May be doing a kustom in the near future and need to now what everyone prefers-dummy spotlights or real ones. Are dummies commonly used or considered kinda wimpy? -Dean
Once upon a time at Paso, I ran across a 55 Buick with factory spotlights. They were cool to look at, but the poor sod couldnt use his glovebox because the handle was in front of the door.................... Real ones are cool just because you don't see them all that often. Dummies look nice but are just a store bought look.....so I have NO opionion on this. WTF?? I have a set of real ones if that helps! **x Brandy
If YOU are doing the car, WHY are you concerned as to what EVERYONE prefers? Do what YOU want and to hell with everyone else. In answer to your question, dummies are(were) predominate on kustoms simply becuz of the cost...they can give you the look for pennies...REAL Appleton spots (which the dummies were patterned after) are very expensive, even the repro items, if you can find them. Dummy spots were(are) like adding fuzzy dice to your car...they really don't do much for the car and neither do dummy spots...unless you like the look! R- PS, WHAT are you building?
Dummy spots were(are) like adding fuzzy dice to your car...they really don't do much for the car and neither do dummy spots...unless you like the look! R- PS, WHAT are you building?[/QUOTE] Well its a '49 Chevy 2dr Coupe a buddy of mine has. If he comes up with a good price and the car isnt too beat up, looks like I'll be building a kustom Real stuff is always better, but dummies do give the same look for a hell of alot less than real ones. Think I'd just go that route. -Thanks, Dean
I paid less then $40 each for mine and they both work. Last one I bought at some peddlers faire from a hippy. Go figure. **x Brandy
Some 50's cars presented mounting problems and the manufacturers had to produce car specific mounting plates. Then of course there are 2 handles sticking into the car. OK I guess if you are reproducing a "Highway Patrol" clone. If you cant find a matched pair with the proper hardware then go with the dummies. Just another custom touch like twin radio antennas. Ive had real ones in the past. On my 53 I have dummies, along with dual antennas frenched in.............
the problem with functional spotlights is they are just to flat and don't have that appealing teardrop shape (unless you can find and afford appelton 112's)..the Cal Custom styled dummy spots are probably the way to go if you plan on using spotlights...what are the chances you'll actually use real spotlights anyway??? just make sure you mount them correctly, that is critical....
Real ones are great for deer hunting off the side of the road I personally never understood using any non- functioning item on a car but to each his own
BOTH of which are on my car!!!!!!!! it's a KUSTOM which means it's customized to how I want it and that's all there is to it..run what you want or can afford and be happy with it! creepy
What Chopmerc said...mount them on the A pillar. And if you really want to drive people crazy, get some shafts and handles, and mount them inside. Mutt
Sure are.........but it took me the last 3 years to find them at a price I was willing to pay! I like to save my money for shoes. **x Brandy
Nothing wrong with dummy spots, or dummy lake pipes, (only poor, high school kids ran fake whites) There were available in the 50's, and used in the 50's. They look good on the right cars, and stupid on the wrong ones. They look good mounted correctly, and bad done incorrectly. My old boss and mentor had them on his show car 54 Merc that was built during 57-59, and won about every award possible on the East Coast. He worked for some of the major players in custom car building in NJ, and then went off on his own, building custom cars. He and his friends all had custom cars, even through the the unpopular years, and most had dummy spots, only 1 or 2 had real ones. I tend to believe they knew what was 'traditional' or not, since they were THERE! So much for ****in' experts!
heheheheh especially since alot of em dummys arent even positioned like they would be if they had been real heck i've seen dummy spots located on the hood on a car even...
Yeah, correctly mounted spots (fake or not) can really lift a traditional kustom car and wrongly mounted simply kill it... It's a very big difference in which model fits the model of the car. Late 40's and early 50's style looks best with the fat 112 Appleton style. My 2 cents...
