How did Roth afford to build so many cars ?

Roth did have a 55 Chev 2 door sedan with radiused wheel wells and a Ford 390 under the hood.

Ford was promoting their image through custom cars at the time, one of their deals was to give Roth 3 390s with transmissions. 2 of them went into the Mysterion, the 3d went into the Chev.

(the Mysterion had 390s not 406s as advertised)

You couldn't miss it, it was painted red or orange and had Roth on the side in big letters in his typical serif style.

I believe the engine out of the Chev wound up in the Orbitron, at least it had a chromed up 55 Chev small block and it did come after the Mysterion.

 

I'll ask Darryl,or maybe Dennis this weekend. He drove Hearses when I was a kid. After he got rid of his Ford Pick-up with ROTH on the doors.

 

Mid 70's we had Roth come by the shop to stripe a Ghia show car (come on, it was the 70's!). Interesting but odd guy. Was talking to him about how straight his lines were. He says "There's only ONE perfectly straight line!". Loads a brush, walks over to the 'fridge, puts it on the door and we watch it slide down the face. "That's the only perfectly straight pinstripe!".

 

I didn't read this whole thread yet, but if it hasn't been said yet, Roth had a line of model kits made after his cars, so I'm sure a good chunk of the car was paid that way.


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The HAMB needs more of this kind of thread.......

 

I'm not sure how but glad he did !!! He was one of the great kustom car builders of all time !!

 

Met Ed in 1960 and will never forget when some kid came up and asked him if he was Ed "Big Daddy" Roth. Ed rolled up his sleeve and there was a tat of his signature. Dean Moon also had a Mooneyes tat on his bicep.

 

At a custom car show in Borger Texas I met Ed Roth. A couple of days later we were talking about the show and a kid last name of Christie said one of Roths car was in his Dads garage. We all went over there and sure enough there it was a small Red and Blue thing. I think it was the ROTAR or something like that. It had been in the show and for some reason they were storing it for him. Ed used to visit them ocassionally.

 

For those worried about the German helmet thing being "un-polically correct", I would tell them to look at uniform "steel" pot our GIs wear! Mighty similar to the Heinie's helmet.

 

These are the threads that make me visit this site every day

Crazy, I have both tattooed on my arm (well not Ed's signature, but rat fink)

 

Ed was a very hard workin guy with a dream he realized. One of the true hot rod heros for me. ~sololobo~

 

What he was building out of foam, paper mache and plaster of Paris was the plug. What's pulled from that when finished is the mold.

 

It's actually not the only thing stated wrong, He also missed the Radiator on the Beatnik Bandit,... and the Mysterion,... Or as Steve refers to it as The " Mysterium" (Sp ?)

Here is the engines on the "Mysterium" as quoted,.... And ya'll might want to look close at the intakes where the radiator hoses aren't hooked up,... WAIT A MINUTE !!!!!! What is That !..... A hooked up coolant system ???? Why,.. It can't be ,... can it ?

 

I am in the process of building a Mysterion clone. That was one of the first custom cars I remember as a kid. I started reading Rod & Custom magazine just when they were publishing articles on the Mysterion and it literally took my breath away. I have dreamed about build a copy for the past 50 years and am finally able to do it. I am a 40 year practicing mechanical engineer so I planned my build to be strong and runnable. I plan on driving it!

I have studied every available photo to death and know a lot of the details that most people don't. For one thing the entire frame is made of flimsy 10ga steel bolted together at a couple places. It had to break! There was at least one radiator in the car. There is one photo of the interior that clearly shows a radiator cap embedded in the fur upholstery on the deck next to the driver's right shoulder. A really strange feature of the car is the way he made the tie rod. Notice in pictures where you can see the steering gear, with the wheels straight ahead the steering gear is all the way to the left. The car can steer right (you see occasional pictures with it turned that way) but there is no way to turn it left. There are a whole bunch of thing like that which make it an unusable car.

Ed was a brilliant artist, not a mechanic per se. His designs were inspired, didn't matter that they didn't run.

 

driving hot rods is over rated

 

Wow !....... Maybe you can give us a dissertation on how the steering worked (or didn't work) and what kind of components Ed used ?..... Looking forward to your expertise in this matter.....

 

I am seeing a center steer rack and pinion on the car like rear engine dragsters use.... wheels cocked a little left and plenty of room to turn it some more.... both ways.

 

I have been hooked on chrome as long as hooked on Hot Rods and I know chroming was a LOT CHEAPER back in "those days" then it is now, since we decided better to save the planet then look at shiney steel! (EPA, Green Weenies,etc.)

 

If memory serves me correctly, It was a early 60's Porsche carrera rack and pinion..... But because of the coil sprung suspension, A pan hard rod had to be used,.... that most people think is a drag link... or a tie rod.

This particular rack & pinion was perfect in the fact that it centered between the engines, and could have equal tie rod length, So they would travel on the same long plane, reducing the arch and reducing most bump steer.... and because Mysterion had a single seat and center steering,... It all worked out pretty good.

Ed was far more than a brilliant artist... And I would love to see him and Dennis when self proclaimed experts would say something stupid about the function ability of one of Ed's cars..... And then be made to look like fools, Because Ed built something that functioned perfectly,.... That the self proclaimed experts never even thought about.

