Early 50's cars as hot rods NOT customs...GALLERY

DAMN!!!! Never saw so many '49-50 Old's in my life!! Want one bad.

 

Vnak photo
The actual 55 Chevy two door sedan of our high school cruising days would have the lower section painted a black. Otherwise, the chrome rims make the early 60’s look and popular style, similar to our teenage years. The 56 Chevy 2 door post from our group, would have been painted silver with white tuck and roll, and chrome rims.

Hello,

There was a time period when the early to mid 50’s cars were the only thing around our neck of the woods. (if cities could have woods…) It might be that (the time period) was when we were growing up and beginning to enjoy the cool cars coming out of Detroit.
Whether it was 2 door or 4 doors, they were nice looking and were the main form of transportation. The 4 doors were usually the family cars, but they were the ones we all learned to drive and take our driver’s license tests in those years.

HAMB’s FIREMANGORDY 1955 Chevy
A great example of what the Chevy Sedans looked like in the late 50s and early 60s in So Cal. (including that cool headliner.)

In looking back, we saw some 29-34 roadsters, coupes, and sedans cruising around. But, very few of our group had the time to set aside a daily driver to changeover to a completely different motor/trans set up. Jobs and high school called for a reliable form of transportation. A coupe waiting for the next motor transplant was going to take at least a week and that was valuable time for school and work, to pay for the modifications.

So, most of the hot rods were considered mild customs, with a few bolt on up grades in power, like new dual quads, tires, or flashy aluminum covers/accessories. Whenever there was a vacation time during high school the modifications started to happen. (Spring Break or Easter Vacation?) A jaunt to TJ for full tuck and roll upholstery, a tear down to port/polish the heads, more carbs and possibly a cam. A shorter vacation during the year called for changing tires/ chrome rims/ hubcaps/Moon Discs, etc.

Jnaki

Our time in high school was pretty fun, while still going through all of the teenage angst stuff like everyone else. But, we had our hot rods to help ease any pain caused by those social mores and ancient beliefs. Our local area just happened to have a long history of hot rods/drag racing and cool cruising grounds. The old historic stories were passed down to the next generation of hot rodders sitting in the back row of the drive-in parking lots.

There was just too much to do to let the small stuff get in the way. A band of teenagers is how we grew up, with support to go along with the problems. When high school was over, many split up to “Go their own ways...” But, it was the flock of hot rods and cruisers that made it nice and nicer.

 

Just saw Jeems old thread pop up .. I saw that I had posted ....IN 2011 !!!!!!! The time ! where d o it go ??? anyway, I DID finish my car !

 

rfraze is correct, they were known as scavenger pipes. I suppose Pep Boy's sold them as well as most muffler shops. They were very popular in SoCal in the late 50's & early 60's, I remember one of my sisters boyfriends had a shoebox Ford with a flatty and 3 speed. He had his stock run exhaust, that ran thru glasspacks, exiting at the bumper but his scavengers were capped and were run straight. As I recall he had the 4 scavengers, rippled lake pipes with triple outlets plus a pair of lake plugs that were all capped and ran straight thru. He would wake the dead when he had everything uncapped!

 

I agree.

 

Your car is Sweet! I love it.

 

This Chevy had the 1950’s look that a lot of hot rod teenagers wanted their car to look like in the early 1960’s cruising scene. A cool modified, custom hot rod that looked like it came directly from Lions Dragstrip onto the drive in cruising scene.


Hello,

This photo of the green, Chevy sedan is one of the best examples of dual (quad) sets of scavenger pipes. The most common set up was a down pipe outlet with two bolt caps. Take the caps off and connect your set of scavenger pipes. So, the set up was direct exhaust down from the stock exhaust manifold into the outlet, into the scavenger pipes. It was supposed to be a cool looking replacement for not installing “real headers” in stock car class racing at the drag strips.

On the street, it spilled over from the drags, because it looked cool and gave the exhaust sound a slight rumble/rap. It was an instant ticket from the local police if they stopped anyone using these open exhaust scavenger pipes. So, most figured out the correct rpms to keep the sound quieter and mellow, when near the local police, Sherriff’s cars or the CHP.

Jnaki

In this dual pipe format, a set of dual chrome pipes welded together into one exhaust flange was heavy. So necessary extra brackets were usually bolted on to the frame. Using two, dual scavenger pipes was twice as heavy, but at the time, no one actually decided that the extra weight was off set by any motor performance gains, if there was any. There wasn’t as far as our time slips showed at Lions Dragstrip. They just looked good on most cars.

SAMPLES:
2017
https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum...ds-and-scavenger-pipes.1086065/#post-12309869

2017
https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum...ricks-in-the-60s.1081062/page-3#post-12268468

2018
https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum...r-hot-street-car.1130653/page-3#post-12881296

2018

https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum...odders-cheap-tricks-in-the-60s.1081062/page-6

 

heres my ride, 52 styleline with 355cu, it pretty much fits the bill for hotrod stance, may change out the Detroit steel wheels in the future

 

this is how it used to look before the v-8 swap and suspension

 

Is this too far to the other side?

 

This is how my car looked late 60's early 70's. 332FE, 2 speed floor shift, 9", ranchwagon driveline. He towed his Pilot speedway car with it

 

Hello,

With the fine weather in So Cal and the many places that are available to take short or long road trips, people are bound to see the same hot rods or cruisers at the various places. What better to showcase your hot rod than at a local, Cars and Coffee event, a city sponsored car show, the weekly Donut show, or even a big time charity event like the annual “Cruising For A Cure” event?

One has shades of a pure stock looking 50’s hot rod, down to the excellent curb feelers that we all had at one time or another. (We had to protect the whitewalls, that was for sure.) The other has a lowered rake stance that gives off the look of a pure drag racing coupe. There were different ideas that flowed from the early hot rod designs, with little money spent on customizing parts of the cars. These modern versions were/are driven a lot and that had some extra touches to stand out from the rest.

Jnaki
SOUTH ORANGE COUNTY

The San Clemente Cars and Coffee weekly event, held at the new Outlets ocean view parking structure. The event is the largest C&C event, revitalized remnants of the original Irvine C&C that started it all.
CENTRAL ORANGE COUNTY
OC Events Center OC Fairgrounds
photo Roger Rohrdanz
Seal Beach
NORTH CENTRAL ORANGE COUNTY
The Santa Ana historic home tour and car show

Vnak photo
"Round round get around, I get around, yeah
(Get around round round I get around, ooh-ooh)
I get around, from town to town
(get around round round I get around)"