SHOW RODS 60 & 70s..stories - pics ?

OK...............so where is it now???

 

X-Ray is in the hands of a private collector. It's for sale...if you can come up with $45,000.00 for it. I tried to trade my very low mileage 2005 Lotus Elise for it, but he wouldn't have it.

I figure it would take around $35,000 to $45,000 to properly restore and put it back as it was when first shown in 1963.

 

Where would one find these "dragster hubs" that can be used with motorcycle rims?

 

try racing junk.com or just put a wanted post here on da HAMB..........wht would ya do it for a street car?? small disc would be a smarter move and a hellofa lot safer

 

When it comes to dignity, I think Dean Jefferies Manta Ray and Bill Cushenbery's Silhouette were miles ahead of Ed Roth. The Outlaw, and Tweety Pie were the only Roth cars I really liked.
Again, we all have our opinions.

 

Came across this one on Youtube... not sure if it was posted here before or not..

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This thread is like a flashback to my early car nut years. The early A/FX, Tom Daniels models, dune buggy's and vans. Pre and early teen years. Model cars, drag racing and those wild show cars where my addiction. Some of the crazy cars I really liked then look pretty goofy now. A few like the Car Craft Dream rod, The Pie Wagon and Beatnick Bandit still look good. What a great tread. Sure floods the old cranium with the "good old 60's, Love, peace and psycadillic cars.
My first rod and custom show was at an Armory in Wichita probably 1967 or 68.
I was about 13. the one thing I remember is some of the floor was soggy dirt and it was cold. Also airbrushed Tee shirts, angle hair, mirrors under the cars.
Thanks for the time machine trip Meatball and good luck with your Pie Wagon.
Mark

 

those are some cool cars.thanks

 

awsome thread- i've always enjoyed all aspects of hot rodding 40s drag/street/race cars, 50s and 60s show rods, the wacky rods, the zingers, even street freaks, and vans. there was a old book at my library that featured all the wacky rods like the hard hat hauler and the pool table car. i think i returned the book way over due. eventhough they were around in the grey area of actual hot rodding they were neat. some were a bit much. but hey, those were the times. my mind was blown when i went to the radir wheels party last year and the bed buggy and the bathtub car were there. unrestored. since i am younger, it was cool bein able to see these cars up close. i just think it's nice to find out that these cars are still out there, are being restored, or are being created for the first time. maybe someday there will be a stickly wacky rod car show. like em or not, it's become a bookmark in hot rod history. i wouldn't mind if cragar started making 15x18 wheels agian- ha

 

The yellow version of the X-Ray is the way I saw it in the 80s when I was working for Ray, doing some art work for a car show. It was pretty gaudy! Just curious...the Boothill Flower Truck...did Ray rebuild that as something else? I remember something in Ray's shop showroom that looked very much like that, but it was covered in coins and old money. I seem to recall it said something like US Mint on it or some other nonsense. Can anyone help me out with that? I'm trying to come up with a collection of Ray's work to do a poster tribute to his career. Any Farhner photos you have would really help. They're hard to find on line.

 

I remember a wild candy blue truck that hauled a chopper on the back.It had a cab that kinda floated and hung out low over the pavement. I talked to Starbird about it and he thought it was one of Roths that ended up somewhere in Germany.Wish I could see it again!

 

Here ya go....





Or check out this link
http://www.mrgasser.com/megacycle.htm

 

aint nobody can redo a SHOWROD like Fritz.............

 

Has anyone seen "The Song Remains The Same" ?. Amongst the great music and concert footage, all four members of Led Zeppelin each had their own "fantasy" sequence. John Bonhams litle ditty had him driving his C-cab to Santa Pod raceway where he got to make a pass in a loaned AA fuel dragster. I can't remember who's rail he was using for the shoot, and I would love to see that C-cab again. Can anybody help? ROCK ON !!

 

if this is what your takinn about its still alive and well in england,even hittin some rod events.me Ive never seen the movie as I hate zepplin,they have been played to death on the radio...the c-cab was built by Andy Brizzio (Roy dad) in the 70s and was driven cross country to the NSRA Nats

 

Man, that thing is just wrong. Hahaha. I think people in the 70s were sniffing more paint than they were spraying. Oh well, what can you expect from a decade that brought us such wonderful ballads as "Muskrat Love", "Disco Duck" and "Kung Fu Fighting". LOL

Still, I have a soft spot for these show rods. Brings back my childhood.