The chrome frame did in fact become a problem, mostly due to the weight of the two FE's And the effects of Hydrogen Embrittlement,.... As per Ed.

 

i would not write this if i would heared this from a friend of a friend. I heard it from lil daddy itself. One reason why erverything worked so fine was that big d had a couple of slaves they worked for him. All the kids was painting ,laminating,and and and the whole day long. If you ever have the chance to speak with lil daddy or Williams try to talk a little with tem about the roth studios.

 

I wish I had a dollar for every Rat Fink or Monster Car Drawing I tried to draw and got in trouble for in school....My nose should be flat for everytime I had to stand in the corner with my nose pressed to the wall......Roth was the man....his lines and detail was sooo nice and clean.......I never was a Von Dutch fan...his stuff was sloppy to me...but to each his own........Roth's work is probably why I've been building, Pinstriping and Lettering cars since the late 60's....self employed sign shop full time since 1971

 

is this the original or clone? could there be differences in the two? I dont know just asking.

 

These are pictures of Dave Shuton's clone,... But Dennis Roth, another buddy and I were taking a really good look at it.. With the exception of the stainless steel frame,.. it is just about dead on to the original car... including a couple original parts from Mysterion.

Yeah,... Dennis has some stories from back in the day,... not all good,... But his recollection of the details on the cars is spot on,.... Ed was insistent that all his cars functioned, and could prove it.... He was a man of many talents.

 

Ed is someone I have always looked up to, hell I have a giant rat fink tattooed on me. Did you know him? I couldn't even imagine how awesome of a person he was, and to be able to pick his brain.

 

Yes that car can steer both ways . . . . but it isn't the Mysterion Ed built. It is a clone started by Mike Moriarity and finished by Dave Schuten, both Roth fanatics. The engines and car in the photo a couple posts above is of this ~2005 clone, not Ed's original. Ed used what he called a Morris Minor steering gear but I have been looking for one like it for 30 years and have never found one. On my recommendation Dave Schuten used a late model Porche 911 I think (they are common, show up on ebaY all the time) true center steer rack and pinion and that is what I am using too. Ed's gear was sort of center steer but was offset to one side. Look at this picture and you can see the problem he would have had steering it left. The pinion housing is at the end of the rack tube to the right in the picture. With the wheels straight ahead, that rack is deployed as far left in the picture as it can go.

There are very few photos of this car and the ones that exist are really poor quality; dark, out of focus, too far away, etc. Gathering details to build a replica has been a real challenge. You need to be a great detective. All of the articles in rod magazines have the facts totally wrong so you can't depend on them.

Incidentally you can easily see many differences between the yellow car in the pictures above and this original Mysterion car. They are close but there are a lot of fairly large differences.

 

Other oddities in the car are fun to dig out;

Look at the tie rod ends on the 4-bar - Ed turned the rubber dust seals around so they faced away from the knuckle.

The wild front shocks have the front with the mounting bolt horizontal but on the frame they stick up vertically. When the springs flexed it bent the shocks in the middle because they couldn't articulate up and down. The bent shocks can be seen in later pictures of the car.

The tie rods are so close to the lower 4-bars (barely an inch) that if the suspension flexed very much they would definitely interfere.

There are little oddities like that all over the car. Fun to study!

 

That's incorrect. There was no "plug". He formed the bodies,layed the fiberglass on then knocked the plaster/vermiculite(spelling) out from the bottom. The only thing he made plugs for,were the Trike bodies that he made to sell. The cars were all one-offs. Some of the bodies had chicken wire or metal lath to hold the plaster/vermiculite,while he shaped them.

 

I recently spent some time at a show with Darryl,and asked him about the "how did Ed afford to build his cars" thread. Without hesitation,he said,"selling T-shirts!"

 

Yes I knew Ed, and I know Dennis, Ed was a very talented guy with art, fabricating and a number of other things,... But in the early years it seems the pressures of trying to raise a family and run a business was rough. Ed was,.. to be frank,.. A little unusual, He was a strict and demanding Father.. Hung out with some really shady folks... But toward the end found religion.... (which we disagreed on our different theologies).

When all is said and done,.. Ed was just a man made bigger than life by coming up with creations in art and show cars that emerged at exactly the right time in post war "Americana" ... Kids were flocking to see horror and Sci-FY movies instead of westerns.... weird was cool and "in" as well as being on the fringe of.... "anti establishment" .... He was trying to run a business and raise a family appealing to the car crazy, monster loving youth of America...

Unfortunately some of the people we put up on pedestals,... when scrutinized too closely,... We can find flaws instead of enjoying them as the people they are, with faults and bad days (just people that are capable of making mistakes, Just like You and Me.) ... not the ones we imagine them to be.

I'm sure Marilin Monroe and Ann Margret didn't always look smoking hot,... And Clark Gable sometimes had a runny nose or a zit.... Just ordinary people that do extraordinary things. After all,... The perception of the American Graffiti Coupe in the movie,... and the reality are eons apart..... But I still enjoy the fantasy of the movie....

 

You can see the bent shocks in this picture of the car....