I can see where kids get that impression........Its like today ,most have the vision of cleaning up the planet ,...when the reality of it is ....it just did not work out that way.
All the hotrodders had visions of a shiney car one day ,.......that day just never came for most....................
I like to refer to that as distorted reality and perception.
The perception was to do a finished shiney car ....the reality is it just did not happen that often.
So in all reality you guys built unfinshed rides/ratrods....or whatever terminology you want to affix to it.
Soo thats where the perception comes from that all rides were rats/unfinished back then.......they may have been unfinished,but the dream or goal was always to finish the ride nice and shiney,it just did not happen to most of the rides ,therfore giving the perception that most were rats/unfinished ,......which they were
The perception problem comes into play then ,because of that vision of completion one day ,most rodders feel thay were building a finished ride ,even if it never got there, ....meaning they did not build rats/unfinished rides ,but they did


The goal was never reached for most /making most rats/unfinished rides number more than the finished rides ,making the reality or truth that most were really rats and unfinished ,which they were.
This just goes to show no matter whats inside of your head {good intentions}that unless we manifest those into reality by actually doing it ,...it remains little more than a thought or vision and not reality because physically these cars were unfinished ,there was a vision of completness one day,but it rarely got manifested into the reality of a finished car ,...just the vision of a finished car.
Now most are left with the visions and not the actuall unfinished car to remind them that it did not get finished and the rality of the situation{no matter what the intentions were} most did actually build unfinished rides ,it just was not there goal to do ,but yet thats how it usually worked out for most or it took many years to finish and in that time it was driven unfinished giving the impression that there were even more unfinished cars floatin around than there were................
I can only guess as to this being why they think every car was unfinished or a ratrod,..........................I dunno...............