Bill Niekamp Roadster Revisited

You might remember my "Guess who's coming to lunch?"*post*from last month, expressing giddy excitement for the Bill Niekamp Roadster coming for a car show at my work. Seeing this iconic hot rod in ... <BR><BR>To read the rest of this blog entry from The Jalopy Journal, click here.

 

Cool car!

 

So Bitchin! While the color has stopped me from putting in my top ten the car in black and white could certainly climb the ranks!

Ya know a lot of cars used silver on suspension pieces and such like Larry Shinoda's Chopstick Special Coupe. I love that look. So-Cal coupe ca plated the suspension which give a similar look kinda sorta. It's cool.

Aren't those gauges a bit too new for 1950 or when then was restored to?

 

I have a hard time deciding between this car or the Dye roadster as my favorite track style car.

--louis

 

One of my all time favorite hot rods

 

The gauges and steering wheel are not the same as when it was first built.
Quite a few things are different actually.

Remember this was one of the first "hot rods" to be "restored."

Thanks for sharing, Jay.

 

That car warped my cranium for atleast 3 years, I was the top of my favorites, but tastes change, not that it still isnt in my top dozen....

Oh and you mention the 3 on the tree, it's more common than you think in the era that car was built, first off many of the parts cars of the era were already column shift, and second floor shift wasnt the 'cool' thing to do since column shift was only a few years old in fords and lastly the smaller bodies of model a's and model t's are more comfortable without a shifter in the way of your knee(model t guys like myself understand this statement), and in that era the hotrod world had more of the smaller roadsters instead of 32's 33's or 34's than they had 10 or so years later.

If nobody belives me look at the 1948 hotrod mags, count the percentages, there arent very many '32's that are seriously built and even less 33's and 34's

 

Man, I just can't grasp how you can dislike that color so much JJ! That is one of my favorite things about the car. Matter of fact, I'm seriously considering that blue for the body of the T-Bucket I picked up a couple of weeks ago with silver frame. I too dig the silver underpinnings big time. It has to be the right silver though, 'cause otherwise it looks like poor man's chrome.

The gauges were originally a cluster from a '49 Plymouth that I assume Bill bought or "procured" brand new from the plant he worked in. I remember reading the story that Jake wrote as to why he replaced them about twenty years ago, but I for the life of me can't remember why.

I've said it before, but this car is my absolute favorite car EVER! And that is saying something, 'cause I've "always wanted" one of everything. It is the one that really pulled me into the traditional car thing as a little kid looking at the Rod&Custom series on it's rebirth in the early seventies. Even as as a 7 or 8 year old kid, it made me wonder why it was so different than my dad's T-Buckets were, and made me curious about the era it came from. I can almost attribute this car with my fairly extensive knowledge of most things postwar America if I really stretch a bit.

I think in Jive Bomber's last write up on this I explained that of all the historic cars that I have had a hand in working on, or have at least searched out to see in the last 35 years, this one, the one that in my mind is most important, I had never actually seen in the flesh until LARS a month and a half ago! And I almost didn't bother walking the exhibitor's building where it was quietly tucked in the back... Damn glad I did, 'cause it was a bit like INDY'S first glance at the Holy Grail.

 

Iconic. One of my favorite Hot Rods.
I'm forever greatful that Jake preserved the car rather than see someone butcher the car up in the early 70's. If I were to ever meet him, that's the first thing I'd tell him.

6 hours a day x 365 days. If someone were to have it built at todays shop rates of say, $100 hr. + parts, it's a quarter million dollar build.

 

Gotta be one of my all time faves. I saw it at the Petersen years ago and just couldn't take my eyes off of it. Any under the hood shots out there?

 

DUH..............Nevermind!

 

This shot really floats my boat! What a nice ass!

 

Too cool Jay!

Gotta be in everyone's top ten list. Top 3 for me.

 

Jive-Bomber Jay - Thanks for sharing the pics of your "lunch date"

 

I remember reading that it doesn't have a lot of welding on it? Obviously things like the hairpins, etc. but much of it bolts together-

 

I'm picky with blues. I don't think I'd paint a car most shades even thought my '33 is looking to be sprayed in blue eventually but it's a grey blue. I love light blue metallic too like on C1 corvettes but this seems too saturated. It's not bad but it's just not a color I would have chosen for the car. I would have been cool in red. But it's a bitchin car for sure so I can look past all this!

 

I love it in any color.It's the same color I was painting BMX frames in the 70s.Too many righteous things about it to beat it up over color.And Seatex,you're right,she does have a beautiful ass.

 

A hotrod icon of the first degree. Plain but elegant, simplistic in design and aesthetically well executed. It would be the same regardless of color; the blue/silver was simply Bill Niekamp's personal choice. It shows its pedigree in the b&w shot.

Always in the top ten for me.

 

Niekamp, Flint, Dye..........and for a body change up, Mack............it would be tough to pick just one. A boat load of inspiration for decades.

 

Beautiful!

 

Thanks for the "low-down" Jay, fantastic opportunity you had.

 

My all time favorite hot rod. This car will be forever burned in my mind.

Since the Niekamp roadster still exists, I built my car in spirit of the Niekamp roadster.

 

Love your car Joe, from the first time I saw it. That was when we helped push it into the fence at the Gold Coast for Viva. And watching you complete it was great !

Johnnie.

 

Thank you man!!! Good times at Vegas, good times, I hope all is well.

 

the Niekamp roadster has always been #1 on my list of hot rods I would like to duplicate.

 

I new there was a reason I like this car so much. Great looking car.

--louis

 

Me too Jo! Definitely got a similar "vibe" to the Niekamp, especially sans screen.

 

It got done in red...by the same guy that put the overheating Buick nailhead in it.
Jake had a Rod & Custom magazine cover shot with his Dad when setting the mock-up flathead in there.
Oh, the Buick? It went in Jake's '34.

 

The Niekamp certainly deserved the first America's Most Beautiful roadster. I picked up some of the early 70's Rod & Custom annuals as a teenager in the late 70's. Jake's articles and tech were the best. The story of restoring the car, There was even a story in one about him driving it on the LA freeways one night while it still had the nailhead and wide indy tires and how it handled like a slot car. Once restored there is the epic adventure of Jake & Tom Senter driving it to the Memphis Nats along with Bud Bryant's 29 on 32 rails and the Highland plating special. Those articles are must reads. Hard to believe it's been 40 years since the car was put initially restored.

 

Since I finally got to see Jake's coupe at Pete and Jake's this past June, maybe there's still hope for me to see the Niekamp one day. Like 31Apickup said, all the articles that Jake and Tom Senter wrote about the Niekamp are "must reads."
But then, Jake is one of my favorite car writers, too.

Dave in James Dean, IN