Does the general public react when they see you out driving?

Don't you love people who know more about your car than you?

 

I think half (If not more) of peoples reactions are what we do it for.

I always enjoy the reactions and looks on peoples faces. Over the years I've had many different cars ('67 Shelby GT 350, 62 Falcon Ranchero, '66 Mustang, '62 Falcon coupe Pro Street, '56 Buick Gasser, etc)They all got there fair share of attention. Once in front of a 7-11 a guy jumped the parking bumper and hit the window, because he was staring at the Shelby, HA!! The biggest "reaction" car from little kids to our elder statesmen hands down was my RED 1957 Thunderbird! I know it's a cool car, but that thing got peoples attention.

After it was first done a friend and I went for a ride. 3 different girls/ women commented heavily on the car. When my wife got home from work, her and a girl friend took it out. I warned her it was a "Chick Magnet" They both said "We're gonna pick up some hot guys" They came back after about 1 hour giggeling. "You were right. We were at the first red light when some 30 something hottie, rolled down her window and started going crazy over the car. Even asked for a ride!" For the few years we had it it was a non stop people pleaser.

Don

 

Sadly, no. A good good friend is competing for the 170 lb title belt in the Omaha Fight Club this weekend. I'm his driver back to Lincoln, in case things don't go so well.

 

I had been living in my house for about a year without meeting any of the neighbors. I pulled my 56 chevy out the other day and every single one of them came over to introduce themselves and offer a hand.

 

funny you say that.
Just the other day while stopping for gas on my way over to Danimals place , a guy asked me what year my car was and what engine it had in it..I said 53 chevy , with a 327 engine i put in it.
He sid No that cant be right..a 327 would never fit in an old car like that..I said oh really..thats funny , i wonder how i got it in there than? I popped the hood just to let him know i wasnt pulling his leg. he was speachless, and walked away.

 

It's absolutely impossible to be in a bad mood and drive my car.

I cant drive to the hardware store without at least 2 or 3 wavers or folks asking to trade cars. I take it as the highest of compliments. To this day, all of the attention is unnerving to my wife. I dig it.

 

Someone mentioned it earlier. The cars and trucks that we drive aren't the "norm" anymore so when people see them, they are surprised. It's usually a good thing but there's always that asshole in his $50,000 ride that he just picked up from the builder and had absolutely nothing to do with the build other than financially. The person that looks down their nose at those of us that don't have that kinda $ to shell out. It happened a few days ago to me. There was a guy in a nice, pretty, shiney early 60's vette. We stopped next to one another at a light and I glanced at his car and gave him a friendly wave. This prick has the nerve to look at me, give one of those smartass chuckles and turns away. Whatever, I guess his new car was feeding his mid-life crisis.

Not if they're in the zoo.

 

I get great questions and comments.

I've gotten, "Is it a Nomad?" now a half-dozen times.

It's been called a hearse, an Ecto, and Christine.

Every time I get in it, someone asks when I plan to fix the rust and paint it. Or they'll ask if I have a hood (yes I do - but there's something fun about driving without it).

I've got a Belvedere badge on one side and Suburban on the other (it IS a Suburban) and on more than one occassion I've overheard some blowhard telling someone else about those Belvedere wagons, or how the Fury name was too aggressive so they decided to call them Belvderes, etc. Too funny.

People touch it all the time! I don't really care, but I can remember my dad telling me to never touch something that isn't mine.

Mostly I just built it to bomb around in with my friends...

 

It's Christine's more sensible cousin, Caitlin.

When we were towing my truck after buying it, got tons of looks as it passed by. Best part was pulling it through a rich neighborhood, along the gulf courses. Half the folks there stopped swinging to look.

And that's when it looked like hell from sitting.

 

I was at a gas station one time in a Hupmobile. Old guy driving a late-ish model truck glares at me and says "That one of them kit cars?" I looked at him and said "That one of them kit trucks?"

Another time in the same car, waiting in the left turn lane at the lights, cop bike right behind me. Lights turn green, I turn left into right hand lane of three lane boulevard, cop roars up beside me, points his finger at me, as I think 'wtf have I done?', and says "Nice", speeds ahead and pulls the VeeDub in front of me.

As Mel Blanc once said "When I drive my toys other drivers give me hand signals. When its the Ferrari I get the finger, when its the hot rod I get the thumb".

 

Mel Blanc, the cartoon voice?

 

I actually used to NOT take my car out for a 'fun; drive when it was at the height of being a gold chainer trophy winner (whatever you wanna call it) cuz it would take me FOREVER to get anywhere.
Ive been pulled over by cops to 'check it out' and it used to take me a half hour just to get gas because people would always stiop and chat with me about the thing.

Hopefully now, with no matching interior (changing fron a bench to buckets) with an 8 yearold paint job and 50K miles on it since I did it, people will just look from afar and let me drive the damn thing

Not that I didnt appreicate people liking it, but DAMn, I always had some place to go when they wanted to chat about the remember whens...

 

I drove the T to Home Depot a couple of times over the Memorial Day Holiday. Each time it was a hoot. I went to load about $100 worth of plants and flowers into the car and a lady yelled at me not to get the inside dirty with plants. She hadn't taken a good look inside. It was still covered in beach sand and Lattimore mud !!
I do love all the waves and hoots. My wife and I went to breakfast at a local diner on Sunday morning....that was so cool. My wife was afraid that I would not get to eat....we got a lot of questions.

 

I actually get a lot of drunk-looking guys in other old Ford pickups give me the "Yehh yeh thas'em Goodtruck you's have're." And then a thumbs up.

Then again, my truck's not that old ('64) compared to most of the rides on here, so I don't know...

