The last Grasp Special '34 3 window build

Forgot to mention Geoff about that poster I told you about that was at my Mum's house, your coupe features on it and it looks like it was out of magazine called performance car collections and I believe it has a green coupe that is owned by Mick Jubber on it and not sure who owns the other beige coloured Tudor? It looks like it was taken at the old Gippstown? Blast from the past is featured on it as well? Next time I are down at my Mum's I will take and load a photo of it...


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Geoff,

That blower on the fendered and flamed deuce is a mix of parts? I have never seen a drive setup like that. Looks like a mix from a roots style jimmy blower drive mated to a scott or the like. And dig those staggered carbs!

 

Hey Garyd. You are right about the just hanging at at Rita and Tony's. It is not a rushed thing like when one maybe trying to keep up with whats happening at a rod run one may be participting in. So you have the time to take it all in and take it in at one's leisure. As Jeff said in his last post, everyone at Tony's are on the same page.
Some people have many more pages to them ( I think I may be like that ) and from that so much experience is exchanged and we all learn so much from one an other. Then on top of that you have Tony's amazing garage, that is complimented by all the hot rods contained within and complimented even further by all the hots rod that come along to surround Rita and Tony's house and overflow out onto the street.
I hope my posts on that weekend haven't been to overwhelming for some, what with all images and the almost minute detail of what happened over the course of that weekend. I just wanted to try and convey the atmosphere. I hope I have.

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Gary, yeah I know the poster. I think another friend of ours ( Rob Warden ) did the article in Australian Rodder ( that was a magazine that only ran for 2 issues and came under the same company as Performance Street Cars I believe ). At the time the green '33 coupe was still owned by it's builder ( Graeme Blaby, another friend of ours and fellow club member of mine at the time ). The biege '34 tudor was also built by Grame ( he still owns it, but seldom uses it these days, a few years back he built a '46 convertible ). The article was at old Gippstown.
Below is a shot I took the day Rob did the article, I have a whole lot of shots from the day. Not on file though. They are real photos. I always liked that shot

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Garyd a '40's era hot rod sounds good. I saw you pull up at Tony's in the roadster with your wife and daughter and thought then, that you guys need a hot rod with more room. Those model 'A' roadsters are small in the passenger compartment. One must keep the ladies in one's life happy, especially when it comes to hot rods.
And yes I can do some striping on your roadster if you like. I seldom do cars these days. But I try to keep my hand in by doing stuff here in my humble garage.

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Hi Jaw's. I hope you liked the the images.
Tony has owned that flathead for a number of years. He was always hoping to put it in the 5W. Well Tom ( Tommy Flathead ) and his son Ethan were down at Port Fairy for the week prior to the recent rod run weekend. Apart from cleaning the garage and sorting it out for that weekend, Tom said to Tony maybe they should make a start at fitting the flathead into the 5W.
A brief history on that engine. A guy ( Geoff Spurway ) from down my way at the time. Built a '34 pickup and put that engine together for it. The pickup was on the road a couple of years. Geoff lived at the time in the same town as Peter ( Stork ) Vansittart . Stork was in the same club as I ( The Slingshots ) and eventually he brought Geoff along to a meeting and he later became a member. A number of years later the pickup got sold and went through a couple of owners. Tony ended up with the pickup in a deal he did. Later he moved the pickup on, but kept the engine.
Below is a shot of Geoff's pickup and Stork sport coupe!
Brant if you go back to page 21 there are a couple more shots of the engine, but not in a car. See if you notice anything different about the drive on the blower snout!

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Electric clutch!!!

I remember seeing it and made a mental note.....forgot to ask!

I need some more details.

See in the movies blowers do that all the time with switches n stuff. I always wanted to make a real one out of an a/c clutch like that!

Cool!

 

That sports coupe has an awesome side profile.

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If I recall it is like an Air Con Clutch on that Coupe and Geoff will have to confirm it for us. Unlike Mad Max as that was filmed with the car on the trailer and they just turned off the engine so the blower did not turn over.

