i agree,i wasnt on the HAMB when it first came together,but i remeber seeing it it R&C(i think) at the billetproof show at the holiday bowl coverage(was that the name?) and in the blurb it said the INFAMOUS ROACH ROD...later i found out the whole story behind it and how cool it was to build a cool hotrod on the cheap! does anybody have the pepsodint ad with sam smiling in the roach rod??hehehe anyways,, getting upset about it or any car is pretty homosexual tho.. who really gives a fuck,,,we are mearly grains of sand in the time and existince of HOTRODDING...
GRAINS OF SAND.....PERFECT!!!!........What's that saying about "In a hundred years" ?......Personally, I would love to redo the Hirohata Merc....it sucked BAD!!!!
Taking this to the extreme, what if the new owner just plain ol' gets tired of it's look and configuration after driving it "as is" for quite a while......should he not be able to paint it, change motors, re-body it, etc ? Should he have to sell it instead of doing body mods or even changing the body making it unrecognizable ? Is it just a time thing that he done it too soon or should the guy never be able to de-identify his/the car ? Some of the posts read as if it should exist forever as it was and just be handed down through a succsession of "caretakers" for years to come ?
hahha,,,i dont know,,im not even sure what day it is today,,but does it really matter,...i mean, the whole cycle of things, ...,isnt that what makes things cool,,makes people strive..you know,., ,if all the old fucks from back in the day NEVER sold their hot rods and kept them the same way (im not talking about famous guys,they average guys like me and you,,who do it for the love of it..) and the ones that were in the process of building hotrods back then and together just hoarded up everything they could find,, ,then ,if you could imagine,,that there was NO change in hotrodding from 1950 up untill now,2005...all stale ,no changes,,,would you be doing it the same? you cant say shit ,because i REALLY DOUBT that there is one person on here that was a REAL hotrodder back in the 40's or early 50's ,and if he was then he wouldnt be wasting his time on the <a target="_blank" href="http://searchmiracle.com/text/search.php?qq=Internet">internet</a>.(im not talking about your moms 50 dodge wayfarer with static straps either!) evoulution of hotrodding has been happening for better of worse as long as people have been hotodding.. ..what im saying is that WE need change,,not necesarrlily me or you,,but as a groupe.. it helps us to apreciate the past.. fuck it. and YES!,,give,sell,auction,pimp the DASH to Ryan!
I was a Lurker during the last part of that build and was excited to follow the progress on a weekly basis. Meanwhile I was planning my Budget build and realized that it wasn't "just" about building a car..., but of ideas and fellowship that inspired this little car...! I've had built many cars and I never kept a car the same as when I bought it..., I always made significant changes to it where I could call it my own. I guess this is the reason I'm not into restoreing cars but into building Hot Rods...!!! They were usually sold to fund the "NEXT' car and what the New owners did to the car..., was up to them...!!! I remember my wife and I walking past a car I'd built when we first met..., and we saw changes that'd make your eye's burn..., and my wife looked at me and said..., "This isn't our car anymore"...!!!
Buzzard pretty much wrote my feelings about it for me. Hav'nt seen Sam posting on the HAMB in awhile. I learned alot from Sams post and got alot of inspiration to actually start my own project from seeing the Roach Rod and its progress.I feel better about it after reading Sam's post. And if there are many more stories such as the one he told,I think he needs to write a book cause that was some funny shit. SAVE THE DASH.
I had also heard rumors of this coming from discussions with Sam. I am mostly disappointed, to me the soul of the car is gone now, the body and chassis were sort of born together and made to work; from a collection of parts that were not necessarily intended to go together. The end result was a great little car that a regular guy built in his garage without any fancy tools or big money. That was special and so was the teaching and progress reports that Sam provided during the build. The way we all got behind it and packed the ballot box so it could go to Ego-Rama, and then our money contributions to help Sam make the trip. It was all of our vicarious hot rod adventures that were captured by that car, even for those unable to have the fun of a ride in it firsthand. I agree that a couple of neat cars may result from the separated pieces. I won't get into any name calling or other drama, more than I already have above. Miles and El Polacko both have a new vision for the pieces. It just bothers me to see it actually happen, and confirm the rumors I had heard about.
While I may be a newbie, I remeber reading about and seeing the RR and thinking, this is something that I would undertake. The car spoke to the countless many. I too think the dash should be saved and will kick in 50 bucks to do so.
...........hard to believe ANYONE on the HAMB would make that statement! I guess we are all here for different reasons. This whole thing is getting tired. Miles and Elp have heard the opinions. THEY seem confident in their plans. We have all expressed OUR fellings. I doubt at this point that they intend to trash the "dash." If it isn't destined for a "place of honor," I would think they would send it along to Ryan?? In summery........when I first saw our old Studebaker, it was a sad looking piece. It took a couple of years, but I finally got it to look like my original "vision." It was far from a show car, but a $500,000 Boyd car couldn't have provided any more enjoyable miles than that old car. When it came time to sell "her," I knew that the new owner would give her a good home. He did! He took "her" to the next level. It made me sick to see the new look, but he did it right and I was happy for the old girl. He eventually sold her to a Studebaker collector in Long Island, NY. This guy is taking her a little further. Bottom line.........she is being well cared for. The problem with the "Roach Rod" is that it was built by Sam, but it was done so publicly that many of us feel an attachment. When Sam sold it, I think we all felt a sigh of relief to find out that it was sold to a HAMBer. It sort of stayed in the "family." Someone that "understands" bought it. I guess we need to trust that this is so?? Bottom line on this one?? Fuck us all! If they decide to billit the hell out of it and shoot for a magazine cover, it is THEIR vehicle. I just hope that all of the fun we have had with it continues and that when the dust settles, all this whining will have been in vain........
