My thoughts on the Rat Rod:
They have always been around, I even built a few I just didn’t know it at the time. My first was a 1957 Plymouth Belvedere. I put a 383 magnum from a ’70 super bee and painted it flat black with the full moon disk hub caps. This was in 1983 (I think) I was about 17 and it’s all I knew how to do. I never understood why nobody liked it, I still don’t. That car was more fun than anything I have ever owned. Maybe that’s the thing….. The people that own the Ratters always seem to be having fun. They don’t stress over scratched paint, or a cigarette burn in a seat, or the unexpected rain storm when the windows haven’t been put in just yet. There are no hours of chrome polishing to get ready for that show, just pop a cooler of ice cold beer in the trunk, fill‘er up, grab your best girl, and hit the road.
It seems to me that all the anti establishment-ism (if that’s even a word) gained steam a few years back when the TV shows came out where motorcycles and hot rods are built in an hour and are magazine ready. (Or maybe that’s just when I noticed it, I’m really not that in tune with the world) These are cars that a majority of the car building guys will ever be able to afford. I find myself in that position. For me, having a car that gets from show to show in a trailer is just not something I can afford to own. Not that there is anything right or wrong with it, it’s just not for me.
I remember when I was a kid tagging along with my dad at car shows I spent my time looking up & down the rows for my most favorite of all cars, the 41 Willis coupe. It was in my opinion the coolest car ever to grace a car show or drag strip. They were just cool. That’s the only way I can describe them. Most of them (when you did find one) were dangerous looking and really loud & fast. It was, for me, the definition of what a hot rod should be. The last street rod event I attended, there were rows upon rows of the Willis coupes, all fiberglass, all tubbed, all having the same stance, all having the basic same drive train; BBC / TH 400 / 9” Ford. It’s like a formula for the Willis. Anyway….I never even look at them any more. It’s kinda sad really.
The stuff I found most interesting were the ones that were unpainted, loud, and different in one way or another, standing apart from the crowd, the way the Willis was 25 years ago.
I’m building a 1935 ford 3 window coupe now, and I’m not sure of what I’ll do or exactly how it will turn out, but it will be something I’ll do myself, on weekends, and with what ever disposable income I can muster up for the month. Not sure how long it will take, or what it will be exactly, but the best I can hope for is when it finally does find its way to the road, that some kid somewhere with his dad will think it’s cool and think, “That’s what I want when I grow up”.
That’s the kind of thinking that will keep the hobby alive.
krash
dallas tx