I’m seeing a growing market in antique tractor restorations. Old John Deere’s especially.
The last time I went to a car show I was seeing more unique restorations. for example, fixing up the inside of a car and the engine but leaving the outside rusty. Also taking old cars bodies and mounting them on brand new frames. Then there are the people who make hot rods and such.
Ah, the ubiquitous “rat rods”. (IMO, a stupid trend.) They are supposed to represent the ‘foundation’ of rodding, a throwback to the 50s when people didn’t have enough money to finish their car, when the aftermarket wasn’t there yet, so people made do with what they could get.
So rat rodders are making “faux patina” cars. Deliberately distressed parts, mismatched components. They find an unrestored car and leave it old looking. I bet there are even aftermarket fake old parts.
The thing is, people in the 50s had discovered paint. When I drove my Road Runner in primer, it wasn’t because I thought I was “cool.” It was because I couldn’t afford paint. As soon as I could, it got painted. It wasn’t “cool” to run mismatched parts. If you were running a Mopar 318 with 340 intake, no one thought it was a hot setup. Just a necessary one, until you could find a solid 340 block.
The thing is, cars evolve. they eventually get finished (at least, in the automotive equivalent to Zeno’s paradox, nearly done). Rat Rods are stuck in some middle area. The owners work hard to keep them “unfinished”.
My observations at our local car shows:
-They are really low-key events. Just have your car nice and clean, it doesn’t have to be perfect.
-Owners are often present, they sit behind their cars on lawn chairs.
-People are interested in how long you you have had the car and how you obtained/restored it. Some owners will bring a photo album of the restoration process.
-If there is anything unusual or unique about your car or it’s history those make good conversation topics.
-Don’t point out flaws on your own car, you are probably more critical of your car than others are.
-Not to be sexist, but I don’t think passersby are going to expect technical knowledge from the owner’s wife. Heck I’ve run into many male owners that don’t know hardly anything mechanical about their classic car. If you get asked just some statement like “It’s really fast” or “It’s nice and loud” or “I like the way it looks and drives” should be enough to convey that you like the car for what it is, even if you don’t know all the parts.
Rat rods are like any other niche - there are realists, and extremists. IMHO, rat rodding is about exactly what it claims to be: engineering and performance over appearance. The best rat rods have good paint jobs in dull black and very little that is “old and rusty” - but they have meticulous engineering and construction.
Frankly, I think the latter years of hot rodding, with engraved everything, billet components from end to end and $30k paint jobs are the “stupid trend.” It’s bad enough that many cars that end up in my two sections are trailer queens, rarely driven except on and off a covered trailer; modern hot rods are objets d’art that are loaded and unloaded with cotton gloves.
Fine, if you want art objects. But rat rods and street-driven are a hell of a lot more honest than trailer queens and automotive artworks.
I think we are seeing different cars in our different areas that are called ‘rat rods’. I’ve seen rat rods here that are not about “engineering and performance”, rather they are about “the look”. For example, a rat rod that had many license plates riveted together for a floor. Aside from that being dangerous, sheet metal is cheap. You can make a solid floor easier than finding 30 old plates. When you are running a Buick nailhead and 6 one barrel carbs, that’s not about performance, because a Chev 350 with a single 4 barrel is a lot cheaper and will run consistently better. Using a beer bottle for a radiator overflow can is all about the look, not engineering.
As you say, there are extremists. But, there is a middle ground between 60K billet trailer queens and a “poseur” POS that probably is a major pain to drive. (I should upload a picture of a patina’d 32 ford sedan I just saw at a show-channeled, lowered to an inch of ground clearance, and NO floor. Tell me you’d ride in that! No track would ever let you race it, either.) I also see around here primered or flat finished simple 32 highboys, with, say, a flathead and gennie Ford wire wheels, and a Mexican blanket on the seat. THAT is what rat rods are supposed to be emulating.
Eample:
[edited-the third car on the page-the sedan with the organ pipe intake. The link only goes to the main page-sorry]
What is he trying for with that? What kind of intake is that? Who EVER ran a car like that in the 40s-50s? Looks like steampunk. I will give him credit-it obviously runs.
If you would call this a rat rod, I’m with you:
Flat black, wire wheels, bias ply tires, “left over” racing ident. A period-correct car. But most people wouldn’t call it a rat rod, I bet.
