The other day i went to the local CHP station to look up a guy who once worked with me but is now a CHP officer. I walked in off the street. Old, fat guy. No writing on my shirt. No grease showing. And the Sargent at the front asks me why they won't face the rotors on his new Dodge Pickup. I thought "This is odd that he is picking up something." So for some people you don't even need the car for them to know.
A few years ago I worked in a large Ford dealership. Out of the 400+ employees I don't think there were more than 2 or 3 who were really what you could call "car guys". The rest had no interest, and little knowledge, of the car hobby at all. Once I was working with the outside sales guy and we were riding around making sales calls and I was noticing nice cars we'd see along the way. "Did you see that?", I'd ask. "What?", he'd say. "That cool car!" I said. "What cool car?" "Never mind" The guy has been in the car business his whole life and has no interest in cars. Even more amazing, I currently work for a company that sells aftermarket performance parts just like Summit and Jegs. I'm the only guy in the company that's into hot rods and customs and racing, etc. The ONLY one! To the rest of them we might as well be selling copy machines or kitchen applliances. One of our marketing guys just bought a new 2011 Challenger so now he thinks he's into this stuff. We do have a couple of ex-racers but they no longer have any real interest. But on the other side of the coin, you should've seen the looks I got right after I started working here when they all found out I have no interest in football! They looked at me like I was green and had six arms.
I know axactly what you're talking about! I have relatives who will say How much did you spend on that?",then look amazed! These are the same guys who have NO PROBLEM spending $1200 plus,on a gun! I have a friend with a Yacht,and recently told me it costs him 30k a year to have it! When he runs over to Catalina Island,he dumps about $500 in gas ,ALONE! You can have boats.....I'll take an old car anyday!!!
Everywhere I go in my town,I get "aren't you the guy with the old cars?" When I ask,"How did you know?",they usually say..."the hat!" hahaha!
A guy I work with has several Corvettes . We were talking about the younger generations and cars. He said that he was always amazed that when his daughters were dating , not one of the guys that came around and walked past his collection ever took an interest or asked any questions about the cars. Now I know that when I was that age I would have been severly attracted to a cute blonde , but I would always have had a minute to check out a cool car.
It's all relative, guys. We are into hot rods. Others are into golf or stamp collecting or shows about vampires. I look at them like they look at us. It's the way the world works.
You know how many people think your an idiot for not investing tens of thousands of dollars in Star Wars memorabilia instead of the car hobby? Be thankful the car hobby isn't even more popular than it is. Prices are governed by supply and demand. You want to start paying $100,000 for a Model A sedan? When was the last time you took a sincere interest in public education or school administration and budgeting? How about the exciting world of municipal school bonds and the most current text books on French Literature? As, a retired school principal, maybe your friend would really be honored if you showed an interest in something that must be close to his heart. It goes both ways.
I thought you were going to say "Now I know how much work goes into either the cute blonde or the cool car"
My daughter (22) made a comment the other day that made me happy and sad at the same time. She said "Thanks Dad for teaching me about cars. I know more about them than any of the guys I date." Glad she is happy. Sad the guys don't know anything about cars. Maybe she should date other guys?
A neighbor, friend, or co-worker being "non-car people", is one thing, but for me a far greater sacrilege is when people who are in the "industry" show, or have no interest in the old car hobby. I know business owners, corporate heads, etc. who are in the automotive aftermarket (Parts store owners-Parts company corporation executives), who have no interest in old cars. I, for the life of me, can not understand how anyone could be a leader in the automotive aftermarket, and not be passionate about the roots of the industry. It really is an eye opener, and explains in a way a lot of issues we, as parts consumers are faced with..it is corporate greed, only concerned about the "bottom line". Lastly, I for one have many passions. You really can be passionate about Golf, Real Estate, Travel, etc., and still be a "motorhead".
But hasn't it always been that way? I think a lot of those that weren't around in the glory days assume that there was a time when everyone was into their cars, and I have a feeling that that is not the case. I remember the bastard that was my stepfather working on our family car every couple weeks back in the 70s, not because he wanted to but because cars came with a maintenance manual and were simple enough that you could do your own routine maintenance and save yourself some money. But to him and I daresay to hundreds of thousands of regular Joes going back through the ages it was a chore that he hated. If cars were as simple nowadays as they were back then, I bet a lot of people would do their own work, but it wouldn't necessarily make them "car guys". To some people the automobile has never been anything more than a means of getting from a to B and with the passage of time it has been taken more more for granted. Pop the hood on any modern piece of shit nowadays and try and figure out what's going on underneath all that plastic. Unless you specially trained it's highly likely that you are just going to scratch your head and walk away. Cars have evolved in such a way (as part of the plan by the motor industry I believe) that you're more likely to need a computer expert than a mechanic. They are seen as disposable tools and manufacturers have a "don't get it fixed, just buy a new one" mentality that actively discourages gearheads. I would venture to suggest that although there have always been "car guys", those with the sort of passion that we share here have always been a lot fewer and further between than our idealistic view of times gone by leads us to believe. Just running off at the mouth because I'm bored. Paul ps.they laugh at us because we're different,we laugh at them 'cause they're all the same.