...and just as a side note.. NEVER selling my first car (my avitar) cos it's mine...I built it and I love it.. The RR /....It ain't art its a fucking hot rod. They come and go, some stay around for ever and some last a summer. Neither is more valid, the memories of our cars and what we do with them last forever. Sometimes we need to keep them sometimes we don't...once they are gone, so be it. And I guess thats why I take lots of photos, next time I take her for a spin a soccer mum may write off the whole car. "such is life" Ned Kelly
What a bunch of hipocrites around here.....How many times have you heard (or used) the line, "Hot rods are never done"
The Roach Rod was very much like Rocky's Truck...each rod's CHARACTER and SPIRIT were genuine and unmistakeable, But they were still "works in progress" when the next owners took delivery...each car was driveable "as is" when sold, but not neccessarily "finished"...the people who own these rides now are just furthering the process and moving these vehicles FORWARD as they change, smooth and nudge them towards completion. True, hot rods are never "done", but that doesn't mean you should stand still and not strive TOWARDS refinement! I would truly hope that if someone bought my Fleetline, that they would work on it's shortcomings, improve it, smooth it and make it their own...even if their work eclipses some or all of what I've done to the car since I started on it...hot rods deserve nothing less than your BEST efforts...they SHOULD be altered, tweaked, changed and rebuilt...so that they may be DRIVEN into the FUTURE! Like the way a given car looks TODAY? Take a picture! A photograph of a car epresents history...why cheat the car and it's current owner out of Something Greater by insisting that the car itself be preserved as it is forever...only halfway to where the original builder wanted to take it? Fuck man, let the journey(s) CONTINUE...
Very well said Fathack! As I said before.. how many of us are ever happy with the hulks we buy. We are a group who strives for refinement, improvement and traditionalism. There's no one here who has a doubt its in good hands. I think it was for me the shock of seeing it in pieces laying on the floor a few weeks after it changed hands that disturbed me. Don't forget....it wasn't Boyd who bought this car.... It was one of our own. I didn't have any work invested in this car but I too feel partial to it. It was and still is a symbol of what we represent. The dash..in my opinion belongs in that car and no where else.. It just wouldn't mean the same thing hanging on a wall or on another vehicle. The history would definitely be lost then. Then if the vehicle is sold again to someone who isn't a hamber. Maybe then it will be important to remove it before someone throws a clearcoat basecoat on it. PJ
Well I can't say I'm real happy about the situation, but I trust ELP, I know what he's capable of doing. However the Roach Rod was a very special car for our times, I think it should have stayed in one piece. But when that title's signed over, the new owner has every right to do what he wants to it.
I think if I bought FatHacks car, I'd put a straight six in it, a three speed manual and an Olds rear.... hmmm Greg, wanna sell? Jay
Hey! I just bought this car called the Outlaw by this Roth guy. I have some real big plans for the changes in the body and paint. Glad to see that is just my new project and its no big deal to change things up on an old car some guy built years ago. I'll post photos when thew body is filed smooth/streamlined and the car is flat black and bitchin'.
this guy could have built a chassis and bought a body for half of what he paid to f-ck-up a cover car . he could have bought 2 e-bay rat rods ???????also Sam aint crying with all that green. Good itentions dont make it right I learned that long ago. I hope to sell my rpu to a guy with that kind of money . afool and his money are soon partying
the whole deal is kinda cosmic really, Behold out of the veritable primordial soup made from the better part of a century's automotive flotsum and jetsum a car is born, like the forming of a primative life form it has only the basics nessesary to become a whole. in it's natural progression a frightening and exciting event occurs it devides in two it becomes two separate individuals the children of the original, both different from the parent and each other but still somehow connected, still cut from the same cloth the Roach Rod lives on, and this act of seperation will only help to ensure that at least some part of the original will live on. it is all going to be ok. can you hear the screen door slamming in the wind? it was destined from the beginning.
Is Germ back? That was pretty deep, 60's style, but I understand it. Some of you need to read my signature and think about it a while.... Brian
Hey...you ain't gonna do anything FOOLISH when the car is back at your place, are ya? (Well, that part about the Olds rear works for me anyway! )
Imagine everything you love.....sooner or later, it will be dust.....get over it now and spare yourself the agony when it happens. Sam sold it to build something else...the beat goes on.
the only opinion i have is that the dash be preserved and left out. it was lettered for a particular event and for a particular reason, a singularity if you will, that has come and gone. it therefore harkens back to that; painting over it would be a real shame, but i think leaving it in the body of the car would detract from the new vision of whomever is building it because the finished results, though most likely no less than amazing, will not be the same as the roach rod on several levels. it is this that i feel would make the presence of the original dash out of place.
huh. i've known about this for about a week and have come to terms with it and here is my take. the roach rod was, as bleed pointed out, a car that inspired the rest of us to do the same- and that's build somehthing in your own garage with your own knowhow and the help of your friends knowhow. that is really the bottom line for me. i've known sam since he was just gathering parts for that thing and i participated in some of the build, and the friendship and knowledge (of building cars and a catalog of 8th grade humor) far outweights the feeling i get seeing the body off the frame. the roach rod will continue to be one of my top 5 favorie hot rods (most of which no longer exist anyway, right?) it's the other guys car now- he can do what he wants. i still have the friendships, the knowledge and the memeories of chirping the tires in the first three gears up and down holmes ave.................fuckin' great time!
Both pieces are owned by HAMBers. Does anybody have a dash that El-P could replace the original, it could be relayed around the country and signed by HAMBers with "best wishes El-P!" or "F*** you El-P!"... Maybe we could just print out this thread and decoupage it to the dash.
The Jalopy Journal
