Hack, You're right about a stock 302 being a better alternative for a T or A banger. yes its an improvement. But you have to understand where I'm comming from. In the '70s when the gas crunch hit I stroked my hawg and went from a 38 mm Mickeyrooney to a 40 mm L series alchy carb that I converted to gas. At the time I owned a tall geared '64 Chevelle SS (my bad weather car)that I traded for a '57 Chevy wagon with a 2x4 Vette mill I did pull the 4.11 in favor of a 3.55. The chevelle was quick but it just lacked in cool factor. There were some really cool rides that came out of the resto rod era, I'll give you that. But there were also an awful lot of Pinto powered As that folks tried to pass off as rods. The excuse was well it has to get good gas milage. Rodders are salmon man, they swim upstream and if a dam gets in the way they figure out a way to jump it. I'm not saying that everyone should own a 9 second streeter, but what I am saying is that it should be a rod if you're going to call it that. If its a grocery getter call it a grocery getter.Drive it too and from and build a real rod for rodding.
Lets just agree to not agree. I'm not big on the whole trailer it to the big highroller car shows either. And I know from experience (as you do also) that you can not only build an efficent hot rod motor and drive it. I'm not real big on the whole rust in piece thing, I like paint and polish. But given a choice I'm not going to spend my last dime makeing it look good, and neglect the heart. Its like spending money on Botax when what you really need is kidney BTW there are still rod runs happening, you just have to stay away from the trendy guys.
Then you're contradicting yourself, aren't you? You've said a car has to be HOT to be "worthy" of being called a HOTrod. How Hot? If not under 10 seconds, ("a 9 second streeter" is anything under 10 seconds right?) how fast does a car have to be to qualify? There's a Model T "HOTROD club around here that your T has to do at least 60 mph to get in. Any of today's grocery-getters will do that, a stock 57 VW will do that, (barely,) but a Model T has to be "hotrodded" to do that! I knew you would have to contradict yourself from the start, since your original hotrod definition only has room for the one and only "Milner,you've got the fastest car in the whole valley" definition of what's a real hotrod and what's an also-ran-couldn't-cut-it-grocery-getter. By you're original definition the only car worthy of the title "hotrod" is the one top eliminator at the HAMB drags, and what was that? A new turbo-diesel Mercedes Sedan? (I know it wasn't, but it was faster than most, wasn't it?) If timing slips are the criteria, the only REAL hotrods are NHRA fuel dragsters! and funny cars! But in order to put one of those really hot hotrods on the street a lot of compromises have to be done. like an engine that will idle and not melt the sparkplugs in the first 100 feet of running etc. A channeled model A with a 49 Caddy, first year OHV V8 would surely be called a "HOTROD" by most people on this board, but it only has 160 hp, maybe (being generous) 180 hp if it's got multiple carbs and headers. That's way more, multiples more than the 45hp that the stock 4 banger had so it will scoot pretty good, right? Yea, that's a HOTROD! But a stock Accord Hybrid sedan who-cares boxy grocery-getter has 255 hp right off the assembly line... NOBODY gets 255 hp out of a normally aspirated flathead... So flatheads aren't "HOTrod" engines? A Model A that's had '39 hydraulic brakes installed, to stop better with reversed eye springs to lower it some to handle better, and a Model B engine and trans installed so it's got a syncro transmission to make it easier and more efficient to drive, is a HOTROD. Any one of the above modifications alone makes it a hotrod! Anything that makes a "restorer" shake his head and mutter, "that's not the way it's supposed to be," while puckering up on his pickle, is a HOTROD.
Hey!!!!........Ernest Hackingway.........get out in the garage and finish the chev....NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!