 

THATS THE ONE !!!!!!! I cant thank you enough !!!!!! I have not seen this since around 1966 or 67 when it was at the state fair in Hutchinson kansas in a small show car display that I went to every year !!!!! That was the main thing I went to the fair for !!!! Thanks again , Dennis

 

Doug Thompson had nothing to do with the building of the X-Ray

The names Ray Farhner and Doug Thompson are used together and they did collaborate on the Eclipse and other customs prior to 1963, but the X-Ray was completely Ray's creation, began after Doug had gone on to open his own shop.

 

The Boothill Flower Truck was originally built in California as the Paddy Wagon, (possibly by Art or Mickey Himsl..not sure about that one, but I know it was a different one than Andy's, Meatball). Ray purchased it for something like $4500 and remade it into the Flower Truck.

Then, a couple of years later, he recycled it again into the Money Truck or some such. He spent hours gluing money and rows of coins on it, covering the whole thing up, then cleared it. He asked all of his friends to contribute signed bills so I and quite a few of us humored him. I gave signed a $50 bill as my "contribution". There were a lot of silver dollars on it too, as I recall.

 

Not a story, but a kool video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTjb...y&thread=10131&page=1&feature=player_embedded

Marty

 

I remember this car as a kid too... any more pictures??? I had this car picture hanging on my wall for years.

 

what is this car called

 

Aaah aah aah!! This is funny as hell! I want a model of this thing!
I know the majority of the cars on these 12 pages, and many i dont care much to see really,
but this one people! Pure Evil genius.
Did the question about it having a model version been answered?

 

Bonez...it was a model by the ELDON company,Ive seen it on ebay a couple of times.....

 

what else the OUTHOUSE car

 

Thanks for that info. I had no idea that the truck I saw used to be the Paddy Wagon! I wish I would have taken photos of all those weird creations when I was in his shop back then. I also wish I knew what happened to the Mysterion body that was reportedly in Ray's shop for a while. No one seems to know where it went from there.

 

Oh and the Megacycle is one on my Roth favorite creations, im not in into futurable style but this one i'd drive the wheels off!
I add a few pics of stuff that didnt appear yet on this thread, the Road Agent is my other Roth Favorite, i dont care much for the others, i just recognize its genious and the importance of its builds.
Then whats the last one pictured at the KKOA Spectacular of some years ago?
Is it a Shuten creation? What year Autorama coverage did i miss? I keep this picture togheter w/ Roth, Moriarity, Shuten and Plowboys stuff, but dont know whos built it nor hows it called, maybe someone here will know.

 

The Farhner story has been circulated for years.

There's another story that a guy named "Jim Smith" had the car, in (maybe) Kansas City back in the mid-70's, and reportedly he sold what was left of the body to a guy in Independence, MO.

A third version is that a different guy bought the car less the wheels and rear axle from Farhner and kept it in his parent's basement until about 1980 and then he sold it to the guy in MO.

Some of these stories / sightings may have been perpetrated by Big Daddy himself to throw people off the trail and keep the car's whereabouts a secret. Kinda like how he did with the Orbitron.

 

I was at Ray Farhner's shop when Bob Larivee's car hauler stopped there, on their way to L A, to pick up the Mysterion in the summer of "66 and return it to Roth. Ray had used it as a feature in his shows that season and the frame had broken in half.

Ray called Ed Roth. After he hung up, Ray said, "Ed wants only the front suspension and the rearend...he doesn't want the body or frame". Keep in mind that, at this time, the car was not an icon, just a beat up old showcar that didn't even run. So Ray fired up his cutting torch and cut the front and rear portions of the frame off and they loaded the pieces into the semi back to Roth.

D-fens, your third version (in quotes) is correct; As stated in the book (Thacker's, I believe), Ray later sold the body and what was left of the frame to a kid named Doug. I knew Doug. He later sold it and that's where the all the conflicting stories begin. Several people have said they saw it sitting in a body shop lot in Grandview after that.

In an interesting aside that day, my friend, who was seventeen at the time, jokingly asked Ray if he could have the cyclops headlight/grille piece from the Mysterion and Ray gave it to him!! Unfortunately, Ray called him later and asked for it back when he sold the Mysterion to Doug for $750.