This type of thread has probably been done before but what was the car that got ya hooked? For me it was my Dad's '50 chevy coupe. It was 1973 and my Dad had just finished building the coupe. It had a wicked '70 350 LT1 motor with a tunnel ram and two fours backed by a four speed. The front suspension was from an early Vette that was blocked up for that gasser stance. The exterior was painted '73 Cadillac Firemist Cinnamon and the interior was done in black tuck and roll. It wasn't the look of the car that got me hooked, although I have loved gassers ever since, it was my first real ride in it. I was eight years old and my Dad takes me for a ride around the neighborhood. As we are returning back to the house he arrives at the last stop sign. The fenderwell headers are open and rumbling. Dad tachs the car up and launches it. Now at that age I can just see above the dashboard. When the car launched I was thrown back in the seat and staring up at the sky. The front end had just lifted off the ground. I was hooked! My Dad had built the car to street race. It would pull the wheels in the first 3 gears and twist one wheel off the ground in fourth. It was never beat. After a while no one would race my Dad because of the car's reputation around the area. He changed engines and later sold the car in about '75. I didn't speak to him for a while because of how much I loved that car and how mad I was at him for selling it. He got the car back around '82 or '83. Someone had painted the car a green metallic but otherwise it looked the same. Dad again decided to sell the car. I wanted to buy it so bad but I couldn't afford it being a kid in high school. In '89 my Dad again bought the car back with no motor or interior. By now we're in the middle of the monochromatic fad and someone has painted the whole car '69 hugger orange and subframed it. Dad finished the car. In '91 Dad has the car at the Super Nat's in Canfield. While he was there Hot Rod Magazine does a cover shot of it along with a couple of other cars for the September '91 issue. A feature followed in the November '91 issue. Dad still has the car today. It's still orange but it now has all the chrome back where it should be. Someday I will be lucky enough to own the car that hooked me. What car hooked you?
..for me it was my dad's cousin Billy's 57 Chevy. It was a streetable gasser style 57 with no interior(just two bucket seats)no front bumper and a wicked high winding small block and a stick. I went for a ride when he came over one summer day and i remember I didn't even have my shoes on. Well he cracked through the gears and spun that SB to the moon and that was it!!!!! What a sensation!!!! revvin small block and W--bang w---bang through the gears!!! That was it. After that my dad had a 68 chevelle 396/375 Convertible. And when that car was moving, I was in it along for the ride. Great memories.
My Grandpa's 64 Lincoln, my uncle's 40 Nash coupe, and Falfa's Chevy. Those 3 made me start noticing cars. But what really got me hooked was this: there were 2 gassers in my neighborhood when I was a kid, one of which was just up the block, and belonged to a guy named Phil. It was an early 60's Pontiac, shiny black, and it had a big SCREAMIN' blower sticking out of the hood. Every time he fired that thng up (it was REALLY friggin' loud) me and my brothers would go running outside just to watch him take off. Once in a while he'd light 'em up for us and we'd jump up and down and cheer and chase him down the block. It's funny, I'm getting chills right now thinking about the whine of that blower, and how we thought Phil was the biggest badass who ever lived.
I was about 13 and the kid down the street had a white 40 ford coupe. i used to walk down the street and stand in front of his house to check it out. he spoke to me but never gave me a ride. he was a hood but i loved to watch him drive that 40 past my house. i was and still am hooked on 40 fords
A 29 model A coupe. A good friend of mine and his brother bought a 29 coupe, all original. After seeing their car I had to have one too, so I searched around and found my own 29 coupe. I added juice brakes from a 39, 16 inch wires, and found an overhead valve set up from an old Gleaner combine in Kansas. This was the summer of 1959. By the time school started, I had it running. Used my mom's sewing machine and done a white Hyde interior. Used her Kirby vacuum kit to paint it. The vacuum had a paint jar that would spray pretty good. We lived on the farm, so I moved it into the barn and painted. Sure miss that car.
A couple cars here, one was a '32 Ford pickup in about '64. It was painted a dull green, like an Army drab, chopped, channeled, and a big ol' Hemi with no hood...made an impression. The other was a '30's coupe, I think it was actually a Chrysler, about a '39, but it had no front sheetmetal on it. The guy lived at the other end of the block from my parents and we could hear it get fired up. I was about 14-15 at the time. The guy used to take it up and down the block with open headers. I couldn't believe it when i saw him lift the front drivers side wheel when he launched it. He used to street race the thing, but had to tow it to the races; one day when he came back with it i heard him talking to his friends about all the tickets he had just recieved when he got busted!!! The '32 pickup is still around, owned by the same guy. He's in his 70's now and a friend. His son's are all into cars with a couple trad rods. The thing i didn't know about the '32 when i was younger was that it was and still is driven with hand controls, the guy that built it had polio as a child and can't walk without crutches. He fabbed all his own controls back in the '60's. He still drives it and still has the same Hemi in it
The one that got me hooked on hot rods was a '67 Olds 442. The one that got me hooked on building something more gasser-like was, well, just about everything I saw in the early '60's hot rod mags.
