Yeah, saw it this morning! I think my wife had more fun showing it to here work pals than I did. My boss is starting to understand the power of the HAMB and HOPUP.
Hop Up (both the website and the annual) are REQUIRED reading if you're into this kind of stuff. No tech to speak of, but lots of ideas if you pay attention. It's inspiration. Steve.
Reading this about the Roach Rod made me think of something I read last night. There was this thing called "Onetree" in England. They had to cut down this big ancient oak for whatever reason. Since it was of some hippy significance, they cut it up and gave it to all these prominent artists to do their work on it. A bunch built great sculptures and furniture and such. But one guy just took the shavings and used them to smoke a ham. How cool was he?
http://www.hopupmag.com/index.php?/weblog/article/C5/ Wait, to understand this properly, am I to understand that the new owner of Sam's "Roach Rod" cut up and parted out the car??
I saw the intact chassis for the roach rod last night, not all cut up and parted out. Yes, the body and chassis have gone separate ways, each now destined to now become two cool cars. Both are in good hands. Yes, I too would have liked to see the roach rod remain intact, but it's not my call to make. I didn't shell out the moolah for the thing. This is just normal hot rod evolution. Sam tried to sell the car on e-bay and had no takers. He put it in the HAMB classifieds and had no takers 'til MilesM stepped up. To all the hand wringing Nancies crying about the fate of the roach rod, I say you should have ponied up and bought the heap when you had the chance. Aye, chinga!
I said the same thing in response to an e-mail that went around yesterday announcing Mort's take on it on the HOP UP site. As much as we have recently turned attention to "preservation", Hot Rods have ALWAYS evolved to each new owners taste and personality. Look at Art Chrisman's #25 racer. It evolved weekly for almost 20 years. I wouldn't screw with it now, but that was the first dragster to win the FIRST national title and it evolved from a very early lakes car. I threw out the question to Sam that if he magically found a nice '27 Roadster body on his doorstep when the car was still in his possesion could he resist the urge to pop it on that chassis? I know Sam, and even if he didn't- he would definitely work out all the necessary details in his head. It's our nature. At the same time why do we not moan about the old gennie's that we are "cutting up" to make hot rods? KIRK did it with his '47, Jay's doing it with his '39 Merc, Ryan did it with his '38, I'm doing it with my '29-and the BEST example is that Sam's own Model A coupe was a COMPLETELY restored stocker before he made it "better"(he love's thumbing his nose at the guys from his local Model A club that double over in disgust that he RUINED that car). These cars have survived 50 to 75 years without being cut up, have been lovingly restored and now we don't bat an eye at desecrating them. They are in our own eyes "better" , what ever that means. Every piece Sam put into the Roach rod he made "better" than when he found it. All of it could have ended up in a land fill, but he made it a bitchin' car. The next guys, they will make it "better" too.
P.S.- I'm pretty sure Sam bench raced the idea of stretching the chassis and slapping on a Touring body so the whole family could enjoy the car on more than one occasion in his very active garage. Guess he knew it would cause such a furor and sold it instead.
You're right Jim... Miles took his car to Steve's shop... Steve traded the front half of a '27 Model T roadster to Miles for the RR body... he then sold the RR body to another customer of his... and now Steve is going to build two cars out of the one. It sounds like a "win-win" situation for all involved. At this point, I'm just waiting to see what he makes out of each one... it's gonna be interesting to see his vision of the parts... Sam.
This new HAMB is REALLY different- on the old one 20 people would have told me how full of crap I am by now!
Actually, I decided to not make the RR into a touring because I realized the whole was worth more than just the parts... after all, it was a rusty T-bucket frame with a SBC, 4 speed and a 9" in it... with a cut down '23 T coupe body on it... put 'em all together and you have a car... take them apart and you have parts that used to make up a car... I vote that we let this fall off the page... I'm not loosing sleep over it any more... so other shouldn't either.... what needed to be said has been said... lets move on and build cars! Sam.
Thank you, I just wanted to let you guys know that you were on the site. Heck even I had pix on it last month from the salt this past year and Mort mentioned that I was from St. Louis, MO. Haha, my wife is from there though. I started to mention in the begining post to please don't complain about the RR that Sam used to have. Chris Nelson Kansas oh yea, Sam I may be picking your brain about chassis build up in the next week or so for the "Rail Banger". Thanks
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