Tudor Made Hot Rod Magazine

Now I can say that a car with my stripes was in Hot Rod Magazine!!!

Great write-up ans pics!

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Congrats!!!! josh it looks great.

 

Kool.... Perfect Stance and great coverage in the mag....

 

Congrats on the coverage, well deserved!

 

My copy just arrived today! I am super stoked. Big thanks to Mr. Byrd who liked the car enough to take pictures make it happen. Lots of cool stuff in that issue as well. The Bombshell Buick and the Race of Gentlemen. I ripped the cover taking the THIS IS YOUR LAST ISSUE cardboard cover off. They glue that right to the binder? Oh well. I'll be picking up some extras believe that

Thanks for putting up those pictures Andrew, Crazy. That was the coolest day when everyone came over and helped set the body on the frame for the first time. It never came back off of there. Everyone had tons of ideas of how to set the body. Most wanted to keep the heavy channel. Mr. Muddler and I stayed up to the wee hours drinking mass quantities of beer adjusting the channel and "eye fucking" as Chuck would say.

Almost as cool as the day Andrew laid this on me :

I am still in blown away by this painting. Bad Ass.
I really wanted a high boy bad I kept raising the jacks while he was lowering them on the other side. Finally Jeff conceded on a suitable elevation.

Then we welded angles to the frame to hold it in place. And that was it!
I thought I'd share the information I sent to Tommy Lee for the article. They only have so much space but I thought it would be cool post this stuff:

Any other individuals who helped: _The SFCC Car Club, Joe Varble, Ray Balew Ray’s Hot Rod Shop Calhoun, GA, Steve Kirk, Hog Mtn Garage
Purchase Price:_Body Shell for $300
Condition: Body Shell minus floor or firewall. It did have doors, dash and deck.

Body was heavily covered with bondo and gold paint. Up to an inch in some places
Date Project Started:12/22/2005 Date Completed: On Going

Home Track: _Paradise Drag Strip, Calhoun, GA or The Silver Dollar
Dragway, Reynolds, GA

Weight:_2500 Lbs with me in it_ Miles Driven Per Year (Approx.):_3500 or so Total Mileage:_10,000 miles so far

How Did You Find The Vehicle?: My dad found the body and I put it on a frame I had constructed for a 31 Model A Tudor I was building. My father is a 32 guy and knew about this particular body his friend had in Savannah Ga. My father mentioned this body and the possibility of getting it over the course of a year. He always warned me about how rough it was.

My father’s friend had gotten the body from gentlemen he knew in Brunswick, GA in 2004. Pop’s buddy brought the body back to Savannah and was planning on building it for another friend of his. They sat on it for a long while and finally decided it was too rough to do anything with.
All the while, my dad had kept after him to let him look at it and possibly sell it to him if he ever decided to let it go. Then on Thanksgiving 2005, dad got the call to come look at it.

My Dad in turn called me and wanted to know if I was interested. Of course I was very excited and wanted to see pictures. I was also bracing for how much it was going to cost. I had decided I was going to try and get it no matter what. A few hours passed and my dad finally emailed me pictures. We chit chatted and finally got down to brass tacks. I asked him how much it was going to be. Well to my surprise, Mr. Doyle basically gave us the body. My dad paid him his offering price plus a little because of his generosity.

We borrowed a trailer from a buddy, Al Greene, down in Savannah and my dad went and picked up the body the next day. Sweet!!!!!!!!!
Then my dad brought the body to Atlanta when he visited for Christmas a few weeks later and presented it as my Christmas present!
Well it wasn’t long after that and I invited all my buddies over.

We picked up the sedan body and tossed it off to the side in favor of the coupe. The we sat around and laughed and pushed it around mocked up as a way channeled coupe with a model A grill shell and a 671 blower core stacked with old carbs. The body had no floor or firewall and had been severely channeled back in the day. It had so much bondo, the roof was over 2” think in some places. You couldn’t see a body line anywhere on the car. The reveals over the rear wheels were gone! The trunk lid was completely smooth. You couldn’t even see the beltline between the rear deck and cab. The doors had been shortened 6” and some crazy rockers had been welded and mudded in.

After all but a few left, I jacked the body up with floor jacks and blocks of wood until the windshield opening looked right in my eyes. Jeff Mudler was there with me until the wee hours of the morning. We finally welded temp support angles to the outside of the frame to hold the body where I liked it. I say “Where I liked it” because the whole time, Jeff was trying to talk me into keeping the deep channel on the car. 
I spent the next few years doing the dirty work.

I constructed sub rails, a floor, finished the 32 frame I had started for the 31 Model A. I installed a
Chevy 283 with a Hampton 4-71 in front of a M-21 Muncie 4 Speed. I wired and got the car running. I utilized an 8” ford rear end with a 4 link rear suspension. I made the bottom links that could be seen out of 36 Ford Rear Wishbones. I had the car on the road for a few months getting the bugs worked out.

During construction I had been slowly removing the bondo from the exterior of the body to find out what I had. Mainly removing filler from the deck lid and rear quarters where the bondo was found to be 1 ¼” thick in places. The body was in good shape under the bondo as it had been well protected. The perimeter of the body was heavily dented in or not there from the neandrathal body work practices utilized to smooth this entire body.

I was talking with my dad one Sunday afternoon about removing the bondo. I told him I was about to tackle removing the bondo off of the entire roof. He immediately said if I did that I would be creating a can of worms. That really stuck in my head and I thought about it while I was grinding off inches of bondo all over the car. The entire garage would be completely white with bondo dust every time I went after it.
This body really was a can of worms. Then if built a bad ass engine it would be a can o worms when you nailed the gas. I wrote Can O Worms over the driver’s window on the roof sill with a white paint pen. From then on the car has been known as the Can O Worms.

