Mythbusters: an unscientific statistical analysis of rod building styles, circa 55/60

You very well could be right, I added them up at 11:30 last night, and was getting a little groggy. Later today, when I try to tidy up the table, I will double check them.

 

Ah, I get you. I'll leave that job to someone else. Its HEAVILY highboy biased, and most of them run overhead valve V-8s, so you can kinda draw your own conclusions as to how that relates to what the historical record indicates.

 

Having been around in this era and being heavily involved at the time I would like to add some information that has been overlooked. I grew up in Southern California and I can tell you that we were not popular with the law at that time. If you even tried to run without fenders you were nailed. There was an abundance of OHV engines in the cars back then and the flathead was little more than a boat anchor. Primered cars were the rat rods of the day and we rarely put ads in HRM to sell a car because of the lead time involved. The L.A.Times was the place to look for cars, the little old lady from Pasadena was NOT a myth. A deuce was very rare in those days and roadsters were nearly impossible to find. Your statistics are interesting but don't truly represent the facts. It seems that history becomes distorted the further we get away from what really happened. Imagine what archaeologists will speculate what pull tabs off of beer cans were used for in 1000 years.

 

x2, plus regional trends as well

 

"There was an abundance of OHV engines in the cars back then and the flathead was little more than a boat anchor"

Quote of the year



MELTDOWN DRAGS
JULY 19&20 2014

 

crminal,
I think that there is common and uncommon to be dealt with to get to your question. I used the term street scene which would not have been era correct but it is understandable to the younger set i am sure.

What was in th magazine would have been uncommon as the magazine went into print while common would have been what you are going to find in someone's old photo album. As time went on the uncommon would become more common and the uncommon would be the fellas that were just one step ahead of the average joe.

 

Dad built full fender cars, always. His region woulda been midwest being in the greater Detroit area. Many an OHV put an ass whippin on the few flatheads that he could recall. To him and his "gang" they were junk. His favorite style was the Caddy in a 30s pickup truck, and he liked Mopar rucks the most. Even dropped an F-1 on an Olds chassis once. I was a tot back then and that truck scared me. He got written warning for no rear fenders and no full box on the back. That was in the very early 60s.

 

All valid points, but I wouldn't worry to much about whether George's survey is accurate or not...and whether the magazines' cross-section represented the nation as a whole, etc. As he said, the point isn't what's best, or what's more traditional, etc. It's just an interesting exercise, and a topic for discussion. It's a given that the various build styles existed, so they're all traditional.

I think that maybe one of the reasons so many go fenderless today, is not that they necessarily think that's the way it was done back in the day...but rather, due to a lack of good available fenders. Seems the fenders suffered most, and it might not be so easy to find a nice set. And/or that it takes less work, time, skill and expense to just leave 'em off...epecially on a channeled car. And/or that it's less difficult to fit the size tires you want and set the stance, without the restriction of the fenders. And/or they just like the look.

I guess my favorite is unchanneled with the cycle-style front fenders (made with a spare tire ring) and bobbed rears...partly for the era it emulates, and partly for the benefits of having fenders, yet still giving the car that "minimalist" look. But I love all the other styles too. It's great that we don't all prefer the same thing, so we can mix it up a bit. "It's all good" as they say.
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Pretty cool to see the sheet totals from different areas. That was a great idea...for a lowly "Camadian" I hope you can tidy up that sheet a bit, to make it a bit easier to see the local trends.

I like reading local trends, etc.

 

Thanks for taking the time to do this study. What prompted you to do this? I mean, you just wanted to confirm that channeled cars were very popular?

 

Interesting. I'd like to see an analysis of engines that powered those cars, 265/283, Dodge hemi, olds rocket, Studebaker v8, etc.

 

Thanks George, this is an interesting topic.

My gut feeling is that the numbers would stack up quite differently for roadsters as opposed to coupes/sedans/pickups, e.g. roadsters would be more likely to be channelled and/or fenderless.

Did you break it down into open/closed body styles by any chance when you were counting?

 

George, do you realise you've now shone a light on an ugly truth that was previously mired in the dim memories of our 'heroes'?
Our notion of 'traditional' now is a skilfully crafted and hand-wrought highboy, fitted with a flatty or other pre-SBC early-OHV V-8. Open headers or zoomies are de rigeur. Bias plies have become the new radial. Patina can be more admired than shine.
Good for us, they are truly beautiful, worthy and to be aspired.
Don't let your logic and research get in the way of our ardent dreams.
I can no longer hear your truth, for I no longer wish it to be so.
(Facts should never get in the way of a good story)

 

My sample size was 40 magazines, or 55% of the total possible sample size, big enough for any statician to consider it a valid sample size.

