Who was your inspiration in metal shaping or welding?

I did not have the luxury of growing up with a Dad who was a metal shaper or into Hot Rods or a welder like some people.

My inspiration came from my high school shop teacher Mr. Flynn. He took me under his wing when I was a senior and taught me to TIG weld. He spent extra time with me. The seed was planted. I was a production TIG welder for many years to follow. I went back and thanked him years later.

 

My dad, we was a boiler shop , pressure vessel ,welder all his life.

 

guys name was Rick Holmes, and back in 91' i had an old three wheeler
and me and some friends were gonna go riding but my friend noticed that my
frame was cracked. not knowing what to do, my friend knew of a guy who welded
in the beaumont ca. area. so next morning we drove all the way to beaumont
and showed the bike to Rick and real calmly he said 20 bucks. i thankfully handed
him the loot and he started. it took him 5 minutes to fix it and thats when i knew
i had to do this for a living.

 

The pictures in car magazines. I didn't personally know anybody that could weld when i bought my MIG.

The builds on the HAMB have really opened my eyes as to what is actually possible to be fabricated. I am frequently amazed/impressed/awed by the work of some of the guys on here.

 

Lil' John Buttera, Jim Bailie, Steve Davis, many others.

 

A guy by the name of Joe Wetsch here in town. I hope I spelled his name correctly. He builds alcohol funny car stuff, tube frame cars etc... I just thought it was cool to check out what he was doing once in a while. If I recall he has a miller dial arc or something like that. That was the first time I ever seen a tig welder, when I was in college. After seeing the nice clean welds it produced, I knew I needed one. I bought my dynasty DX that year, and haven't looked back. Now I can do my own cages, exhaust etc... It's a true complement when people ask who did the work on the car.

 

Jim "Jake" Jacobs. After reading his two-part how-to in Rod and Custom (80's?) I went out to the garage, and armed with a hacksaw, a jigsaw, a flat bastard file and an oxy-acetylene torch I chopped the top on my sedan. I had never done bodywork of any kind before, but armed with enthusiam and Jake's blow by blow it was a piece of cake.

 

Ron Covell-

 

i'm just poor can't afford to pay someone else so i learned how to do it. mostly self taught. for things i couldn't figure out i searched for the experts in that feild and sweep their floor, ect. till they showed me how-to.

 

Had a desire to put metal together and liked sparks. I enrolled in college welding classes while being a Sophomore in High School. My teacher had a sand dragster and was a good instructor. Learned with Oxy/Acetylene welding first and its still my favorite. I can Mig, Tig, Arc, And Oxy/Acetylene weld. Practice, practice, practice.-Weeks

 

I'll admit it...Jesse James. On one of the MM specials, he said something like "Just get out there and do something. Grab a piece of metal and go for it." My welding/metalworking skills are still only a shade above 'lame', but...gotta start somewhere. I tried, and whaddaya know, it actually worked. I've only completed a couple of small projects, and others may scoff, but...it's good enough for me, and I felt like I accomplished something. Now I gotta find me some classes so I can get better.

 

As far as being inspired as to what was actually possible... The earliest actual contact with someone who really knew how to work metal that I can remember: In the early '80s I took my mini truck (remember that fad?) to a body shop my friend worked at and told them I wanted to remove the stamped-in letters "TOYOTA" off of the tailgate and assumed they would cut the whole thing out and replace it with a sheet of flat metal. But instead, their metal guy (nicknamed "Pygmy") said he would makes cuts down the center of each letter, heat and hammer weld it flat! I thought he was totally nuts and was making the job much harder than necessary - but I was shocked when he was able to do just that, and metal finish it damn near perfectly straight!

 

Two people Bob and Dr. Brooker, Bob was an old school (WWII) Army Air Corp Airplane skin repair and fabricator. Dr Brooker was an old professor at Pitt State who worked under Boss Kettering way back when. I was always amazed at how they could convince the metal to do what they wanted an not vice versa. I'm not always as good getting the tin to do what I want!

 

My inspiration is a little odd. I grew up in a construction family, from famous restorations to factory work. Also the great grandson of a famous builder on Mackinac Island, I come from a line of woodworkers that are just top notch so I grew up know how to work with wood and work well with it.

Well, no body knew how to work metal and it was a complete mystery to me, which is why the attraction. I like to make with metal, weld, join, shape because it was something that people couldn't do. I still see woodwork and such as something simple that everyone does because I just got so used to it. Metal is still magical to me.

 

I had never done major body work before and paid someone to do the metalwork on my 54F100 : cab corners, floorboards, patch doors ect.
When I started to assemble the truck I realized they had put the patch panels over the rusted out areas with out removing the rusted out parts.
This was of cousre after I had not looked at the truck due to family reasons ( layoffs ) ect.
I found the HAMB page and started to redo the floorboards, I next found metal meet and have gone to 2 meets sofar.
I now have the cab justabout done and now in the process of building a custom box from sheet stock and tubing ( see winter tech week ).
As soon as the new motor is in the my Surburban this month I will be getting back to finish the metal work and hopefully get the truck painted by winter.

So getteing took by someone inspiredme to lear how to do metal work.

jim h

 

Ron Covell, Jesse James, a few others I'm sure.
Ron Covell got me interested years ago. Jesse kept me interested from MG up to now.

