Thread: Hello fellow car nuts!

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Posting as suggested after I join.

Been a car nut ever since I can remember. Having grown up in Europe I was into European cars for the most part. Dad was a big Bentley fan and has an appreciation for British cars in general. He's had a ton of Bentleys, everything from the prewar Bentley beasts to the modern stuff.

I grew up a huge racing fan and loved Porsches and rallye cars (Lancia Stratos mostly). As I got old enough to buy my own cars, I dabbled more in Italian cars for fun and German cars for daily duties, steering away from British cars since Dad was such a British car guy.

The thing about modern cars is they're all becoming to be the same thing. I remember one could relatively easily tell the difference between a car's drive by feel alone. Heck, you could tell if it was a German or Italian car by just shutting the door. Driving a Ferrari on the freeway at 60mph feels not so different from driving a Toyota nowadays.

So I got into classic cars. After meeting some great folks I realized it may not be for me. Great to look at but maybe not as great as I'd like to own.

I had never really looked into classic American cars though. Went the muscle car route and saw the market explode to the point of being ridiculous. So I started looking at the prewar cars and was really amazed at the cars out there. Far better than their European counterparts a lot of the times. A friend of mine has a Deusenberg and the thing absolutely blew me away. The complexity and and the technology for such an old car is magnificent.

Again, not exactly the sort of thing that you want to drive everyday or even close to it. Then I discovered what to me was a pretty unexplored part of the automotive world in rods and customs. Really fantastic stuff.

I love the do-it-yourself, incredibly customized, and deeply personal culture of rods and customs. So here I am. I have extensive driving experience with all sorts of different cars. I pride myself in having had a lot of different cars I've driven a good amount on (not just around the block but a few hundred miles). Rare stuff like Dad's old prewar racing Bentley, to my Lamborghini Murcielago which I drove over 20k miles in the first year. But I've never had the pleasure of being behind the seat of something that one could essentially build completely to their liking.

I look forward to learn and ask dumb questions until you're all sick of me. Don't have much to give back to the community other than my own knowledge if anyone is interested in stuff I know and respect to those who contribute.

Cheers!

Welcome Stick. You have really driven some awesome machines. I like th muscle. You can still find some great old cars for resonable prices. If you have any particular car in mind let me know and I will hunt around.

Welcome aboard. I'm glad to see another rodder coming into the fold, however, your intro leaves me with some questions about how long you will find hot rods attractive. Please understand I am not being critical, just asking some questions I think you need to ask yourself before you commit.

Hot rodders are a special lot. We are willing to put up with many obstacles and solve many problems along the way, and even once the car is running we accept the shortcomings and idiosyncracies of our rods. Regardless of how we all say our rods "drive like a Cadillac", in reality they do not. Oh sure, with modern IFS and IRS systems you can get a rod to ride in a very decent manner, but the envelope is still basically 80 year old technology and not designed to match the comfort level of newer stuff.

I would suggest you actually get to know some rodders and see if you can con one of them into letting you sit in or maybe even drive their car a little. While these things are fun, they don't come without issues. Lots of people look at a hot rod and think it would be fantastic to own one, but in the real world people buy and then sell them quite often because they find out they are not willing to put up with the aforementioned issues.

But as jyardgirl said, we are here to help in any way we can to get you to your goals.

Don

Welcome to CHR, Stick. I like all kinds of cars, from old to new, from this side of the pond and from the other side as well. Bentley's are biggies, but they do seem to hold up well. A friend has a 1964 RR Mulliner Convertible that he bought new. Still drives it after all these years, still sounds and rides as good as when new. I've had a few of European cars in my life, mostly Italian and they were all great rides, although a lot more finicky than the usual American iron.

We love photo's, so if you have any of your current or past rides, let's see 'em. We old folks like photo's more than text.

Originally Posted by mopar34

Welcome to CHR, Stick. I like all kinds of cars, from old to new, from this side of the pond and from the other side as well. Bentley's are biggies, but they do seem to hold up well. A friend has a 1964 RR Mulliner Convertible that he bought new. Still drives it after all these years, still sounds and rides as good as when new. I've had a few of European cars in my life, mostly Italian and they were all great rides, although a lot more finicky than the usual American iron.

We love photo's, so if you have any of your current or past rides, let's see 'em. We old folks like photo's more than text.

I have some pics of my cars. I think I may have some of the Porche Turbo, the Ferrari 360 (video too of that one I think), Mercedes CL600, Aston Martin Vanquish, and maybe a Diablo Roadster. I'm pretty sure I have pictures of the airboxes at least since I had them custom made in carbon fiber.

