Hotrod Hayride 2010 part three: The Oval track

After seeing all the good stuff on the meeting grounds and campsite, on saturday morning we were off to the racetrack. It was a 45 minute drive over rough roads. My van is american and it doesn't like bumps or curves.

It rides on the bump-stops at the front and those rubber blocks can only absorb a certain amount of suspension travel, resulting in suspension arms hitting the chassis with a loud metallic sound at frequent intervals. That and the fact that the rear springs have sagged to the point that a turn to the right or small bump or hole will cause the fat rubber to come in contact with the left rear wheel arch didn't make it an enjoyable ride.

Once there, it was worth it though.
We arrived in time to see the Vintage F1 stockcars go round.

Some of these cars were raced in the 50s, some are reproduced. Some drivers are vintage too, in their 70s and still racing. The guy in the pink car was one. He started at the back of the pack every time but finished first every time.

Some hotrods were raced as well.

This strange shape was a heavily modified Ford coupe. Widened, with rear deck shortened and nose stretched, I liked its strangeness.

Motorcycles came out to play. Unfortunately, the quickest had a flat tyre and the second had engine problems.

This guy came all the way from Switzerland to race his stock car. Nice car, too.

The pits were on the dust in the parking lot. Which most of these guys must be used to.

Old car, knackered metal.

Tuning car with precision tools.

At the parking, we ogled some more beauties.

Sometimes the right wheels and stance are enough: 70s Vauxhall coupe.

Nice.

Pro street, street legal. The police never find it as funny as you do.

Imagine driving that to the shops. "Excuse me, could you pull your child's scarf out of my blower, please?"

Real custom pickup. Needs minor bodywork and a decent paintjob and we have a winner!

It's not a real pretty example but you don't see many of these early Dodges anywhere in Europe. We need to bring the Vans to the Street, man! Right on!

'Till next time, be like the Fonz.

Hotrod Hayride 2010 part deux

Well we'll continue where we left off: with cool cars.

Aussies would call it a Ute.Could be a killer with the right paint.

Cool Greenbrier lurking underneath the trees. Really dig these Vans!

Would be a cool van without the big sidewindows and the running boards..

Although I'm just about almost done with the everpopular 5 window coupe, this one looked good.

Nice kolor combo. Vintage-drag-look is cool in my book.

Can't beat Metalflake in the sun for effect! Very cool panel, too.

Beauty in red with sixties wheels. Perfect for thin sidepipes.

Very low. Seems to me a lot of these cars are incontinent. Lots of coolant, leaking, spewing or boiling all over the place. Get it together, guys!

Very nice bare metal rod.

Bar-B-Q-ing on Keystone Klassics!

That's all folks!

Hotrod Hayride 2010 part 1

Well, I'm back in the land of the living after a great weekend in the UK at the Hotrod Hayride.

I'll be posting a lot of pics this week cuz it was grand trip and I think more people need to go there next year! Hats off to the Executioners cc and everyone involved for organising a great event. Here we go:

I took off on thursday morning, on my way to pick up my travel companion LeShawn when I noticed the charge meter going off the scale. A quick diagnose pointed to the voltage regulator. I'm sure the electrics in my van wouldn't last long at 20 volts or more and with the alternator disconnected, neither would my battery. After a few roadside calls, I found a company called Van Dijck USA parts who had a replacement regulator in store but unfortunately he was closed. After some persuasion, he agreed to let my friend pick up the item at his house, thanks man! I drove with the alternator disconnected and fingers crossed for another 120kms to my friends house, who had already picked up the regulator when I got there. Amazing how long the ignition keeps working on the battery alone. After a quick fix, we were on our way again.

We drove to Duinkerke (F) to catch the ferry across the channel to England, stopping at nearly every gasstation on the way. I have a small LPG tank of 50 liters which only lasts around 200kms.

