekend so the time has come to show him this. I hope he will read all this and want to get on here and talk about the good ol dry lake days...

 

There is a ad in the classifieds for converted Lincoln distributors......

 

Hard at it. Putting the good ready to run rearend in and brakes painting all of it black lacquer of course. Got a good buddy over to help.

 

Looking like you are making some headway with it.....