Hot rod, come erano realmente

[mopar]

E qui un po' di risposte:



depends on how far back you go. in the late forties, early fifties, no billet wheels just hubcaps. Shiny paint, mostly hand rubbed lacquer. Looked great, didn't last like modern paints.

Mostly whitewalls, but not all. Customs pretty much all had whitewalls. You would never see a Merc custom with blackwalls.

West coast, the front was low for rods, rear was low for customs, east coast the rear was low for customs, and the rods mostly set level.

Had some beaters but mostly rust was a no-no. Lots of primer, both spotted and full.

Most of what is called a rat rod today would be laughed off the street. You might get into a show with a unfinished, but clean, custom, but no ragged looking cars would be allowed.

Most of the vehicles in the basement at the Autorama wouldn't have been allowed.

That's all I can think of now





But to better answer the question, there were all levels of hot rods and customs back in the day. Those who could afford the best, built the best. Those who could not didn't build crap cuz that's all they could afford, they improved their cars as time and money allowed. Most guys wouldn't take their cars out of the garage untill they were sure the car was up to even a minimum standard.

I don't remember anyone in my area (north Jersey) building a rough piece of crap cuz that's what they wanted. There was no "go to hell if you don't like my car" attitude.





as good as it gets....by today's standards.

But they had, as the top of the line paint, nitrocellulous Laquer....shined as good as or better than anything today but it's life was finite and it required more upkeep than today's modern clearcoat finishes....

Those babys were SHINY!





I grew up in the Chicago area in the Fifties, and there were VERY FEW hot cars around, compared with today. There was a monumental gap between the cars seen in magazines, and the locals. I remember a local show in a New Car dealers service dept.,(a small one compared with today), and the available cars didn't fill the shop.

Paint quality varied all over the map.Enamel jobs were horrible.

As for welding, forget about it ! Lots of stick weld goobers on the frames. Undercoat covered a lot of sins.



If you study most of the early photos of kustoms you see, right off, that panel alignment wasn't anything like todays Riddler winners. The '54 'rockstar' on the cover of Mazumma's copy of Custom Rodder is a case in point. As for the paint, look at some of the 'peel' and dead spots in some of the photos, can't plame it all on the photographer! Some of the early clears and later candies were literaly a ticking timebomb, the reds and yellows being some of the worst in direct sunlight.

Also, some of the 'big named' builders leaned heavy on lead to cover their soft skills as fabricators, but we gota remember most of these vehicles were built quickly, and without a million dollar budget.









When I was first getting into automobiles,there were quite a few cars around that I would term,"daily drivers" in todays jargon.Actually ALL cars except for a very few true show cars were just that.



They seemed to be divided into two camps:those who didn't mind driving their cars as a,"work in progress" and those who wouldn't bring their car out until it was completely finished.



As for the quality of the work,I think the fit and finish on a lot of them was very good.What most lacked was the finished look underneath the vehicle as a lot of people tend to do today.At that time it wasn't considered necessary for anything but a true show vehicle.There were always the exceptions such as Fred Steele's purple Deuce roadster which sported an entirely chromed undercarriage in the mid 1950's and was driven extensively.



One of the most beautiful cars I ever saw was Norm Wallace's 32 Ford roadster that was a Hot Rod Magazine cover car in 1958 and was purchased by my cousin in 1969 with the original Titian Red lacquer paint still very much intact.Although the underside wasn't as detailed as most modern show rods,it was very neat.The workmanship on the car was(and still is)superb.



I know several older metal men(some who are still working)that did fantastic metal fabrication and used very little filler.One in particular(hotrodder3 on here)I watched chop a Model A coupe one weekend and literally use no welding rod(rather fusing the two pieces of metal together),walk a wrinkle in the metal across the rear of the top and then shrink the metal at the end and finish it off with a little pick and file work.No lead.



I watched another do a black lacquer paint job on a car and finish it off by fogging thinner over the surface and having it come out looking like it was rubbed out.And the paint lasted.This guy also uses a door jamb gun better than most people use an air brush.



You also have to bear in mind that there were no where near as many people in the hobby then as there are now.Also most stuff had to be fabricated;there was virtually no store bought stuff.



Back then you could put together a really decent car for $2500;today that wouldn't even buy the materials for a paint job.