Friday, October 30, 2009

$25,000 Rat Rod?

This "Rat Rod" model A sedan named "Rod Zombie" sold recently for $25,000. You heard me right! Not $5000, $2500, or even $15,000.... Twenty Five Thousand Dollars (US Dollars at that!)

I was blown out of my seat as read this. Not even a vintage power plant, it's a TWIN TURBO Vortec 350ci, which I guess some might feel is super bad ass, but what's the point of trying to carry on a vintage theme on a car with such a modern power plant?

You can see the complete listing HERE from the Hub Garage sold listings.

Patch Concept renderings




This is in the works for some patches. Since I was a kid growing up in the 70's I had a few jean jackets that were covered in patches that good ol Mom used to sew to it. When ever we'd travel anywhere I was sure to pick out a patch that either showed where I had been or represented that place and time, and on the jacket it would go.

As I grew up that same mentality then transfered to tattoos. Unfortunately, I don't have the dough to get tattooed everywhere I travel! I wish I did. But I still often buy patches whenever I go anywhere. It's kind of a sickness, like all my sicknesses that need to be fed.

3 Patch concepts:


Thursday, October 29, 2009

Linking up!

Man, I'm terrible at updating. I had a bit of down time to do some links up. I know there are a ton of folks out there who asked for a link and I can't recall who you were in my geezer old age! Please give me a shout at the email addy:

carter.fine.art@gmail.com

Remind me again and I swear I'll do something about it provided that you have a banner already made up!

Keven @ Car-N-Art

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Hot Rod Leather

I got a small package from Eric at Hot Rod Leather today (I'm always happy to get brown paper packages tied up in strings!) Inside I found a Hot Rod Leather T-shirt and a few key fobs, all with the two different logos I designed! This is really only a small sample of the awesomeness that is Hot Rod Leather. The products are outstanding and you'd be proud to put them on any car. check out Hot Rod Leather!







Hot Rod Leather Apron! Me wants!




















Black and red Key Fob

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Rods-N-Kustoms

Steve from Volksrods.com hit me up for something brand new with the volksrods world. Rods-N-Kustoms is bringing the two worlds together, European and good old American automobiles. Why should they be separate anyway? So, in commemoration of the brand I got the honor of doing up a logo and T-shirt design.



































































Think of this as a "sneak peak". I'll keep you updated when they are up for sale.

Monday, October 19, 2009

You want a coupe, but got a sedan....

I was sent this link by my friend Nico in Geneva and I was completely blown away.

BEFORE:

























You start with a 1934 "Mordor" Sedan and end with a chopped '34 5 window coupe!

AFTER:


















See everything in between by heading to The Cheaters Geneva! I think you'll be blown away at the succession of photos and what one will do to get the Hot Rod he wants!

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Major Award! (thank you!)























Look what popped up in the mail box today! No, not the famous leg lamp major award from Christmas Story, but a custom metal pinstripe in 3D from ACME Speed Shop as a thank you for being a contributing artist!

I'm really impressed! Now you gotta help me out and buy something.


Monday, October 12, 2009

600+ miles

I had no idea what it was going to be like driving 8 hours in the rain at highway speeds in the old Ford. I found out quickly the limitations and a whole set of new issues with the car. The windshield cracked on me right before heading out the door. The I noticed a leak in the rubber surround which left my foot soaked for the whole trip. I lost a beauty ring while cornering onto the highway and nearly missing a semi truck. I broke a lake pipe mount and lost something from the underside of the car as I was nearing home as it was skipping down the freeway shooting sparks.

All in all, outside of the freezing temps at this years Hunnert Car Pile-Up, it was a fun trip for all of us. I didn't go to be a vender, just a spectator this time. I kinda needed the vacation to say the least. Now, it's back to work.

Speaking of work, I wanted to shoot a note to tell everyone that the ACME Speed Shop is now open for business online. You can pick up one of my ACME "Bomb Shop" logo shirts (as seen on the young gent below) from them! The back design of the 36 Ford 3-window will be a later release.






















