first timers

  A sure way to introduce a young guy to the hotrodder hobby is to give him a ride in a quick car for the first time. The memory and experience of my first ride I will never forget. I was about 15 and my family and I were out in Calgary visiting some friends. My buddy was about 17 and had participated in the Calgary high school drags with his 78 Mustang II.  It wasn't brutally fast but it was just plain brutal. It was really high in the back with big tires and looked really mean. It had a homebuilt 302 with a 4 speed manual tranny and full length headers that had the mufflers welded to the collectors and no tailpipes. It was very loud inside and outside the car. When we pulled on to the pavement he punched the throttle and the tires blazed as he powershifted through the gears. Every Shift would bark the tires and rock the car sideways. I was hooked at that moment and I began my search for a mustang. I found lots of mustangs over the next couple years but they never seemed to turn up when I had any money. Back then around 1993 - 1995, muscle cars were still seen occasionally for pretty cheap.  70's and 80's malibu's and camaro's were cheap and plentiful and the chevy s-10 V8 swap was very popular.  When I turned 16 in 1993 my first car was a 79 chrysler cordoba that i picked up for $200.  It had a strong 360 and my first mods were a pair of ET aluminum wheels for the back, some lift shackles for the rear leaf springs and a loud muffler. Then I took my dad's plasma cutter to the air cleaner housing and cut off the outer edges to make it into an open element style. I painted the air cleaner lid black and got some big gold maibox number stickers "360" to stick on the lid.  With all my high performance modifications the car still had highway gears and was a total slug. I eventually found that if i put a visegrip on the rear brake hose I could do pretty good burnouts with only the front brakes applied.  After I had about $800 soaked into that car I sold it to a buddy for $300 and he drove it for a few years. On average it was one of my better investments. I don't think I've lost that little of money on any cars since!  My first few cars were all terribly slow pieces of junk. I had an 80 malibu and an 80 Lemans that i wish i had kept. The first time I did a donut was with the Lemans. I noticed that it got lower in the back after every donut as the hockey pucks flew out of the coil springs. The previous owner had wedged hockey pucks between the coils to jack up the back of the car!
   Now that i have been enjoying the hobby for a few years and learned alot of exspensive lessons I like to take guys for their first rides. Who knows, I might be starting the next Don Garlitts or John Force on his way to stardom!  One of my favorite tricks for rides is to put the car in first gear and drive along at just the right rpm for the engine to enter its sweet spot. Then when the guy if half way through telling me about how he can't find his seat belt, hit the throttle hard and glance over and see him hanging on for dear life with a big goofy grin on his face!  A couple days later this guy will be calling to see where he should start looking to find a good big block core!  So this summer I want to encourage you to give lots of rides to first timers to help them see the fun side of the hobby. And if you are looking to get into the hobby I highly recomend begging for a ride in the quickest car you can find at the first car show you go to.  Oh, and one more thing, If you get a ride and the driver just idles around and doesn't let you feel the power, stay away from him, he's a poser. (see previous posts for poser identification). Thats all for today and please feel free to comment using the little white envelopes at the bottom of the posts or become a follower. As you can see i'm allready up to two followers but one is my wife so she doesn't count!