MAGAZINE

ROTTEN CUSTOM

Art Chrome, it was called.

Art Lehner did a bunch of customs and hot rods and classics there. We were too young to really be involved in it, but it was a colorful, chromed, upholstered taste of the big time.

In the late 50's he did a custom for his teenage son that was the talk' on both sides of the tracks and probably both sides of the river.

2000. We drop in on a paint shop where we're having something done and a big primered hulk is sitting there......one that wasn't there when we were there last, and we walk over to it (this is, mind you, only about 3 miles from the Art Chrome' shop) and we sez, "What's this?"

"Oh that's an old Barris custom we're doing paint and body on for a guy."

"I don't think so."

"What?"

"Nope, forgive me, but THAT is an Art Chrome custom."

"Yeah but it's in the Barris book....look..."

Maybe it doesn't surprise me, but if Barris claimed that car, he's, well.......either very forgetful or just a..............

There is no doubt that it is the Lehner car. The color shot attached here is the same one they used in the Barris book, and it's really from a little book page in 1959. No mention of George Barris. Artie Chrome. Chrome was da man.

This one has had Hollydale guys nervous for years, wondering if it would surface.We even went to the gas station once where it had reposed with a tarp over it for most of the 60's (or was it 70's?) asked a few questions, but the search did not lead us to the next clue, and we forgot about it . Kind of. It's going to be interesting to see if the lineage thing gets cleaned up.

The car is tastefully done, as you can see. Nothing baroque about it, just re-re-restyled into a 'special' to suit Artie Chrome's vision. R.I.P. Chrome was an OK guy. Really. He knew I was a geek, but treated me OK in spite of it. We hope the restoration is a good one.

NOT A BARRIS CAR BY ANY FRICKIN' MEANS

HERBIE

We mean Herbie, from Kentucky, Kentucky Road Agent, whose full fendered 32 is all over real magazines this season. But the other 32 in his Moonshiner Fleet is the highboy shown below. Subtle. Stealth black wheels. Rear end is lower than the path-of-least-resistance' norm. You know, there's a reason that they're all so high in the back......it's EASIER that way. If we get used to it and all the 'cool' cars are high that way, well, maybe that's why we set them up that way when it's our turn. Isn't it just the 'familiar' that made the old coot say "I don't like em lowered down, like that"? So, get them lower in the back. Measure the distance between the top of the tire and to top of the fender body reveal........the McGee car - in October of 48 for Chrissake - was low in the back. . Think about it. "I wonder what it IS about the McGee car?" Hellooooooooo?!!! And if your tires are too short back there - it makes it worse. Even a low car will look like an out-of-proportion toy if the tires are too short. See this a lot on smoothies, doncha?

MAYBE IT'S LOADED WITH SHINE?

MAKES YA WANT YOUR FENDERS TO FALL OFF

Herbie hangs, as we've said, with the Kentucky Road Agents, whose cores are hard and who get it the drift.

JESS MUST BE OFF SOMEWHERE BUILDIN' A BRIDGE

T n'A

Craftsmen from all over the Golden State are putting the final clinch on their fasteners, pouring the first pint of flammable liquid into their neo-historic, home-forged , just-like-they-usta-be race cars. It may be the real renaissance, Boys. I mean these cats are goin' through the motions almost identically to those of our honored (Hop Up Honored) forefathers who scratched out racing programs from four barrel entertainment centers that had begun as 20 H.P. motivation for farm vehicles.

Can you believe, some of our peers' mock this pastime because it just isn't fast or hot enough for them. Those mugs are the ones who never have anything positive to say anyway, so.....yeah.......screw em..........about those whose 'wisdom' is alway negative and defeating and miserable? Excise them from your presence. Avoid em. Dodge em. Cleave to positive, good, upbeat and cool. ......there's plenty of that wisdom with Hop Up Guys we've come to know.

So our positive and cool amigos are on the hunt. On point. Making the phone calls, searching the archives, interviewing old timers to solve the mysteries of the banger, first-hand. And there are mysteries. "No hill," says Rustman. "The info is out there. You just gotta meet those galoots, show em you respect what they know. " And we add, "And continue prospecting for it." RE-spect, PRO-spect.

And do what they tell ya.

NOT EXACTLY A SECRET WEAPON

Except that every lovin' one of em tells it a little differently, has a personal angle on just what works, and you have to take it all, throw it up in the air and see what falls back down attached. This is where we find truth. Verita. The real Hop Up swindle is in the process. Yeah, the glory -or absence of it- will be at Auburn, but the fulfillment is in the learning, the building, assembling, the sighting, and that last look before you hook it up to go on up there. That nasty little racer is sitting in the barn, probably ready to go, and you have it all done....forgot nothing......did what you were told, hired some of it done, and it looks cool...........pour a little whiskey into a cup, light a $___ceegar (don't you hate it when people brag about how much the freakin' things cost?), pull up a crate and repose ................... you appreciate the new alignment of the radius rods, the new, narrower track of the rear end. "Ya know, those little coach lines in a model A were pretty cool, weren't they?" you sez to yourself. And you appreciate the privilege of working on and diggin' old Fords, and how lucky you are to have gotten old enough that you can do it so much and you savor the whole thing............finish your cup of hootch, lock up the shop and walk away, already thinking about the next project...........what will we learn on that one?!!!!