Comments from the peanut gallery.

[Fat Cat]

One time at a local car show I had a guy come up to my truck, looked it over and said " I don't like the color"  WTF business of it is his what color my truck is?  It takes all kinds................

I would have told him that his mother dresses him funny.

[BFS57]

Hello;
You all will like this!
One day while parking my 57 chevy at Wal Mart, I guy asked " Thats the one with the HEMI in it isn't it?" I said yes!

Bruce

[GPster]

Around here you can put anything (except a Jeepster) on an S10 chassis and call it a "Rat Rod".  On another site I frequent there has been a discussion recently about how someone had seen a so called "Rat Rod" brought to an event on a trailer. Some people don't know what to be impressed with. GPster

[UGLY OLDS]

I get away easy .....    When people question the SBC in my Olds, I reply that it is actually a "Mid '70's Corporate GM engine" ...THAT keeps them thinking for a while ...    



Bob.....

[phat46]

My brother is a Ford guy (got dropped on his head as a child) and has a '69 Chevelle SS, original BB car sitting in his yard. He keeps telling me he's going to put a straight axle under it and the 347 stroker Ford motor that he has in the shop into the Chevelle just to * off the restorers AND the Chevy guys!  

[Carnut]

Heh, heh, would you believe I've heard the 'That Got A Hemi?' comment a million times?

[papastoyss]

I've always thought the best way to fix an old Ford is to put a Chevy engine in it. Tell that to an antiquer & watch his face get red! It's indisputable though that since the SBC was introduced no other engine can match the SBC for power & reliability in relation to amount of $ expended.

[Boyd Who]

Until somebody finds a hidden stash of hi-po Essex V-8 so I can get one, mine will run a bellybutton 350/350 combo. Easy to install, easy to fix, easy to make look good. That's reason enough for me.

[chimp koose]

Build what you want ,with what you have on hand. I think thats how hot rodding got started. The purist car friends I have that tell me I must put a ford in my model T are too busy putting chalk and crayon marks on the underside/diff/firewall of their restored musclecars to understand the complexity or thought process required to install anything that wasnt factory equipment.While they are taking pictures of crayon scrawls on the undersides of their cars before disassembly,I am crawling around with a tape measure at the wrecker ,in my junkpile,and under my car.To each his own. Enjoy how you will.

[idrivejunk]

What drives me nuts is when folks think a 350 is a 350 and have no idea that GM divisions each had their own (except Cad). I have actually ran into this several times. These are the same folks that say big block 400 Pontiac. Use whatever floats your boat, if you build a custom vehicle its your choice. Where I live, having the original family of engine in your classic is one of the requirements for running antique plates.

[Rrumbler]

Since I sold off all of my engines in the late seventies in a fit of pique, I have often said that if I ever stumbled across a good late fifties or sixties Hemi that I thought I could afford, I'd stuff it in my '59 Chevy pickup just to hear the bellyaching and fussing from that "peanut gallery".  I try not to let the "gallerians" get to me, just ignore them if they get too strident.  At a street gathering a few years ago, a friend and I were looking over a very nicely rodded '64 Pontiac Catalina coupe; it had a "Rat" in it, and I commented that I had not seen one like that with a big block in it.  Some guy passing by stopped and began regaling us about how well this "restoration" was done, right down to the correct "big block", and how that Pontiac "big block" was one of the finest engines ever designed.  After a bit, my face was beginning to cramp from the "professional smile" I had pasted on, and my brain had gone into early hibernation, so I very rudely turned and walked away; he followed us for a short distance, and then I guess he figured it out.

[Uncle Bob]

My late buddy Bubba had an incredible knack for making engine compartments just look "right".  He could somehow blend a bunch of subtle details together to make it all work.  You could usually tell the experienced rod builders by how they showed appreciation for what was done.  Those who'd never done that sort of thing just took it for granted.

He dropped a 350 he had into a nicely restored '40 Standard sedan, adapted some early Olds valve covers (before it became trite), hung a generator, and mounted some mid '50s GM oil bath air cleaner (not the usual batwing, converted the guts to paper filter).  Painted it up with the Olds green, and the correct yellow on the lettering.  Except for the ram horn exhaust manifolds it looked pretty close at a quick glance.

Sitting at the GG Puyallup the first year out we got the normal mix of commentary you'd expect.  The less knowledgable, casual spectators wouldn't know an Olds from a chev anyway.  The sharp eyed rod guys saw the manifolds and got the joke.  Some muttered, some expressed appreciation.  But the best one was a guy who stood there for awhile, and then started commenting about how nice it was to see an Olds instead of those cookie cutter small blocks, and how it looked just like he remembered when guys would just take an engine out of a wrecked late model and drop it in for the added power.  Inside we were amused at his enthusiasm, but then as he walked away the real laugh came.  On the back of his windbreaker was emblazoned; Oldsmobile Club of America.

[Mikej]

I was thinking about putting a SBC in the Comet but now I don't know. Did Mercury make an engine? I may just buy a rear sump racing oil pan ( $370) for the 302 aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand maybe people will think its a SBC. Distributor maybe a problem.

[UGLY OLDS]

I was thinking about putting a SBC in the Comet but now I don't know. Did Mercury make an engine? I may just buy a rear sump racing oil pan ( $370) for the 302 aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand maybe people will think its a SBC. Distributor maybe a problem.

 Now is your chance ...
  Find some "Mercury Marine" Valve covers ......            ( I have seen them for small block Fords..)

If anyone ask's ....Tell them you could not afford the real "Barge" & had to settle for the "Runabout" ... :?:  :?:        

Bob..........

[Carnut]

Yeah, a Ford in a Ford like this one.





My friend Roger Lynn's 40 Ford Standard.