This is a really good question. We can add lead artists, and builders like Bob Bleed too.

 

My mentor back in the 70s was Rene Lavaggi. Old school all the way. Taught me welding and started me on metal work.

 

Im going to say THE HAMB, and you SHANE. My dad was a HS shop teacher, retired before I got to grade school. Never took me in the garage. Divorced my mom at my ripe old age of 6 and worked another job the rest of my life. Never showed me anything about cars as he didn't have time.

I loved cars anyways, drove some cool stuff (for my age and time). I went to college and had dreams of hot rods, but I had motorcycles at the time. I got my cop job, had a kid, sold my bikes and bought my white truck. I wanted to learn metal shaping from being on the HAMB and Metalmeet. I have yet to invest a bunch of $$ yet in tools. but I'm saving currently I read the metal shaping thread all the time and get excited!

So its all of you guys!!!! who inspire me.

Thank you to all of you, and if you want to come over and show me more I'll provide the food (cooking out) and the drinks any time!!

Jarrad

 

There isn't any one person who i can give credit to for my interest in metal shaping. I think it's a combination of all the killer car's i've seen over the years and the fact that i didn't have the money to have anything done for me..So i had to learn by reading and studying everything i saw..and still do.
HOWEVER, there is a guy here in NY that's pretty well known who has taught me a lot both verbally and just watching. Lee Osborn.
He was a big, no, huge inspiration to learn more and to better whatever skill's i had built up..he gave all of us the push to just do it rather than sway away because we were worried about not knowing what we were doing.
He has gone out of his way to show myself and a couple other friends of mine ( and i'm sure many others as well) how to do thing's, and how to do them right..
I KNOW he has forgotten more than i will ever know.


Tony

 

Dennis Webb, nicest (and most talented) bender in the area.

http://www.hotrodhotline.com/feature/guestcolumnists/richardscorner/07denniswebb/

 

i would have to say watching jesse james on MG as a kid. i know im young.

 

Li'l John Buttera, Dick Ellis (My shop teacher), and Cliff Crandall (The head mechanic at the bus garage. They all showed me what could be done with some very basic hand tools and a torch.

 

I would have to say that my insperation is and was being broke and being told it can't be done. I guess it is the rebelious streak in me but I don't like it when people who have now idea what there doing tell me it can't be done. So over the short years that I have been doing this, trying to prove them wrong or right I have learn a ton. Also not have money for all the tools for both the house and work it is amazing what you can do with imagination and inovation.So I guess my insperation are the naysayers. Thanks.


nvr2lo

 

Jean Tinguely

 

Well being I had not know the people I do now I have to say that Jesse James is a big influence to me being in the garage fucking with Metal. But I also know that I will have many many more influences and ideas brought to me before my days end. This being said I have to say that many of you guys here on the HAMB influence me everyday to get out there and create stuff.

 

Necessity + Limited Funds = Inspiration...

 

my Dad was a logging truck owner, still is at 73, so back when i was little i was drug to all the repair shops and it was there i learned about welding, so at age 10 the guys were trying to teach me how to weld, i also had a sunday school teacher who was a 3rd generation blacksmith, his shop was just down across the field from my house, i spent alot of time in there watching him build railings and running his forge, day after day i sat on the little stool he made me set on so i didnt get in his way, he also let me weld when i got a little older, my Dad bought me my first stick welder when i was 12 i guess, the local trade school required grade 10 to inroll in welding/metal fab, a two year course, today i have a new mentor, he was a welder machinest fabricatior back in the 50's and 60's, then he became the shop teacher here, for the last couple of years i rent his old shop, all his tools and equipment are still here, today he and i spent an hour or so going through all the old little boxes here, just a cool old shop. whenever i need to know something hes just a call away.

 

My grandfather..I got my love of hotrods and muscle cars from my dad, but my grandfather was into the classics.I helped him restore his LaSalle,(yeah I sanded alot) and watching that man with an old arc welder,hammer and dolly, fix fenders and quarters just blew me away..things I thought were beyond patching he had fixed up in no time. I used to go over there everyday to help him with his cars.. Now I'm trying to learn as much as I can to build my 50 shoebox, so I can do the man proud even though he isnt here anymore..but I know out of all my cars this one he would approve of..

 

High School shop instructor for the welding. Jim Bridges was his name, what an awesome guy.

If I had to choose someone for metalshaping it'd have to be Kerry Pinkerton. Over the last few years he has turned into a good friend and is the most driven committed metalshaper you'll ever meet. Willing to share every bit of knowledge he has and willing to experiment to gain knowledge of anything he doesn't know.

There are guys who have been shaping metal alot longer than Kerry and have perfectly honed skills and are absolute true craftsmen in the field. I have met alot of these guys and 99% of them are wonderful people to be around and learn from but, spend one day working with Kerry and you would understand why I would call him "inspiring".

 

First my pops since he has been doing cars since the 50's, the rest are Cole Foster, Brain Bass, Metalshapes, (Mark Peridon, Charlie Hall, Dennis Elises all local guys in Tucson) Don Marks and the entire staff the work for El Palocko.