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Hot Rods 3.

Page 5 of 5.
Link to Order Page

The be all and end all of Hot Rods!

From the low-tech history to the high-tech outer limits, from the specialised detailing of rod & custom car shows to the brave new world of brand-new fresh-cloned classics, this third video is where it is right now.

By the time we started on Hot Rod 3 we reckoned we were getting close to the why & how, the past and future of Hot Rods. In this issue we see projects in agricultural iron and aircraft standard alloys that share the same excitment of pushing further the possible. In both looks and performance the original car is often only a vague reference to the final result. Some cars in the Melbourne Hot Rod Show only have the radiator shell of the car they evolved from and in some cases even this is a subtle remanufacture. Hot rodders terrify car restorers because they are too fluid with their ideas - car restorers bore Hot Rodders because they are too rigid.

Just because a car was once constructed in a certain way doesn't mean it has to remain that way.
Mark Plunkett builds and runs an antique drag racer. We filmed him on a hot saturday afternoon sitting in his tin-roofed garage surrounded with bits of engines you would expect to find in a long abandoned farmyard. A straight six from the forties was lying tractor-like in a thin, simply sprung chassis. Beside him a brightly painted body skin that could be flipped off in minutes to get at the simple mechanicals. And Mark talked about a performance hobby that did not require an open cheque book.

Mark was going to get the absolute best from what were his chosen vehicles limitations. He was going to out do the performance records of the car at the time it was originally manufactured.

He was racing against the clock, but the clock and the records were forty years old. - Antique Drag Racing.
Fiat dragster Ford hot rod
Dry Lakes title
Al Teague

Then in the South Australian desert the Americans had sent a team of cars to Lake Gairdner to check out the conditions. These were Bonneville Dry Lake race cars and they fitted in just fine with the locals. And naturally these cars were not budget specials. In fact they were more like wingless aeroplanes in the precision and detail of their construction.

First International Speed Challenge - Lake Gairdner.

Hot rods on the salt
Customised FJ Holden

The display cars in hot rod & custom shows are also often a very long way from the manufacture’s release specifications. The level of finish and detail innovation could never have been economically build into standard production models. The car as it left the factory gates is not seen as the absolute point of reference.

The original car specifications are the rough clay ( and many were pretty rough ) that rodders push and bend to their own ideas. What makes a show winner?

Details make the difference.

Fibre Glass bodies Reproduction title

But then why use original cars at all?
Deuce Customs and Rod City Repros set up in the factory next door simply remanufacture the lot, body and chassis!

Reproduction World.

Antique drag racing,
hot rod shows,
custom cars,
dry lakes racing,
reproduction hot rods.
Melbourne Hot Rod Show
Link to BVB page
Hot Rod orders
 

55 minutes packed with info and inspiration!
$19.95

Airmailed delivery of NTSC ( US television ) copies is usually seven working days.
Link to Hill Climbs

Hot Rods Intro
Automobiles.
Hot Rods 1.
Hot Rods 2.
Arthurs Seat Hill Climb
( Doctor's Hot Rods)

Link to Hill climb

And if that’s not enough for you, check out the HILL CLIMB page!

bushtelegraph@ausbushcraft.com.au

All material on this site is the copyright of Australian Bushcraft Library. 2005.