I grew up in the islands. Karman Ghias were considered the hot car in my high school. Then came American Graffiti. Saw it at the Waikiki # 2 Theater. Paid seven times in two weeks. I think I sat through it over a dozen times. Fell in love with the yellow deuce. Spent my junior and senior years building a '57 Chevy. Took it to Cali for college and spent the next few years cruising most of the major boulevards in SoCal. Still have that car and I'm still in love with the Milner Coupe.
This one is the one that started it.... (Dad's) And this one sealed it.... (was our family car all through the 70's.... became mine in '84. Still have it, although it's in a whole lot of pieces right now.
no particular car pops out... but when I was 12 (1972) I wanted a subscription to street chopper, but I got a subscription to street rodder instead. been nutty about cars ever since. the first car I lusted after was a 50 olds coupe in the neighborhood. louvered hood, shaved trunk, red and white tuck and roll, chrome wheels with a california rake. never saw it move. it was a faded old HOT ROD in 1974... there was a yellow 32 roadster in the garage with a cad or an olds?? it was sold in 75 when I was 15. if he had sold it a year later I'd have bought it... instead I got my 49 chevy, which I still have.
the older guys that live on my street were all car guys and i would sit and listen and watch them work on thier cars as i got older the wood let me help they were mostly ford guys flatheads and y-block but one guy had a 50 old,s coupe and that was the car
Well there are three that did it for me two were my dads and one was my grandpa's. The earlyest car memory I have is of my dad wrenching on his tradional style 55 chevy 2 dr, you know the original faded paint and interior, low as hell on chevy rallys with a SBC. that was in 1987 I was 5. The car cought fire when our yard was burnt by a exploding paint can in the burn barrel "thanks mom" The next car is a 52 chevy that he built the same way but left the 235 or 216 I dont remember which. The last car was my grandpas 53 chevy that was done all original pretty much. It was drug home from this old mans pasture and fixed to the drivable stage and left alone, But when ever I want to think about that car all I have to do is look in the my garage, or take it for a spin, because its mine now. It is getting the 50's style custom look now. Its really fun when all three of use get in it and go for a drive only I am drive and dads in the back seat. lol
it was my dads 38 Chevy coupe. i used to ride in the back window to and from my grand mothers house. He still owns the car, he bought it for $50 bak in 57'. We tore it down 3 years ago and all the registrations and vehicle inspections were in the glove box. It has only 1500 miles put on it since 1968. what a shame on the miles but the body/ sheetmetal is imaculate. Man i still love that car!
1966 ,I was 13, my cousin who I thought was James Dean pulled up in a "Ruby Red" 32 channeled 3 window. It had an olds motor and a Tiajuana roll and pleat white interior. My dad ask him why in the hell he spent good money on that "Heap". I was hooked. Blacky got married in about a year and bought a 64 olds 98. I was shattered.32 was never seen in my town again. I would love to find it if it still exist.
I can't say that any 1 car started it, but I had an uncle who was a Oldsmobile dealer, he supplied cars to some of the local --- well ---well, lets just say they were pretty good fellas. Anyway the first car I remember was a 51 olds that was ordered for one of them and never picked up. So my uncle gave my dad a deal on it. It had bullet proof glass and tires on it. My dad said it rode really bad, but was fast as hell. Funny how well I remember that green metallic paint. But the one that really moved me was when another uncle flew out from Ca and bought a 57 olds J2 from him to drive back. He took me for a ride and put his foot in it, ohhhhh that sound and the speed, I was only 8, but I think I got wood.
It was a car on the cover of Popular Hot Rodding I think 1973 about, it was called Low Blow a 23 T that was black with flames and blown and so low the carbs were above the roof. I seen it being built when I was young. Awesome.
When I was 15 I bought a '48 Chev. Lowered it and it bottomed out. Put a Sears vacuum shift eliminator on it and damaged the syncros. Put a Smitty muffler on and got tagged the next day. Bought a '35 Ford 2 door for $65 after looking at it 3 times (in 1957). Put Sears floaters on the mechanical brakes and a modified flathead that had been run on alcohol on the dirt tracks. Needed 50wt oil; big clearances back then. After the '35 I was never satisfied with 'regular' cars and have been hooked for 50 years, so far...
ZZ Tops car..... Then I fell for it's older sister, the 33-34 2 door sedan...I will have one someday.
there were several, they guy that lived across the street fom me when I was about 10 had a Curtis sports car that he raced, and another guy down the street had a purple 'Cuda with a hemi and a purple T bucket with a BBC, aout the same time my uncle had (in no particular order) a 69 big block Camaro, a 57 t bird with a 396 chevy (my dad still talks about he f*#ked up that car) a series of big block Chevelles, a big block vette with knock offs and side pipes, and a big block chevy T bucket. There are just so many, but that old Curtis still stands out, one of these days I will find one and have the means to buy it
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