 

Hey Wardog. Storks car must have been on the road nearly 30 years. It has always looked great. It has a killer windsor in it. Although Stork was here about 6 months ago and was talking about building a flathead for it. That's after I told him we were putting the flathead out of our race car in the Last Grasp Special. Stork had actually come by to see what I was doing with the engine. He was hoping to buy it.

Geoff aka whodaky

 

That's correct Simon, it does have an air conditioning clutch on it.
I don't know any of the fine details of the blower setup. But Geoff is a real thinker and always worked on a budget. He was very innovative and a great guy to boot!

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Brant, I haven't seen Geoff in years. He moved out of the area when his marriage broke up. At the time he was building a '34 4 door sedan that was full of his innovations.
I am working on my pickup at the moment. Later I will dig out some shots of the Triumph Stork and Geoff built to run on the salt here. Geoff really knows his bike stuff as well. Then throw into the mix the late Nick Naparoski and it was a volatile mix of amazing backyard engineering. All great guys as well!

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Hey guys, It's been great reliving that weekend. Again I had a great time, can't wait for next year. I was going through some old pictures from the port fairy show and shine from years ago and I found these pictures I took of Tony's spinner and your "new" coupe.

 

Hey Mitch. Damn I had forgotten how good Rita's spinner looks. It' been a long time since I have seen it outside.
Always good to see pictures of the 3W. It sought of reminds me that I now own it. I guess I won't actually have that total feeling until it is here in my garage.
But I do appreciate Tony storing for me as it were.
Here's a couple of shots from 2009. It's the weekend I talked Tony into making the 5W a hiboy. It didn't stay that way for long though!
Today I am working on the pickup. The wipers died last week, thought it may have been the electric motor. Turns out it's a seized pivot, so I have it soaking and it should be all good to go later today. Of course Friday coming home from work it poured rain. But you get that.

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Nailhead^^^

You guys have lots of fun!

Good on ya!

 

Mr. Bear thanks for sharing the pics of the spinner and also to Jaws inquiring on he blown flathead. This provides justification to the path this thread is taking many forks in the road that all lead to an equally exciting destination.

Hey Tony I am looking forward to getting the blown motor fully installed and ready for serious road use! I am on call waiting ..

Jaws your intrigue on this very unique engineered set up will be satisfied when we can hopefully place a video of its start up. I actually was lucky to take a spin with Tony in the 34 pick up Geoff had shown shown earlier and must say that it made such an impression to me that all my flatheads since have to Blown!

Our own individual hot rod journeys are just like fingerprints - no two the same making us individual but enough similarity to make them closely connected the difference in our case is that we have the very rare gene - real hot rod in our DNA

 

Too true Tom, too true.

Thanks also for being part of the run on the weekend.

Now Tony and Geoff - get this car finished, I'll be nominating it for the reliability run when its finished.

 

OH I am a fan of blown motors of all sorts...I love to make them work on the street when they are rumored to be un driveable. It's great fun testing....

 

Hi Mark this run was absolutely mind blowing thank you to the RCCRC for the invite and foresight to have the corleonies to stage such an event, I agree wholeheartedly with you mate that the Grasp would be truly mind bowing seeing it blast down the staged courses of your event.. I wait for this day in anticipation

 

Thanks for the replies guys.
I just got off the phone to Tony and he was talking about the reliability run. He also said he had been talking to Mick Jubber there. So our conversation turned to Mick's coupe. I said to Tony I would dig out a picture of the '33 when Graeme ran steelies on it. This shot was taken at the 5th Street rod nationals in Mildura. I also came upon shot of Peter Vansittart's sport coupe at the same event.

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Hi Geoff,

Thanks for the photo of Micks coupe, as TMF and I were also at the R/Run talking about the previous rims as well, so awesome to see it driving through the hills, and we were in Troy's rpu following behind him for a while, great to hear it loading up the quickchange as it accelerated away ahead of us.