When I get home tonight I'll look for them. I used to frequent other forums so for sure there are pics of other cars I had in them.

Ok, here's one set, have to resize all my pics it seems.

Aston Martin Vanquish. Car next to it is my brother-in-law's girlfriend's Mini Cooper S. I can snap more pics of that one if you'd like!

Originally Posted by Itoldyouso

Welcome aboard. I'm glad to see another rodder coming into the fold, however, your intro leaves me with some questions about how long you will find hot rods attractive. Please understand I am not being critical, just asking some questions I think you need to ask yourself before you commit.

Hot rodders are a special lot. We are willing to put up with many obstacles and solve many problems along the way, and even once the car is running we accept the shortcomings and idiosyncracies of our rods. Regardless of how we all say our rods "drive like a Cadillac", in reality they do not. Oh sure, with modern IFS and IRS systems you can get a rod to ride in a very decent manner, but the envelope is still basically 80 year old technology and not designed to match the comfort level of newer stuff.

I would suggest you actually get to know some rodders and see if you can con one of them into letting you sit in or maybe even drive their car a little. While these things are fun, they don't come without issues. Lots of people look at a hot rod and think it would be fantastic to own one, but in the real world people buy and then sell them quite often because they find out they are not willing to put up with the aforementioned issues.

But as jyardgirl said, we are here to help in any way we can to get you to your goals.

Don

First off, thanks to you both for the offers to help.

Don, that's exactly why I'm here. Although I have very very little experience with rods, I do have a lot of experience with old cars. Now I've never driven a '33 Ford, but I've driven 1920s Bentley speed six, 1930's Hispano Suiza, a couple of 1930s Duesenbergs (roadster, phaeton, landaulet), and so on. So I'm not completely oblivious to what it's like to drive something with no power steering, power brakes, a/c, heck no top at all, and a gas pedal in the middle for that matter.

As for goals, something I've always wanted to do is build my own car. Another thing is restoring a car. I figure rodding or building a custom is pretty much a mix of the two things in a way. I don't have what it takes to build a car from scratch (a Simpson's episode where Homer's long lost brother tasks him to do it comes to mind), so rodding is neat because you start of with a template so to speak and then take it from there.

What I'd love to do is find a 41 Caddilac or something along those lines. Again, haven't looked into things as much as I'd like yet so I'm just going by interesting cars I've seen. A beat up old car that I won't feel bad tearing to bits to make it into whatever I want.

No, there is no guarantee that I'll fall in love with rods and never look back, but I'll never know if I don't look at least.

I can't seem to find pictures of my Lamborghinis. I have some of the engine and the airboxes of an SV I had since I was emailing JR to see if it was feasible to have some carbon fiber ones made for it. I'll look for the video of me driving the 360 0-60 street start (gear engaged 5mph, not dropping the clutch or anything, and bumps on the road) cockpit view, driving the Murcielago with the door up (yeah yeah, not the smartest thing to do), and of me driving a 1967 Lamborghini Miura in the Running Of The Bulls. The sound on it is GLORIOUS.

Happy mopar34?

I'll try to find family albums to look for Dad's old cars. Those will really blow your socks off. Back before the digital camera days I'm afraid. So I don't think I'll find anything. But worth a look in the old family albums.

The current cars I have are boring so I won't bother. Boston isn't exactly a good place for nice cars. I also didn't put picture I have of two other old cars I used to have because they're quite plain. I took the pictures of one because I sold the car on eBay the other I didn't bother. A surprisingly capable Corvette C5. I put a supercharger on it and it gave the other car, a Dodge Viper ACR, a run for it's money.

I currently have a C32 Benz AMG, a Lexus LS430, an S500 Benz, and an E55 AMG. We have 2 kids now so now everything's 4 doors. We keep a white Porsche Cayenne Turbo with TechArt body and wheels in the S.F. Bay Area. My wife has a really neat BMW Z3 2.8 which is her first car (kinda shows our age). Technically second car, it was a replacement of the Z3 1.9 (only engine available when they first came out) which was a lemon and after a year or two BMW took back and gave us the 2.8. She also has a nice Bently Azure which we keep in Florida so we see it maybe three days out of the year . I can take pics of the Benzes and the Z3 whenever if you're interested since they're here with us. The little Z3 sports the Pinnacle Motorsports license plate holder since it's the only one of our current cars which made the trip to Houston back when JR was still tinkering with my toys .