Does Sam's Merc lose anything without them??? I was going to put spots on my '53 but didn't want to bore through the stainless, it'd be hard to replace. Sam's custom is so cool, it'd look just as good w/o them. -slacker
The car gets cleaner without them, but the thing with a kustom car from that era (my opinion) is to accentuate the lines and features of the original design and add an exclusiveness (does that word exist ? ) from more expensive cars. For example, to totally remove the sidetrim many times destroys the lines of the car and so on. I think the spotlights of these early Barris' cars definitely adds a more exlusive (still clean) look and also look pretty "fat". I know Janne doesn't like them, ha ha... Can't help myself to have a pic of one of my favorite Kustoms...
I shaved all the trim off my mild 60's style custom, and needed a bit of non stock "bling" to give a bit of balance...spots make my car look better. If you don't like them on my car I raeally don't give a ****...I built it to look how I want....and personally I like driving cos they add to the view. Port-a-walls are fake Whitewalls? Well unless someone wants to buy me some 13" 175 WWW's than you can kiss my ***. Cheers Maiki
I have real ones on my truck, but they were already there when I got it. They are OK. At least they don't stick out like a soar thumb on a pickup like they do on a custom. I just never understood working so hard to smooth a car out, to make it sleek, and make it flow, then put two big chrome lumps right in the middle of the lines. Dummies or real I wouldn't put them on a custom. I don't care if they are traditional. Some traditions are just wrong.
I used to own a 90' chevy caprice 9c1 police package, (winner of the 2002 Burnout contest at the Radir wheels wild hot rod party btw, hah!) It had unity spotlights and i actully used them all the time, i live in the poconos of pa and on lonley dark roads at night they come in handy to flip em up and get some more light on the road, just make sure theres no other cars on the road! Also think of this too, You get a flat or stuck at night, or are helping out a friend you flip up the spot and wala!... the fake spots are just bleh, i mean they are cheap, but look it!, they bubble and rust and the cheap little clear lenses collect water and fog up... You can ushally pickup a set of real ones on ebay pretty cheap and you can still buy the install kits with templates, etc from unity.
What's the first thing you say when you see a 1996 Honda Civic driving around with a 2 foot tall wing on the back? In my opinion, dummy spots are to Customs as spoilers and neon are to "Ricers."
THANK YOU Mark. Whether you love em or hate em, there is no question about if they are traditional or not. If they're good enough for Sam Barris, they're good enough for me. Real spots are cool, dummies are cool too. Kustoms are all about flash, and the added chrome adds some much needed bling on cars that have been mostly stripped of their emblems, badges and trim. Just put the post out.
We did it back then for several reasons. With lakes pipes, they were usually hung as soon as you bought them, but you might not have been able to afford to have the pipework done to hook them up. So I guess they would be "Dummys". As far as Spots, they were a fad. One of the reasons they appeared was that the newer "wrap around windshields" after '55 had the A pillar so far on the side, that mounting a real spot put it in the wrong location, for the turned down look that was popular. So, dummies were developed that allowed you to get the look that we had grown up with by being able to bolt them on in the same location as the '40s/early 50's cars did. FOR THE LOOK. Like young guys today using skinny bias ply tires when there's much safer tires available. Like young guys today bolting bullets on their steering wheels so they can be impaled in a wreck. Like young guys today REMOVING good paint to get a rusty look. If someone had told me that in 2005, some young guy would be telling me that they think dummy spots are silly, I would have said, "So what?" "I'm cool today and don't give a damn what some collection of sperm and eggs says in 50 years." Use what you like, and remember - there's someone out there that doesn't like what YOU think is cool. So get over yourselves. Mutt
Ew I think breakfast is about to come back up on me! Do what you want, it's your car. I do! Once upon a time, I couldn't afford wide whites................SOOOOOOOOOO I painted the *******s on! In fact, the photo below, they aren't real. It's Flat white Krylon. You wouldn't begin to believe how many people argued with me that they were real. So do what you want, do what you can afford............at the end of the day who cares what the m***es think. Sheep stick together as well you know. **x Brandy
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