So if I flip a coin 100 times and heads comes up 55% of the time I then can consider the coin to be two-headed ! Sarcasm intended.

 

God, I wish guys would take the trouble to learn to read before they post...Do they still teach that in elementary school, or has that been fazed out now?

 

Btw, George...quit calling me "Ricky Bob". It's Rickybop.


You know...like this.




Or this.




Not this.

 

Well, actually, my thinking was originally that I wanted to quantify my own personal perceptions (namely that channeled cycle fendered cars were the build style of choice '55-'60 pretty much nationwide) and see whether they were accurate or not. I'd been hearing the "East Coast" bs for so long, and pretty much knew that was what it was, just based on the fact that is the style of car I am building, and the fact that just about every car that is influencing me is/was from CA. About 3/4 of the way through the process, it became clear that my perception of things was not as clear as I had thought, and I had overlooked just HOW MANY full fendered cars were out there at that time.
Around that time, I decided that it should be posted on the HAMB. I know its not going to change the minds of any of the dedicated history revisionists, and they are pretty much going to ignore the facts, and stick to thier distorted view of history come hell or high water. These are the same guys that keep ignoring what I have posted regarding the sources I used, and keep spouting the worn out old "well, what was featured in the magazines at the time is a distortion" bullshit. They aren't my "target audience" here, there are a fair number of HAMBers that really are interested, they are who I am after here.

As far as the guys who have asked me to break it down by engine/body style as well, JEEZ! GIMME A BREAK! This took me about 5 hours! Gotta draw the line somewhere. One thing I will mention, better than half of the cars that appear in the highboy or fenderless unchanneled column were not '32's or '29s, the majority were '26/'27 T roadsters on '32 rails!! When you consider that, the HAMB poster child hot rod was a rare beast indeed after '55.

 

Zoomies, oh yea, zoomies. I dont think I really have to say this, anyone with an IQ greater than my shoe size already knows it, but to be clear, NOT ONE CAR in any of the mags I looked at had zoomies...

 

Hey, It was late, I was tired, and my wife was yelling "What the hell are doing out there! Stop typing and COME TO BED!!!"

 

I wasn't actually recording it, but lots of coupes and roadster pu's in the channeled/cycle fender column, and get this, 1 '33/'34 Ford sedan!!

Every closed cab pu in the sample was full fendered. Thats not to say there werent ANY out there, but its pretty clear it wasn't popular at the time.

 

Lol.

 

I know if I was running most weekends at the strip in my car (full hood and fenders) I would seriously consider removing them. Just one weekend at the strip and I found them to be annoying, but I love the look.

MELTDOWN DRAGS
JULY 19&20 2014

 

Was just giving this ongoing "editorial bias" rant a little thought (very little, which is really more than it deserves) and something occurred to me.

I wonder if any of these "Hamb historians" can or care to name the editor of Hot Rod magazine for 5 of the 6 years of the sample period, and give us a brief description of his personal hot rod?

Those of you that know your shit are going to start laughing your collective asses off right about now...

 

Ok, you know, I have given the "editorial bias" issue some more thought, and these guys may have a point, so i am going to amend the numbers accordingly.

For those that don't know, the editor of Hot Rod from '55 to early 1960 was Wally Parks. I inadvertently included his car in the sample, and without really thinking about it, included another car in the sample that is virtually a CLONE of his car, Jim Hinds roadster! Please forgive my grevious error in judgement on this matter, my only excuse can be that it was late and I was tired! The presence of Mr. Hinds car in the magazine CLEARLY constitutes editorial bias, so I have removed these two red, fenderless, flathead powered '29 highboys from the sample!
So the revised numbers are, uh let me see, remove two from the total, divide...yes, the revised numbers are fenderless highboys constitute 2% of the sample, not 6%. Sorry guys, I just dont know what the hell I was thinking...

 

Ok, enough tom-foolery, back to business. Lets see if this works...Revised table. Well, thats a LITTLE better, I will play with this a bit, maybe I can improve on this. I've fooled around with this for about an hour, I do not have the best computer skills, this is as good as its gonna get.

 

He's trying to skew the results fellas! Get 'im!!!

 

I laughed my ass off when you sent me that. My wife asked me what was so funny, but she just didnt get it.

 

Yep, nothing will bring the peasants out faster than deflating their myths....

 

George: The results you've found doesn't surprise me in the least. I can't count the times over the years I've been told to either unchannel my car or go fenderless to make it "like they used to be" . Having been into this style (but not ass down) ; since I was a kid, I just laugh and shake my head! RickyboP : Great Dion tune, kinda forgot that one.