Dave, you make some good points. Like you, I'm self employed, and both of us depend on working for customers who have the means to pay for that work.

My beef isn't really directed toward anything but the attitudes some people display. Doesn't matter whether its the guy who buys a rod as his latest piece of ego-stroking jewelry, or the one who looks down his nose at everyone else as he preaches his only-steel-is-real sermon, or the one who cobbles up some death trap with no regard to safety or function, and then assumes the bad boy wanna-be attitude toward anyone else who doesn't happen to own an equally sloppy example of zero-level workmanship. I just happen to find all three of them equally irritating.

But, in every case, its a people thing. Give the typical only-junk-is-cool bad boy a sack full of money and he'd immediately decide a pro-built car is the only way to go. The quality of his ride might change, but the crap quality of his attitude would remain the same. Reverse the roles and put the rich fellow who happens to have a superiority complex in a rat ride, and he'd assume the thug persona to match. In either case, its not a car thing, but rather an attitude thing that turns the average person off.

Achieving the success and money to have a pro build a ride doesn't make a person a jerk. Neither does the ownership of an all steel 32 3W make a person a jerk. Nor does the guy with the rat become a jerk because he drives the rat. If any of them happen to be jerks, chances are about 99.9% they were jerks before they ever owned any sort of car, and they'll be jerks till they draw their last breath. I figured out long ago the best way to deal with them is to have nothing to do with them. They're all narcissistic toads who'll never do a thing to make your life more pleasant, and denying them any sort of attention hurts them more than any sort of tongue lashing or smack in the mouth ever would.

I've run into customers in my own business from time to time who've offered me work that would pay decent money. But a conversation with them leaves me knowing the profit isn't worth the price of dealing with them, so I decline the work. I'd much rather deal with customers on a basis of mutual respect, and make a decent living for my efforts, than to make exceptional money by dealing with people who demand you stroke their egos while making it clear they think they're doing you a favor by offering the work. Life's too short to do otherwise.