Canadian and fellow club mate, Andrew Montgomery, created and painted an awesome logo depicting the “Can O Worms” rocking and rolling with plumes of white tire smoke. I really cherish that he took his time to do that and the FREAKING AWESOME job he did. (please include a picture of that art if you can)

After driving the car everywhere for close to a year with gaping holes in the rockers and terrible looking gold paint half removed from various parts of the car, it was time to figure out how to rebuild the bottom of the car.
Joe Varble offered his idea and help to re-skin the doors to make them full length. I am more of a mechanical person and had no experience with major body work and was terrified to perform major surgery like that. The sides and rockers of the car had gaping holes 12” tall between the wheel and the door where the car had been channeled. Something had to be done. I had left the 6” tall rockers on the car so the doors weren’t open at the bottom. With Joe’s help and encouragement, off came the doors and the passenger side of the car was under construction.

Joe and I spent many cold Sundays cutting and hacking on the car in disbelief of the condition of the body. Then came opportunity came to take the car to the first Billetproof at Bid Daddy Don Garlit’s museum in Ocala, FL. All of a sudden, Joe and I had a non-negotiable deadline which Joe didn’t like at all and still curses about to this day. But when he heard, Jeff Mudler was flying down to ride to surprise our Atlanta club mate and to ride to Florida in the Can O Worms, he said he’d bust it to get it ready. He likes Jeff for some reason. We managed to button up the passenger side with tack welds and kleckos to hold her together.

The entire SFCC car club hit the road with 10 cars for the road trip to FL. We all had an awesome trip.

It wasn’t long after we returned and plans for a new engine were made. Club mate Russ Pendley introduced me to Johnny Thomas from Cumming, GA. Johnny agreed to help me build and engine which was a true honor and a great experience. Over the next two years, Johnny guided me through lots of ideas while he created a very special stroked and blown small bock chevy. Brilliant machine work and years of experience netted 716HP on his engine dyno. Dyno day was a blast. Several club members joined as the engine was fired and put through it’s paces.


The 8” Ford Third Member I originally installed did not survive a trip to the Atlanta World Of Wheels when I decided to do a burn out leaving work. This was after the addition of new 383 and 30” Tall Hurst Cheater Slicks. Dave Cox from the Hog Mountain Garage rescued me with his trailer and suggested we tow the car into the World of Wheels anyway. So we did and displayed the freshly destroyed driveshaft next to the car with a puddle of gear lube.

Realizing how serious the power was that the new 671 blown Johnny Thomas 383 was making, the car was taken directly to Steve Kirk’s Drag Car shop for a custom rear suspension. Steve fabricated ladder bars, rear housing supports, a back brace, wheelie bar mounts, coil over crossmember and installed a custom stainless exhaust. Bad ASS bullet proof stuff.

The car hooks and goes straight. Well some of the time anyway. Plans for some slicks and some ¼ mile passes are being made. I drive the car almost every weekend and whenever I can and enjoy giving rides to whoever I can talk into getting in the car with me. Joe Varble still won’t get in the car for some reason.

I asked Johnny Thomas if he wanted to go for a ride and he walked directly to the driver’s side and got in. I’ve got video of him driving it.

Then the Hog Mountain Garage guys took it for joy rides ripping around the neighbor hood one night! It’s a driver. Hopefully I can park it long enough to get some paint on it one day.

 

Great story thanks for sharing! Congrats. That was about the best issue HRM has had in a long time.

 

I celebrated some but still need a little more

 

Thanks Neil. Congrats to you on your cover and article in Street Rodder. Your coupe is truly a work of art. Love that thing especially the punched out 871 blown 409 JEEZ! I found myself wondering how much power that things has got to have and scheming on how to get a ride

 

Thanks Jeff - You've only built about 5 NICE cars since I hacked mine together. Can't wait to get down there for a visit soon. I'll bring you my smallest pulley That would be insane and fun.
Hope we can make it happen

 

That would be awesome! Thanks Brian.

 

Thanks for the rest of the story. Too cool.

 

I remember that first day well...good times.
Only thing that SUCKS 'bout that damn article is..SOCK FUCKERS CAR CLUB didn't get printed anywhere! Can't understand it?
B.

 

There are so many of you HAMBers in this issue, it's amazing. Congrats, Gary

 

They could have used the politically correct moniker that I use to describe the club,,SOCK FOKKERS,, HRP

 

Congrats!

 

Can I get your autograph Josh ? HRP

 

Congrats Josh that is way COOL!! That is one of my all time favorite hot rods.
Daron

 

Congrats, Josh....and Jeff Brock also has a feature of his 52 Buick Bonneville racer in the same issue..one of our HAMBers and all around nice guy.

 

Big time congrats bro, bad ass coupe that is super cool and very nicely built!! ~sololobo~

 

Congrats Josh! Not many cars are driven to the track where they run a 10 second 1/4 and then driven back home after dark! Well deserved ink! (Not to mention Fla and back several times )

 

Oh yeah....nice work Josh. Congratulations.

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Friggin' cool ! Congrats !

 

Congrats Tudor.

This is a very cool car to see in person folks.

It has a most excellent bone shaking *rumble* as well.



Now that he's famous I guess I'll never get a ride in it now.

-W

 

Way cool. Thanks to all........

 

Props to Brock.....That thing is bad to the bone

Thanks Rock!

 

The plaque is shown in one pic, but you need a magnifying glass to read it (unless you know what it says). Congrats, great article.

 

It'll just be an "X"

 

Congrats on gettin published! Nice ride! Next time I'm in Greenville I might have to look ya up and get my picture took with ya!

 

Awesome story bro.....I just wonder how much beer we really drank that first night, haha.

Bitchin man, time to run to the store and get a few copies

 

Lord only knows