It's Go Time!!

It's the beginning of June so we thought it might be time to get out on Saturday Nite. So we took a ride to Millers Dog-n-Suds in Fox Lake. This place is like a time machine. The same family has owned this place since 1967 everything like the drive up speakers, canopy and the grounds are meticulously maintained and kept clean. hand painted signs for the menus and specials all add to the cool factor of this place.A great collection of cars showed up Saturday nite. Quality stuff. Check out the pictures! We also hit the new Superdawg in Wheeling but i forgot to snap a few shots of the place. More later.

Updates to the wagon queen family truckster

This past winter the wagon got a chassis update. After the last few seasons of struggling to find a setup to get down the racetrack. Somehow we had lost about 4 tenths overall and could not find what was wrong. We changed torque converters, Changed springs and ride heights. We changed front suspension travel heights, tire pressures. Carb setups bigger hoodscoops. all to no avail. We gained nothing. In fact as we found more power the car would slow even more. This also led to inconsistant reaction times which meant we lost a lot of races. We haven't had a good run in two seasons. Very disapointing to say the least. After some disscussion with people who know more than me. It was decided that the chassis that was put under it about 20 years ago just might be the culprit. I bought an Adjustable 4 link setup with a torsion bar from Autofab. This a company that John at Rocket Racing has been using for his chassis parts for a while now. When the stuff arrived i was not disapointed. Everything is first class. Before we could install the system we needed to install a set of solid steel body bushings. This means the body must come off the frame. Problem is the body hasn't been off the frame since 1972. This was by far the worst most labor intensive job i have ever done to a car. 4 solid 20 hr days with sometimes 4 guy's working on the car is what it took to complete the job. It's finished now. just needs a little TLC and a few hours going through nuts and bolts and we are ready to test. If everything goes right i should finally get a 10 second time slip. It took almost 25 years and  a whole bunch of people to get this far. I will post results later.

The Search for a Good Time

The question had been raised several times over the past few seasons. This time we found the answer. Years ago the drive-in was the place to be on a Friday or Saturday nite. There was always plenty of action. Some was a little shady. For the most part it was good clean fun. Alot of you guy's remember Crusier's Drive-in, Strats(which became legendary) Swoony's, Skipper's, Bopper's, Flukey's and The Frosted Mug. All had a different crowd hanging at each one which meant different cars. None of these places i mentioned above where as famous as Duke's Drive-in. Thoughout the 80's and early 90's these where the places to be. Then it all came to a stop like someone turned out a light. The drive-in's started closing up. People got married, had children, moved away or moved on to something else. Then all the towns that used to write 10 dollar tickets for loitering and chased hot rodders out. All of the sudden accepted the car crowd with open arms. These show's where fun at first but then i noticed that most of these guy's wanted nothing to do with cruising or even going to two show's a nite. They also pack up and leave before the sun goes down. Don't make any sense to me. I came up with the name "lawn chair jockey's" to name these guy's. So between the jockey's and the yuppies with double wide strollers and their undisiplined dogs and guy's that seem to think that brand new Mustang's and Corvettes should be able to participate in a "classic car" show. These shows started to become a drag. So the question was raised "are there still Drive-in shows" If so are some of the old haunts still around? The answer is YES!!One Saturday nite a bunch of us took a ride to Dukes Drive-in. When we got there we knew right away that nothing had changed! The place was packed! Check out the pictures. Later in the summer we hit a few more places some where good others not so much. Miller's Dog-n-Suds in Fox Lake was a good one that we will be returning too. Swoony's is still going although the crowd has changed a bit. This year we will be hitting a few more. Stay posted here for a complete list of where we are going a little later.

More Pics from July 3, 2011

More Pics from July 3 2011

The Edgewood Ave Festival of Independence. 2011

Some Pictures from the 2011 edition of The Edgewoood Ave. Festival Of Independence. This years show will happen on Tuesday July 3. Show Car parking will begin at 5PM. We have a DJ coming in this year for our musical entertainment. We are changing a few things for this years show. You will be receiving an Invite to show your car. I have a number of cars in mind. This will help keep everything under control as we are limited on space and i would like to keep my show from being a "used car lot" Hope everyone can understand this. My friend Eric Vanberkem has been enlisted to cook for us. That is not set in stone yet. Stay tuned for more details.

World of Wheels 2012

World of Wheels was a little disapointing in my opinion this year. I thought that car count was down a little bit. No doubt the high price of travel may have something to do with it. What was there was of the highest quality. Although I lean toward more traditional styled cars, I have a huge respect for the Ridler type cars because of the craftsmenship and attention to detail. Here are some pictures of some of my favorites. I hope next year the show is better.