yup another highly edamacated minnie sotan . it is nice to have friends that are not car folks ..until .. the old tin is crushed-scrapped from their family homested place cuz who would want all them old cars outa the barns gee i did not know you would have wanted any of them,all the title cards where in drawer too .. or my friends wifes- sister dads old car magazines went to the recycling they were 60 years old and had no value had to make two trips .... then they say" did ya see that new picker's tv show you should sell all them signs and old cars in your barn they might be worth some money" .if they were mine i'd sell them and buy a new flat screen to watch football . why do you keep em any way ? ......why would you two sit at a car show all dayfor 3 -14 hour days and look at 10,000 old cars ? .. why does it matter what kind of wheels it has wheels are wheels ? ....why would any one need more than one car .. you insure 5 cars ? ...you own 23 cars why? why do you have a hundred wheels on a rack and have 5 sets of 4 tires mounted on rims with different bolt patterns just so you could bring another old car home aren't all wheels the same ? the latest for me anyway " you won a new Mercedes at the casino did ya keep it?" i would have taken the money .. they never ever ask what model ,or the color .. just how much the taxes were ..
My neighbour stated when we were talking about rods and the prices of them as I had just had a good offer on my A.. "god you could get a Porsche for that!".....no fucking idea!!! My sister was round my house a couple of weeks ago and was forced to have a look at the Truck I'm building for my wife....now I am 49...she is 51, when we lived at our parents house I was building cars and bikes all the time with my dad...over the years she has seen the various POS I have driven and built.... and yet she has no idea how I know how to build a car and was actually shocked at what I had built.....again no fucking idea the thing is people walk around in a bubble and what we do is totally outside any terms of reference to their lives
"Sorry I don't like football!!" (Soccer) is a statement guranteed to confuse in the UK. Blokes still try to talk to you about it though and really can't understand why you have no idea of what they are takling about "I'm in to cars!" usually they gets "Oh you like Formular 1?"... "No, hot rods!"......blank expressions all round...
Been there, but with Football, not soccer. Kinda like going to a cruise night with a nice Mopar and being surrounded by small block camaros - "that a 350?" "No, 360" "wow, that's 10 better!"
I found a 39 Chevrolet in a barn while I was stationed in North Dakota around 1990. It was in excellent condition and only needed to be dusted off and resurected. I tracked down the owner of the farm and asked him if he would sell it. He was amazed that anyone would want it. His exact quote was, "why in the hell would you want that thing....it's just a damn old car.....doesn't even have a radio in it" I bought it for a song and did get it resurrected after a terror filled trip dragging it home from the barn.
I find this comment almost hilarious! It's called being a well rounded person. I've been a gear head, car nut, auto designer, auto sculpture in clay, welder, and half a dozen other things. We also have a horse farm, and my family has three golf professionals in it. We also had a skydiving school in your part of the country of three decades. We flew, and built airplanes. Check out my photo album and you will see that many of us are gear heads at hart, but we opened up our horizons and did other things. Because of this well rounded thinking life has had a flavor that those that limit there self will never know. One other thing, When your a well rounded person, and opportunity comes along you have a better chance of running with it if your mind is open to other things in life. If you grab opportunity with both hands the rewards can be great. Every time I've seen a guy that's complaining about a dead end job. I see a guy that's not well rounded enough to do something about it. Ya, It's hard to understand these non car guys, but they represent the masses. I've noticed at times some car guys complaining about feeling lesser than some because they work on old cars. I never understood that. Look at it from the other side. Most can't weld, fabricate, trouble shoot. Hell if the kitchen drain gets clogged there screwed, but us car guys can fix almost anything. Be proud of what you can do, it's not always about the money. Just call me well rounded. If your not that's your fucken problem, if you are, welcome to the club. Johnny Sweet
The Ol' Man was a died in the wool car and bike guy up until he passed. He always gave me a hard time about fooling around with those old cars and motor cycles. Of course if I got stumped he was always the first one to grab a wrench or a test light and shove me out of the way. Tub Man, Some people are just clueless. Even if they figure out what it is they just don't get it. Hell we have guys on here that post OT things all the time, they just don't get it. I have a neighbor across the street a lady that is '84 years old, she looked at my Stude when I rolled it onto the garage and asked what I was going to do with it. I told her that I was going to put ti together and drive it. he response was, "But it doesn't have any glass in it?" She just doesn't get it. There was a neighbor lady that lived next to her about the same age that saw the stude and fell in love with it, she didn't ask me a damned thing about it. She just said, "What a beautiful old Stude that's going to be fun for you to drive!!!" She got it right off. Then there are other people that just are not very observant. it may be that he was in the shop fooling with snow mobiles which are obviously something that interests him and was focused enough on that to not pay attention to anything else. If he were my friend I would take him out let him crawl all over it and just believe that he just didn't notice it. Hell you may just ruin him for life.