Tony, I wish to voice my appreciation for our chat on sunday, as I found it quite inspiring, and look forward to maybe next year parking my coupe alongside both of you guys....

Cheers, and loving the thread,

Drewfus

 

Geoff it was an honour to meet Mick, he is truly a top bloke and a hot rod purest! This landmark coupe is in the best hands and I can't believe my coupe shared the same driveway for the night!!!

I was great to hear Mick's and Tony's recollection of the past at Thommo's place late into Friday night !

 

Geoff and the gang, well I just got home from the RCCRC run over the Australian Day weekend, and I really tired to sort my roadster for the run but I run out of ideas and time and try and drive it the 4 hour trip without my nephew Frank riding shotgun and my back pain making my decision to go or not to go. Tommy rang me and said just come down and ride in my coupe and enjoy the ride. Working on Tom coupe over time made the run worth going shotgun with Tom. Thanks to Thommo and his Family for letting us stay at their place, and I hope to return the favour some day. Thanks to all the blokes that write in on this site .And please let Geoff know that he is doing a real good job as he spends a lot of time setting all this up, Thanks Geoff.

 

Geoff,

Thanks for posting the picture of Peter (Storks) coupe.

it'd have to be the most bitchin Model A coupe of its era and fir the following 25 years!

Love to see it at the run one day.

 

Stove, I agree about the Storks coupe, it is timeless and still looks bitchin! I have only seen it in the flesh only once and would love to see it again someday soon.

 

Tommy. It was also great to meet you, by the end of the weekend, felt like I knew you a lot longer and I tell you what, love your coupe aswell, also liked Steve's car a lot. As for the wheels on my coupe, it's a possibility the old wires that were originally on it could end up on it again, I certainly haven't ruled it out as Graeme still has them and I know he won't part with them but he will if they go back on the coupe. And yeah, Friday night was grouse, always enjoy chatting to Frank, we agree on a lot of issues.
And Tony thanks for telling me about this thread. I will go back to the start and check it out. Also enjoyed our chat on the way to the homestead. And lastly, I get blown away and am honoured that people still hold my coupe in such high regard, makes all my effort in trying to keep it preserved worthwhile.

 

Thanks again guys for all your posts. This thread from the out-set was always going to be way more than about the build of the Last Grasp Special.
I think it has evolved into a truly unique piece about a special segment of hot rodding in Australia today. Not only hot rodding but the lives and events of those that contribute to this thread.
I could go on and on about my thoughts on that, but I won't. I think I tend to think to deep about this stuff sometimes.
Anyhow moving right along.
Mick you say you are blown away by the response that your coupe recieves. My coupe may never have had or still have the impact that your coupe has, but I know from people that I have talked to it did have an impact of soughts. Because we own these hot rods, along with other people who have significant hot rods, as well as those hot rods that may not have been ás significant. We tend to take our hot rods for granted. Because we own them, we're the ones that have to live with them. I don't think we ( I know I don't ) put them on pedestals. So when someone says that one's hot rod inspired them, one can feel a little overwhelmed.
But I think another element of it is the person that owns the significant hot rod, what type of person are they. I know what sought of person I am. The person I am is I guess what made my coupe what it is. However I am the first person to let people know I didn't build the car from scratch.
I am going to stop there again. I am thinking to deeply again. I hope that all makes sense and is perhaps food for thought!
I was inspired by Larry Stacy's coupe from Oklahoma.

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Guys ..The best way to see for yourself the impact your cars create is to let someone else drive it down the road and watch it disappear ,and upon its return see how good it looks coming back towards you otherwise you never really get to see how good they look, Jeff

 

Hi Geoff i spent the weekend out riding with spurs at the grate race
He has now put a 34 pickup on the sedan chassis and stork
Has gone in a new direction with his coupe he has the stroker
Windsor that dad was going to put in his roadster . Your story's
Are a good read I will try to catch up with you when I'm
Home next month regards Darren