 

Exactly.
Every time I drive the old cars it seems like the crazy people come out.
I drove one of the Comets all weekend.
Got back in the truck and almost threw myself into the dash on the first stop.
Maybe all cars should go back to drum brakes.
Then they would be, pre-occupied enough trying to stop, to prevent texting on the cell phone.

Probably would be carnage for the first few weeks though.

 

Have always got hi signs, smiles and thumbs up from the public. Seems like older people (60-70"s) like the 57 Olds. I guess they can identify with it, may have even had one at one time. The 34 gets thumbs up from fellow rodders and kids. Kids love hotrods and streetrods, just like dogs love trucks.

A couple of years ago I was at a car show and an older couple (in their 80's) came over to look at the 34. Seems they had one like it when they got married back in the early 40's. He was talking about the chopped top and the updated drivetrain, and she was talking to my wife about the fun she had in the back seat.

 

like i said in the thread i started today, i drove my car fro the first time this weekend. in the span of about 10 blocks, pretty much everyone i drove by did a double take. one dude damn near broke his neck, and another guy came from across the street to talk to me while i was washing it in the driveway.

from cruising around with other guys from our club at Roundup, i notice a lot of old timers like to chat at red lights. they are the ones that know these cars best, and can relate.

it almost always starts off with "i had a..."

 

Did get quite a few thumbs up this weekend.
Makes you feel really good.
Seems like the number of old cars, on the road around here, on weekends is down drastically.
Probably due to the gas prices.
Seems with less ones on the road they notice the few that are a lot more than usual.
Lots of people, in our area, really have long commutes to work and it's starting to really hurt them.
Number of boats on the water was way down also.
Something I've never seen on a Memorial Day weekend yet.

 

I had the opportunity to witness several near wrecks yesterday as I followed Dad on his 400 mile journey from FL to GA with the 64 Riviera. Cars would fly by me like their butt was on fire, and then slow way down when they sighted the Riv. After we unpacked, we took my truck over to the storage lot, and on the way back, we stopped at an intersection. The guy at the adjacent corners says "I need one of those." That was great. Oh...it's shiny.

 

ive been buildin driven hotrods since 65 it took a while to get use to the looks and commets an dumd questions but i always treat these people well because we are very fortunate enought to be driveing these and there is nothing like it tim

 

Flower always gets the attention in her roadster but the best one was the little 6 year old at the "Back to the Beach" show, he thought the roadster was really cool and wanted to sit in it.......his Daddy said he could not, that alot of people don't allow that..............so Flower says "hey...you can sit in MY car, I built it so I can let you get in". The little guy crawled inside, his parents took a bunch of pictures and he was thrilled. THAT was worth it all, the huge advantage of a real driver.

 

My F1 project currently in bare metal gets lots of great comments, especially at gas stations. It's rare I don't get asked to lift the hood. In our consumer society there are still people that get it, that appreciate old vehicles and value the ingenuity it takes to build and drive one.

I don't give new cars a second look, seen 'em once seen 'em all, but I get a big kick seeing and hearing an old owner-built project car running down the road. A few weeks ago I heard an old Mustang on the freeway taching high rpm in the right lane, and as I rolled down my window to fully enjoy the music, it instantly transported me back to '69 and driving my own '65, miss that car. Cars don't sound like that on the freeway anymore, everybody's got OD, but hearing that sound again sent a shiver up my spine, and I was grinning ear to ear.

 

I took my T-bucket from PA to the Jersey shore this weekend for the first time. I was a little concerned about the Jersey laws. I was stopped at a light and a cop pulls up along side. Down came the window and the cop says, " Sweet ride!" Asked where I was going and pulled away. I felt a little better after that.

I feel like little kids, middle aged (like me I'm 60) and for some reason college girls react to my T the most.

 

my first "old" car was/is a 66 caddy, i've had it for a while and many a car have came and went. its not that old and nothing compared to pretty much all of the cars here, but everytime i go out i get thumbs up and waves.

the funniest places are at 2 in the am outside clubs, most of the crowd is in their 20's and just start yelling out "HEY NICE LINCOLN!" hahahaha i just say thanks.

people come over to chat and always ask me crap. my buddies have big brand new escalades on big 24 inch rims and have never had someone wave or talk to them about cars. haha and their set of rims cost more then my whole car and all the crap i've upgraded on it.

i imagine my 52 chev truck will be even more of a conversation piece.

 

I get all the usual reactions when i drive my '46 Chevy coupe, but what baffles me is the little kids, i mean the ones under five years old that stop, point and yell when i drive by. How could they know that that car is different from the run of the mill cars? Thhey can't know what cars looked like even six years ago, yet they react to a really old car like they know.....weird if you think about it.
I was doing a shakedown drive in my "Abortion", my 46' Ford "bobber" truck last summer. As I drove by one house a guy was standing up at the top of a long driveway and dropped what he was doing and ran all the way down to the street to look after i passed the driveway. Maybe he just wanted to throw something at me

 

I honestly would not want to hear about that from an 80 year old woman.

We've grown accustom to the difference. But when something new to their eyes (old cars and truck) that just has that something different, they know. No modern car has the same mystique as a classic machine.

Then again, my god parent's 9 yr old daughter calls mine a Hill-billy-machine, so I could be wrong.

 

Part of the fun of driving the "cool" cars is the attention you get. We were out in my 61 Lincoln convertible one time and my sister in law (not a car person at all) came with us. When we got home shes goes, JC I felt like I was in a fish bowl. Everyone smiling and giving you a wave or thumbs up...its insane.

 

lostn51 hit the nail on the head - user friendly

 

My ride makes little babies cry, young girls smile aand old ladies swoon!!

 

My personality sucks, but I have a cool car.