I'm always messing with my model A with the garage door open. Ya gotta admit a model A hot rod ain't something ya see every day. Delivery people, salesmen and neighbors will come in to talk to me and never even notice the car a foot from them let alone say anything about it? My brother's one of 'em.
So many things to sample from life`s smorgasbord ! I just keep coming back for another helping of rust, grease and bloody knuckles.
Guys it goes deeper than that. We tend to think in car related terms and through our knowledge learned from cars. You probably know chemistry due to air and fuel mixing, getting compressed and ignited, and what comes out. Also that there are different steels with different properties. How weather and altitude can change a fine-tuned engine's ability to operate. You can grasp almost as many colors as a casual clothes shopper because you have seen Reds that are close but not 'right'. You can also spot most fake patina quickly. You know when those jeans were bought worn. You know what a new, old original, used and restored part looks like. You have a grasp of physics at least in 2 dimensions because you know how fast that project is going to be and how much brakes you are going to need. You can also look at a part and have a good idea if it's going to hold up to the stresses involved by the size, shape and materials. You understand balance of form and function. A lowered, chopped '50 Merc (not an MB) should not have a big fake chrome scoop sticking out of the hood. A Street Beast 34 is like a movie prop western town. When you talk to the guys that only know football and drinking, they lack the strong background knowledge we have of the world around us. The wine connoisseur may understand the climate and soils. The football guy may know the extreme abilities of the human form and dealings in law and business. The golfer has physics, wind and terrian mapping. I think we have a better, broader outlook if we explore it all.
When we first moved here to the Central valley, we had a lady that babysat our girls after school, she lived out in the country, and they ran a small dairy. Her husband was a pretty sharp guy, always welding some kind of discarded mechanix together to make his own machinery. We were out in the back of the barn one day, and I spotted a mish-mash of cobbled together Ford driveshaft casings and axle housings...it was a sort of conveyor, and then I spotted something that nearly knocked me over. There on the bottom of the machine where it changed direction of rotation was none other than a V8 Halibrand Quick change! Closer up, I read: "Culver City, Calif." I asked where that came from! (was there a car...?) He said it came out of the wrecked racing car the neighbor's kid had, "The thing had been wrecked so many times they just cut it up. This was the only thing I wanted, so I used it on here. It has gears inside, so I get two different speeds out of it." This old gent had a junk pile, and let me take a couple of things. ('36 front axle with wishbone, and a '36 transmission, nothing else Ford related...) He passed away 2 years ago, and when I went out to visit his widow, I asked about the machine. She said she had everything that reminded her of him taken away, just cleaned the place up. Sold the cows, too. Drat!
I can remember driving my '37 Ford coupe and one lady commented "wow - you sure did fix that volkswagen up nice". WTF?? At least she saw it as some kind of old car. I went to volunteer at the local high school tech department, but was turned away because "nobody was interested in that old stuff any more". Its sad, but no reason to give up trying to pass along the knowledge.
non car people are wierd. I always get a kick out of sports people who come up and start talking about some game they saw yesterday as if they were actually playing in it. I had a buddy many moons ago who came up all excited about some game he watched on TV that day. when I showed no interest and mentioned that I didn't care he says, "oh yeah, I forgot, you're not athletic". the funniest part of that thinking was while he spent the afternoon watching TV I was out on a 50 mile bicycle ride.
My sisters both married sports guys. These guys plan their entire lives on the "game" and spend all their time talking about the "game". There's always a game be it football, baseball, basketball or hockey that's either on or going to be on TV soon and they can't do anything else because the game is on. I think it's pathetic to live your life that way.
The Jalopy Journal