Bolding mine, quoted for truth! I had an early 70’s Duster with that engine, what a POS. I went to university with a couple brothers who were MOPAR-mad and with a lot of money. One had a 69 Barracuda convertible, the other a hemi Belvedere and a 440 Superbird.
And if they held on to them, they now have a lotta lotta money. I’m only a distant Mopar fan but drool drool drool…
I went to high school with the son of one of the biggest Chevy dealerships in the region. He drove a new Vette every three or four months and about every third one was a top-of-the-line model.
The classmate who had one of the only genuine 427 Z-28s ever built really pissed him off. 
(Me? All I had was a '68 Mustang. Still have it.)
Probably some semantics going on here. Yeah, I’ve seen the nuthin’-but-junk contenders. Yawn.
I think most who take pride in the rat rod label are closer to what I described - just as well-built as any hot rod, but using period-correct parts, a lot of re-engineering, and only minimal attention paid to body, paint and chrome.
One of these days someone’s going to enter a free-standing paint job, sans car. And win.
Passersby.
Well we picked up the car last week and it’s awesome.
We flew to New York then made our way over to Staten Island to the guy’s house. Super nice guy. We stayed at a crappy no-tell motel on Staten Island then drove over to NYC for some touristy things before the trip home. We had 3 days to kill because we couldn’t cross the border until Monday, so we put “forbid toll roads” into the GPS and did a backroads hick town tour of upper New York state. It was so much fun! Everywhere we went people looked and asked questions and some guy even offered my husband a beer “…since you drive a Mopar.”
We had zero problems crossing the US border and only a small snag at Canadian customs - they wanted to see the original eBay ad even though we didn’t buy it through eBay (my husband saw the ad and waited until the auction ended before contacting the guy privately.) Luckily he kept all his emails and could provide the guy’s eBay handle and they found the ad, I guess they keep an archive.
Anyway, I think this is going to be a fun hobby. I haven’t driven it yet, it’s going to take some getting used to because I drive a nice small Jeep Wrangler and this car is freakin’ huge compared to that.
Some people have memories or old dreams about all sorts of different cars. I long to buy and restore an old International Scout someday. Why? Because I wanted one for my first car and my parents talked me out of buying it. A friend’s brother bought one a few years later and we had great times in it.
So most people would disdain buying an old, underpowered, rust-prone, off-brand box on wheels, but it’s my “dream car”.
That’s not one I hear very often. a 225 Slant-Six with a Torqueflite is one of the legendary engine-transmission combinations of all time. And the Duster, a (also legendary) Chrysler A-body, was a POS? I hear that even less. Everybody hypes the big engine Mopars, but what you had is still a very desirable car. I’d buy that exact car tomorrow if I had the coin.
To be fair, it could have just been mine that was a POS. When it got cold outside (10 - 20F) it took ages to warm up. If you put it in drive too soon it would stall. There were signs, like foamy oil, that the engine hadn’t been looked after. It had no rust while I had it. Handling was about what you’d expect from an American car of that era.
“How tiny is your penis?” Just kidding. I don’t really ask questions, I just admire.
Legendary? Like the Vega aluminum 4 banger? like new Coke? That kind of legendary? Otherwise, no.
The torqueflight was a 904, not a 727. There is a difference. One is a classic performance tranny, one goes with sixes and 318s.
Dusters made cool pro stocks back in their day, but that was with a pro stock hemi and a lot of chassis work. But stock? Pu-leeze. I was there.
In their time, Dusters were boats. Heavy, no handling, no room for decent tires. Even with a 340 they were not comparable to a 'cuda/Challenger. And by the time they came out, the muscle car era was dying anyway. The 360 Dusters (and 'cudas, to be fair) were smog-motored dogs. They relied on decals and fond memories for sales. Nowadays they can be turned into nice bracket racers. Slip (OK, force:))a 383 in there and some wheel tubs, and you’re good to go.
As much as anything can be made to run well, with enough money, the slant-6 could be made to do something. There was a section in the Direct Connection catalog for sixes. It wasn’t very big.
But, as an every day motor? Well, it worked OK powering the green pea combine I used to drive. Didn’t break too often.
Around 1985-90 I read a hot rodding magazine article about the '60s big-block cars. They finally admitted that 427, 428, 440, 454, Hemi etc.-driven cars couldn’t go around corners to save their lives, however hellacious they sounded and did the straight-line thing. They were testing (IIRC) a 340 small-body Mopar from about 1969-70 and were amazed how well it handled, especially up against the Hemi GTX they were also testing.