I suppose I did. I don't think that stocker motors in stocker bodies count as hot rods. Even if the stock smog motor does make more zot than the original banger. It was the Hackster that brought up the 9 second thing, I never said that you needed to own a 9 second streeter to own a hotrod. I have to ask this question, are the 60 mph Model ts doing it with bangers or are we talking Fad Ts with SBCs here. I don't know anything about the club but I'm going to make an ass out of u and me (assume) here and figure that they are doing it with bangers. No reason for the rule otherwise right? To go 60 in a T with an old banger it has to be Hot rodded, or souped up or built or whatever you want to call it. Right? Face it you could drop a stock Pinto Mill in it and go 60 no problem. Would it be a hotrod? No it would be a T with a stock smog motor in it. What I did say is that to drop a Stock underpowered smog type of mill (like so many on this board advocate) in a stock bodied old hooptie doesn't make it a hot rod. So don't call it a rod and expect me to accept it as a rod. Its not about time slips, its about calling a spade a spade. Ever how cool a stock bodied old car may be if its a grocery getter its a grocery getter. Does it "Rule"? Perhaps when you need groceries, or to get to the laundrymat. The Hackster also mentioned trailering to the WhateverGuys Show that you want to go to. I've never owned a trailer, nor a 9 second streeter for that mater. But I have owned a couple that would run in the 10s. At least one of them made it from here to the coast and back more than once. Was it practical. No it was uncomfortable, loud and used more gas than your standard Pinto powered T. I was young and it was a hotrod, and it was all I owned. It didn't matter. Now I did mention that there were some "Resto Rods" that could fall into the catagory of hotrods. Another concession I guess. By the standards someone might call Ryans '38 a "Resto Rod". No offense intended here. The body is basically stock, it rides on steelies. But although not the norm it you could probably use the term in good consience with Ryan's '38. Its got the heart of a hot rod. Does it make the resto guys scratch thier heads. I doubt if any "Resto Rod" makes the resto guys sct ratch thier heads. Not many show up at our hangouts or cruises and its not likey you will ever see too many Resto Rods at any concourse events. You can bet that the average resto rod will make me scratch my head though. I'll never understand why someone would spend all that time and effort to build one that is all nice on the outside and have the heart of a stone.
Yea, Banger motor, modified. Just cramming in a more powerful newer design motor would just be "cheating" wouldn't it? So, in order to be a hotrod motor, the motor has to be modified for even more power than it had from the factory in order to call it a hotrod motor? I think that follows the line of thought that the engine IS the hotrod, and the only identifying part that makes the "vehicle," whatever vehicle, around it a hotrod...? Even if it was or is already the most potent engine on the road, like an old or new Hemi or Viper engine? I think Shag was saying something like that on here a few years ago. He was saying a hotrod engine should be hotrodded regardless of what it started as or what it's going in. At the LA Roadster show, Tex Smith was talking about how the most fun in racing is getting away with breaking the rules. What rules are there on the street? NONE! A "groin call"? You really don't understand spending time and money on customs then do you? You might look at the Resto-Rod as a custom and not as a hot HotRod, if it's a 48 or older the magazines are going to call it a "Street Rod" and not a "Custom-Rod" whatever that is, but it'll get that Rod suffix never the less. Maybe you have identified why people DO call them RESTO-Rods and not HOT-Rods! (Not trying to pick on ya P&Bner...mostly just hashing out these different ideas in my head too, and you're helping!!!)
I think it's like I said before, sort of... To some people the HotRod is JUST the ENGINE. What car it's in is secondary, or lower. You can tell who these people are. They build a hot engine and THEN find a car to put it in. They might not even know what car they are putting it in when they start "building" the engine. They might know how heavy and long a wheelbase car they want because that will work into the torque vs horsepower vs RPM equasion but that's about it. They might even run the same engine, or the same "equasion" engine in different cars but whether it's in a Model A or a TransAM doesn't matter that much because the engine is the only part that makes it a hotrod to them. And they are right. But when it comes to the "What is a HOTROD?" multiple choice question, the answer is "E" - All of the above!" The multitude of labels and magazine titles that have sub-devided "hotrod" into "Street Machine" and "Hot Mustang" and "Super Chevy" on and on till ya puke are what confuse the issue of what the original is. And HOTROD Magazine, compared to what it was half it's life ago, has turned, by popular demand, into a nostalgia magazine. Usta be Hotrod and Car Craft would run articles on how to improve the handling of the latest Gran Sport of 442 or Roadrunner, NEW cars, Hotrodded! Now the readers get all testy when Friedburgers runs an article about shock strut reinforcing on a new car... I liked the article where I think it was Hotrod magazine took a Sedan Deville and a cutting torch to the drag strip and piece by piece, made that Caddy a "hotrod" without touching the engine... they just "lightened the chassis" that the engine was required to haul down the strip! The British usta call it "tuning". The Original owner's manual I have in my MGB GT has a chapter on tuning and even tells you what parts to replace to make it have more horsepower and handle better. The "ricer kids" do too, Tuning. It means the same thing as hotrodding but just because some of "us" won't let go of a word it's been abandoned by the youth. Hotrod may go the way of Gow Job, in another 40 years. Who knows?
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