After the ferry, we had about 150kms to drive to Bisley and we arrived at around 21.00hrs, only to find an almost empty campground. Parked the van and headed off to the pub, where we met up with Henry & the Ford brothers from Holland. Henry is the guy who initiated the Rockin' Jalopy's Motorama Show in Rosmalen (NL). He also built this crazy Excalibur hotrod:

After a few pints, I hit the sack in my home for the weekend.

Next morning, we headed off to the nearest pub for a gruesome breakfast. Horrible coffee, burnt toast and the most rancid sausages I've ever tasted in my whole meat-eating career, blerk!

After that fiasco, we went for a cruise around the grounds to see if there were interesting cars coming in. They were, this rat Willlys for example:

Ford Pop with a nice 70's look:

The meeting grounds belong to the NRA (National Rifle Association) and during the entire year, shooting contests are held and members are practicing. I'm telling ya, the sound of constant gunfire adds extra atmosphere to a car meeting! The grounds are also filled with old barracks, club houses, canteens and so on, making for a picturesque backdrop.

This Dodge truck would make a great camper!

Lots of rusty pickups and panels around, this one was one of my favorites:

Goldmember pro street.

That's enough for now, next time, more pics of the oval race, bikes & cars and the coolest place to hang out.

Chop that fucking Sportster

After too long a time of not-painting choppers, here's one for all you golddiggers.
It's a hardtailed ironhead sportster, almost finished in this pic, still some details left to do.

It's at my buddy Tjeerd's shop (ShortCut Choppers) which is convenient cuz I can finish the modified tins myself, cleaning up grinder marks and welds and making sure it will still fit perfectly with a few coats of paint on them. After that I took everything back to my shop for filling and primer.

The customer wants gold scrolls, the number 59 (don't know that position) and the letters CTFS on it. It took some sketching and brainstorming to come up with the right look for this bike. When I dream up a design its also good to have the bike close at hand so I can sketch it out on the tins and fit them back to the bike to see how it looks. After that stage I put the design in the computer and have stencils cut.

I use the stencils to spray on gold leaf size (some kind of glue) and then pull the stencils off right away. The size then has to dry for an hour, during which I continue taping off the other parts. After an hour, I can lay on the leaf. It sticks to the surface immediately and I use a very soft brush to get rid of the excess leaf.

It takes a lot of time and today I only managed to do both sides of the oilbag...

one side of the tank,

and half of the rear fender today.

It all still needs cleaning and touching up.
Then a layer of clear and after that, certain parts will be shot in matt clear.
Next week it continues, but first: Hotrod Hayride, yay!

What's he doing?

Can't tell ya. 'S a secret.

Top secret

No, really. I'm painting a prototype of the fun car of the future. It's an electric vehicle but it will only be unveiled in september so I can't show it to you's just yet.

A good day for Truckin'

Bottrop Kustom Kulture 2010

It was a great show, the weather was fantastic, lots of cool cars & bikes & people.

Some wordfamous artists were there, striping and painting away in a hot tent all day. Also, the Dice/Draggers bikeshow was a promising start. Next year: even bigger and better!

So if you weren;t there, you missed something good. Be there next year!

Tow, tow, tow yer boat...

or trailer, or something.

After an epic battle between man and machine, I have finally installed my towing hook.

I bought this thing from Addie's Autoshop (he dismantled many a van, mainly Dodge, lots-o-parts there, some vintage stuff, too). It came from a more recent model Dodge van and it looked as though it would fit perfectly. Once my rear bumper was off and I tried to fit it under there, it turned out not to fit.

I had to take it apart, test fit, adapt and weld together again. My cheap-ass welder quit, I had to  repair that, then minutes later, it ran out of wire, @#$%^&*(!!

But I always win in the end. It may take a while and a lot of bad words leave my mouth but victory is mine!

Even the rear bumper fits over it!

Now I will be able to take a motorcycle on a trailer to the Bottrop Kustom Kulture show, next weekend. Be sure to check that out and visit me at my stand.

http://www.bottropkustomkulture.com/

See you there!