Thread: What I like about rat rods...seriously!

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Guys,

I usually don't like to get involved in debates like this, but I gotta vent on this one. Years ago in the '60s when I first started building rods, we built them from the ground up. Until we could afford the expensive paint job, we drove them around in rough looking condition. Back then they were called "Rods", when they were finished they were called "Customs". Ever heard of a magazine called "Rod and Customs". Back then it was a small (6"X8") magazine of just that, unfinished Rods and finished Customs. You "Nay-Sayers" almost had me convinced that all Rat-Rods are a POS. The more I read about them, the more I understand. You Nay-Sayers have lumped Rods, Rat-Rods, and POS into one category. If it has a rough looking body, primered, and has a bare interior, it's automatically labeled a POS Rat-Rod. That's not right. A true Rat-Rod is built from the ground up just like your shiny Custom. While you were spending hours on your interior and body to get it just right, so were they. Let me give you some examples:

ROD
Your shiny Custom before it was painted and the interior done. It was built well and safe enough to drive. It just wasn't finished.
RAT ROD
Built well and safe enough to drive, only it has toilets instead of bucket seats (Hey, there's an idea), bailing wire to make it appear as something is tied together, and special paint to make it appear old and rusted. Want an example of a true Rat-Rod???...The Beverly Hillbillys truck. Yes, it was built by the guys in TV land, but it had to be built well and safe enough to drive on the highways. Now that was a Rat-Rod in the truest sense.
POS
A car/truck slapped together in a couple of weeks with pocket change by someone who has little or no mechanical knowledge. Their tools consists of an old fishing box with a claw hammer, butter knife, vise-grips, and assorted wood screws. These clowns will get on a site like this one and call themselves rodders, and spout information that they read on another site...or...
My brother-in-laws 94 Ford F-100. He hasn't done a brake job in three years, two years ago he developed a front end shimmy, all four tires are may-pops and one was filled with fix-a-flat last year. Last summer he spent $700 on a paint job and stick-on flame decals. His friends think it's a great looking truck. It's a POS in the truest sense.

There are guys out there that will take a car/truck and slap parts on it without any thought to safety, and call this POS a Rat-Rod. These guys are not rodders...Rodders know better. It should be labeled as to what it really is...A POS and nothing more. Builders of true Rat-Rods are beginning to stand up in defense of their hard work. Now that I've learned the truth about this issue, I believe I'll stand with them.
End of vent...

Now let me get off this soap box before I fall and hurt myself...