Hot Rods Winter Driving

I was just in Vegas last week & other than Counts & Welderup, didn't see a single hot rod.
Kinda disappointed after hearing all the talk about being able to daily drive anything anytime if you live in the south.
Beautiful weather all week(at least what I consider beautiful).
Lots & lots of exotics, probably all rentals.
Had to get my fix at The Strip. (The Bracket Nationals)

 

I don't think I could survive living where people need to use a meat thermometer so they can see what the air temperature is.

 

There was one almost HAMB friendly car that sticks out from the Bracket Nationals.
This beast could really haul the mail!

 

My input isn't too related to the thread but I can't say I know anything about Welderup and the only time I've seen The Count was while watching TV at my friends place (I don't have cable), but I sure didn't think what I saw that "Dude" doing as being related to my idea of what hot rodding is about.
I guess my indoctrination to hot rods came a few decades before the cable TV car shows.

 

Neither are traditional car builders.
My point is, that was as close as I got to seeing anything hot rod.
I like to think that I am not narrow minded enough to keyhole myself into one type of car, thank god because as it turns out I can't afford traditional.
Have you seen the price on 32-34 Ford coupes?

 

Very few people drive old cars with any regularity...anywhere....it's just a sad fact of modern life.

 

Snow? What snow?

 

I do.

 

You might want to take a look at the Counts latest 55 Chevy gasser.
I've seen many on this site that look exactly like it, or visa versa.

 

I do, so long as it not a salt bath. Its been proven that the reason those old cars rusted out was the paint and not so much the salt... I have my cars chassis, frame and inner panels coated with Lubriplate spray grease..

 

looks like Flynbrian found a Diamond in the snow! That beats my puny snow bank. GREAT!

 

EDIT, I messed up the pic loading, if you can't open them, I will reload..let me know, eh?


..as warned above..a LONG pic heavy trip in early "winter" to the closest Post Office. I pull up at the end of my driveway waiting for traffic..first car goes by... rapid horn beeping. I look the other way a FedEx truck passing by and the driver is smiling wide...ok, then, Then I knew it Will be a fun trip.

^^^Dropped the hamb stuff off then went to the dress store next door to tell my friend Barbie that her outside coat rack blew down in the wind. Her long term husband was once very well known in NSRA as a builder, and owns stuff like a Boyd built highboy 32 roadster.


^^^Now to the bank in the north part of my town...I'm on Rt 32 and I see this sign.. "unimproved road"...lol..let's Go! See the small barn to the left. It is what's left of a huge barn complex that was hit/destroyed this year by a texter crashing right through the now gone biggest building. If you are coming the other way up that big hill, you can "get air" if you dare...


^^^ Ravine road was closed for around 5 years due to washouts and no guard rails to keep cars from going off the road into the very steep ravine. It is still dirt..


^^ coming to the end of Ravine, to another dirt road called Bone Mill Rd. The abandoned building to the right was once a UConn "School of Hydraulics" training power plant? Waterfall out of the headrace. UConn main campus is pretty far from here..


^^^ coming to the end of Bone Mill rd.. this is the most peacefull dirt road in my town.. I once sat on the ledges not shown here, for an hour and only two cars went by..both waved


^^^ finally got to my bank to deposit the hamber check, and,,,visit with "my girls" I caused a scene here last January when I needed a balance statement but told the teller I did not have a current drivers license for required ID...Then a clean cut guy customer, a bit younger than me starts in about I'd get arrested.. I said "if they can catch me"... then he says if I get in a crash I will get sued..I said "a laywer won't come after me cause I'm broke". Now 8 people are in on it, amazed at my instant comebacks... Then the head Manager comes out from her office staring at me...I thought she was going to call the cops. LOL She said she only came out to vouch for my identity ...smiling..

^^ I did stop at other stores but this pic..the gas station across from here was run by an old time badboy hotrodder in the mid 60s. He had a 50s built flatty powered 34 5w channeled...he recently passed on, but his son still has it. The son is also wild guy, full of fun, and I'll get him to get it registered again. PS, I never took my keys out anywhere I stopped today...to show how little there is to worry about.



^^^I decided to go home through UConn and tour the farm roads once again. This is Horse Barn hill..It was awful cold and damp, but the hill lot had cars for hikers/joggers. At this point, I thought of hamber Adam who just moved from R.I. ..living off to the back side of the hill, and decided to go find his place..




^^^ Decided to show the old colonial road that many don't know about that visit here. So I went down past the dairy bar to get to it. To the left is "the towers" 60 year old dorms for students. Back around 1968, 5 of us gearhead HS kids went there to crash a dorm party.. we just walked in...live band..awesome...we never got any girls but I smoked my first joint .... I told that story to a couple college girls last Feb when I got lost with the 32 in the other side of campus ...I then said "hey, how did you do with math?" They said "OK I guess"...so I said "That was a HALF CENTURY ago!" You should have seen their looks



^^^pulling the back side of the Hill..

^^^ Adam's place is over there somewhere, beyond those pines..

^^ still on the old road on campus..gets worse ahead.


^^ two houses remain on that road, owned by UConn. The house deck ahead.. I sat there in summer having an Austrian beer with a visiting Professor from University of Innsbruck, Austria, and his 15year old daughter listening to us talk our car hobby. I met him 4 times around my town this past summer, but never at Campus. I did take him to a cruise in the 32 in June. He said rods are illegal there.