ACME SPEED SHOP was born from my passion for hot rods, customs & automotive art.

We have a small area tucked away in the back corner of our sign shop where we work on our cars. We’re by no means professional builders; just do what we can, with the time, tools and experience we have. Although we have a few nice cars between us, it has always been “just for fun”.

Starting a company based on automotive inspired clothing and art was not what we set out to do. We just wanted a couple of cool t-shirts for us and some friends. Somewhere along the way the idea to make a simple shop t-shirt grew into what is now Acme Speed Shop.

We will be featuring the art of many well known artists on our custom designed clothing. New designs will be added often and we have a lot more up our sleeves (pun intended). Please read the bios of the artists and check out their websites too.

BUY ART. It’s good for you.






































Friday, October 2, 2009

2 years in the making: The Old Ford GOES!
























I know some wait a life time to get their dreams rolling, so I shouldn't complain. But two years ago my car pretty much went off the road other than short trips to shows around the Detroit area and now it is finally embarking on a long journey!

The '49 Ford that I pretty much refer to as 'the Ford' went off the road in the fall of 2007 to be converted from 6v to 12v. Among other changes: 4 barrel carb switched for 2 Stromberg 97's and a new fuel tank, new Mallory duel point distributor, electric fuel pump and wipers. The car was fairly stock when it came down to it. In fact I went out of my way to switch the wheels and tires back to the stock size around the same time.

I'm no wiring guru. In fact, I'm just the opposite. I can easily screw up wiring so I took it into a Hotrod shop in town to do that for me. Sometimes even the best of the best can make mistakes. After the switches were made, there was a bog in the engine which happened when the car got up to operating temp of 180ยบ. While it was there some of the above mentioned changes occurred as well.

After long periods of trying to tune the engine from both a fuel and ignition stand point, the mechanic kinda threw his arms up at it and suggested that I had some tired rings and pistons. So a year later the engine came out for a full rebuild along with the trans.




























The flathead was torn down to a bare block to be built from the ground up. The trans was rebuilt too in the same respect. Months later when it was all fresh and ready to go back in, bigger and better than before (4" Merc crank and 3 5/16" bore, taking this flaty to 275 ci) the bogging still remained.

To make a long story a bit shorter, a new wiring harness was put in along with rebuilt carbs, a different coil was swapped, new solenoid, new keyed ignition, geeze, everything electrical that you can imagine. The last step was to replace the 2nd electrical Mallory distributor that was swapped for the duel point Mallory. When the new distributor showed up in the mail I noticed that the shaft didn't have a hole drilled in it for the distributor gear. I riffled through the paper work to find out what size it needed to be, or if there should have been one in there in the first place and some Chinese dude took a nap when this one came down the line.

Nothing in the paper work says that you need to drill a hole to put it on, but it's obvious that the pin needs to go through a whole to hold it in place. But, there was a cheesy zerox'd half sheet with flathead directions on it. The directions explained that it's required to lop off the long end of the distributor after the gear. At this time I glanced over at the dual point and the borrowed electric mallory distributors and noticed that neither of them had been cut as the directions had stated.

None of my buddies who make there living as mechanics thought this would make a difference since the distributors had the clearance to fit in the timing plate and there wasn't a good explanation as to why this would change things. But at this point there wasn't a good explanation of why the damn car wouldn't run like a bat out of hell!

Last night the new electric Mallory, sans the extra length of shaft was dropped in and timed out properly. It wasn't long before heading down the road where the normal bog would happen at certain RPM's and speeds. After two years of driving around the car I knew exactly how it behaved and where the bog began and ended.

Well, no bog....

We all still don't know if it's an electrical problem with the engine ground interacting with the charge of the distributor or if it's oil pressure building up behind the gear pushing it away from the engine.

Lessons learned:
1) Always read all the instructions
2) Just because experts have years of experience, doesn't mean they don't make mistakes.
3) Don't give up and drop a small block in after 2 years of dicking around trying to get it going.