^^ coming down off the hill and the abandoned part of this road once went past those two silos. There are the remains of The UConn Ski Tow down there with old car wheels on steel poles for the tow cables. Closed in mid 70s. I found it 20 years ago, metal detecting


^^^ turned right to head to Adam's area. I missed a great pic here. The girls equestrian barn and indoor arena is to the right... a team girl was leading a few horses across the road to the grazing field. They own 100 horses (I was told by two different people this year).


^^^Where there are horses, there are deer...right on campus


^^^^ok, finally!! let's go down Adam's road..I did see one possible place........ but I kept going...then this guy kinda waves, kinda tries to flag me down.. I backed up and drove in, but I somehow "knew" it won't be Adam. It was a neighbor who knows him. He said "If someday you are not busy, come to look at my 57".. I grabbed the camera.. I don't have anything pressing.. So I said "at your age, you saying only 57, I know it won't be a 57 Ford, it's a Chevy". He said yes.

^^ White Primer still. New impressive motor in it that is "OT for here"......a 283 was in the other corner. He knew about Hamb...he said "Jalopy Journal, right?" He had a 57 2dr post as a teen, then went Mopar muscle just like I did too back then.

^^Very old black tuck/roll

We sure hit it off..might as well say we are friends now....and he looks so familiar...I must have seen him at the cruise in the next town north. He said Adam is kinda lost on local car stuff, as he just moved here. He told him about the monthly cruise.

I still have not met Adam...but I will. I'm not taking any pics of his awesome vintage home or other stuff..or saying where it is.

This is how I meet thousands of people this year. Never would be that many if I sat watching lame TV shit or drove modern stuff.

I hope I did not drag it out for you peeps.. I had a blast today...it was COLD and I did not bring a coat..I knew i'd make it home


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pics not working...

 

Shit... It will take a bit.. but I will fix it..thanks

EDIT...I think they should be re-loaded now.. let me know. thanks


..

 

better now!

 

Pics look great now, Frank.
Thanks for the ride-along.

 

My Plymouth went into hibernation prior to our first snow. The road crews did a fine job of salting the roads, hence the Plymouth will remain in her warm, cozy garage, until warm weather, and a few "gully washer" rains to wash the salt away. Then she'll awake from hibernation, and we'll be back on the road.

 

My car and truck are on low sodium diets. Last year I did rive into early December, but after that the Salt City lived up to its name.

 

Thanks for the ride along F&J that was fun.
I haven't had a rod or custom on the road for too many years but there were a couple of winters that my 48 was the only thing we had that ran and my 51 Merc served as my wife's daily work driver year round for a couple of years rain, snow or what not. Stick a pair of snow tires on the back of both and go.

 

That right there is the most beautiful thing ever.... well besides women and greenbacks!!! MDW


Sent from my iPhone using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

I was looking in a thumb drive for pics of me driving a doodlebug down the center of Rt 32 in a blizzard...but can't find those, but found these. I guess I did drive it all last winter too...

^^ The son of the guy that had the 34 channeled 5w. Man, we had a good time living in his apt after my divorce in 02. We used to burn rubber up that hill partying in summer nights...so i did it again as I left after this.. Then I went to hook up with a young hamber girl up that road.. She once had a Pontiac powered A coupe on here. I found a pic of the coupe and his late Dad, but won't put it here...it was summer.

^^ USN Seal Team veteran...I met him when the girl & brother posed in the previous pic. He pulls in, and out of the blue, I said "..and look at this bad-ass looking guy" to him, in front of them...He might have kicked my ass, but smiled big instead...we B/S'd a long time, I later visited his home in the rod.


I never would have met so many wild, fun loving people, if not for driving it everywhere..

..

 

We have a Sunday event known as "Cars At Captree", which is a state park on an island on The Great South Bay, there is a 3-mile long bridge to get there and a draw bridge to cross too. This goes from just after labor day to mid April (until they collect tolls). This pulls a lot of cars even on cold days and is 5 minutes from my house, which backs up to the Robert Moses Causeway that leads there. There is a concession for egg sandwiches, coffee, soup. Once they collect tolls, the crowd shifts to the old Oak Beach Inn parking lot, which fills up fast, get there at 6:30 and you may not get a spot.

 

I drive my Buick station wagon as long as there is no snow on the ground{we don't get that much here any way} even though the alt is still squealing.LOL.Bruce.

 

It's roadster weather again!

 

If I didn't drive when there was snow on the ground, we wouldn't get to drive much...

 

A few years ago, we had a little storm blow through...it was the same time that some relatives were going to the nearby mountains to spend a few days in a rented cabin. We don't get to do this stuff too often down here, so I took a few pictures. The big truck was "art" at the cabin, I think. But my Suburban was how I got there...

 

We are able to drive most of the time during the winter except when we have ice & snow, and I still haven't installed a heater yet to make it more comfortable but I think after this morning it's going to be moved up on the priority list. HRP

 

That's a good thing, It'll scare the deer off the road

 

I drove my 36 Chev p/u up to Michigan one November to tow back my brother's 52 Chevrolet. When I got to Ohio, there was a snow and ice storm that had passed though , so I stopped in a rest area to take a few hours nap. It had been a few years since I drove on snow/ice and didn't want to push it with having been 16 hrs on the road tired and rusty skills at night. Wish I had gotten pics of that truck in the snow once I got up there.