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Jul 29, 2010 19:09:34 GMT
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But what is anyone doing about it apart from moaning ? We asked for help on here to keep the ACE site up and running recently ...
Luckily one of the guys from the VW scene has stepped forward . Us older guys are doing our best to protect YOUR future , several of us are primarily rodders so not as inward looking as many would believe.
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Last Edit: Jul 29, 2010 19:10:57 GMT by kapri
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Jul 29, 2010 19:16:14 GMT
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'enuff said
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Someone just shot the elephant in the room.
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Jul 29, 2010 19:16:43 GMT
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CCR.
Like Dez said, the inevitable path (unless something "is done", namely, a counter-"green"-revolution) is for contraband hotrods to be sold or scrapped out.
Just had a friend today who lives in the curse word-By-The-Gay (SF) whose nay-bore beotchlady called the Zoning Begleitkommando des Führers to have his Kellison Roadster project declared an eyesore and thus under orders to be eradicated.
So, after rescuing a rare rod from halfway across America, paying for it and paying for the towing, and then parking it up outside his shed, he had to grab a Sawzall and send it to the smelter or risk thousands of dollars of legal costs backed up by criminal charges if taken to the extreme of defiance.
So, that's what WILL happen, because it's happening already and has been for a while now.
You think SEMA cares? Or the big daddies in the equivalent EU .orgs? Nah, baby. They're going to "cookie-cutter" the hobby, with a combination of grandfathering of those paying "engineering report" costs and "handling fees", and new-build bodies-in-white with sealed and certified hybrid or electric "green" power cells.
That's where this is all going.
Unless we fight.
Together.
Hard.
And loudly.
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Team Blitz Ford Capri parts worldwide: Restoration, Road, or Race. Used, Repro, and NOS, ranging from scabby to perfect. Itching your Capri jones since 1979! Buy, sell, trade. www.teamblitz.com blitz@teamblitz.com
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swompz
Part of things
Posts: 18
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Jul 29, 2010 19:32:02 GMT
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This thread has struck a note with me & feel I need to put my two sense in. I am the next generation as far as the UK rodding scene go`s Ive been a part of it for last 6-7 years & am your average 30 year old bloke. there was a poll about members ages on the nsra message board month or so ago & it was round the late 40`s- 50`s mark. now its always going to be a point of controversy about rods not evolving what they should be etc, but to me at least you need to put it into perspective. The rodding scene fundamentally stemmed from lads coming back from the war with no jobs & little money looking for fun- enter cheap old cars "for there era" strap the fastest engine they could find in the rails & drag between lights .. So what makes a rod today?? well , any vehicle from 1930`s - 60`s modified beyond factory spec with the emphasis on speed.. after that it really is customs which is another argument. As previously commented its all relative, an st220 or new golf gti will curse word all over my pop , but that modern technology & billions of pounds in development. however my pop came from ford with a 10bhp side valve engine & top speed of 50 if you were lucky. & that was 54 years ago now its punting 180bhp & an extra 4 cylinders along with vastly improved handling. & thats for bout 8k & all done by my fair hands. every rod is unique & special to the people that built them. I love the scene if not all of its politics but I love planting the right foot on a straight empty road more.. theres allot more that could be said but thats a pint down the pub. on another note Q plate is bullet proof on a rod trust me.
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Jul 29, 2010 19:36:38 GMT
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Ace, you can decry moaning if you want. But really LOUD, really ANGRY moaning, really persistent moaning by way of VOTING and political agitation is the only way to reverse the slide.
I do transport lecturing too. Professionally for money. Founded organizations and directed them and their lobbying. I know whereof I speak.
This gets back to the 2-prong strategy I mentioned some months ago to you.
ACE do a nice job of playing the system you're stuck with to best advantage of the rodder, and I say, "Well done and jolly good show for Ace!" Most heartily.
But that's a game of backpeddling and stringing out the play for as long as possible until you're totally defeated in the end. A great delaying strategy, which is ABSOLUTELY valuable and critical. I toast Ace.
But Ace is not the answer to any sort of tidal reversal. You are playing at the bureaucratic level.
What is needed is the MISSING SECOND PRONG: A "Great Game" at the power political level.
I have had many British friends douse my hopes of a domestic ground swell of British political action by the largely unorganized and alienated "Men In Sheds" within the UK. Perhaps, no insult intended, it is simply not in the national character there to take to the streets by torchlight. That's your milieu.
All I know is this situation is going evermore GLOBAL, what with the EU, the UN, and climate treaties and the "buy-in" by the ruling classes around the world that "hey-hey/ho-ho gasoline and diesel have gotta go". And it all spins out of that pseudo-science, backed by manufacturers with a lot of money staked on obsoleting IC cars and flipping to a new model (and new profits).
The US hobbyist will not go quietly into the "night". But I never thought the UK hobbyist would either. I'm thinking I miscalculated, and I'm hoping I'm frickin utterly wrong.
You're not going to negotiate this. You're going to have to defeat it politically upfront and in their face. With lots of organized MOANING and what comes from vast numbers of MOANERS banded together into a counter-revolution.
Yeah.
Patrick Henry, George Washington, Martin Luther King, John Locke, Ghandi, and Lech Walensa - Moaners every one of them. Very EFFECTIVE moaners!
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Team Blitz Ford Capri parts worldwide: Restoration, Road, or Race. Used, Repro, and NOS, ranging from scabby to perfect. Itching your Capri jones since 1979! Buy, sell, trade. www.teamblitz.com blitz@teamblitz.com
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Jul 29, 2010 19:39:11 GMT
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But what is anyone doing about it apart from moaning ? We asked for help on here to keep the ACE site up and running recently ... Luckily one of the guys from the VW scene has stepped forward . Us older guys are doing our best to protect YOUR future , several of us are primarily rodders so not as inward looking as many would believe. Wind your neck in sunshine, I was referencing Average White Band song titles! The 'CCR', By The Way, is Credence Clearwater revival.
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Jul 29, 2010 20:07:19 GMT
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Didn't look like the Hot Rod scene had given up last time I went to Dunkin Donuts. Seems trad rods are in vogue at the moment,.. but then rodding always has a current trend and it is followed. The lack of younger people building rods is more of a financial issue I think rather than a lack of desire. The same thing is stopping younger people getting into the earlier aircooled VW stuff too. I think that having magazines to cover your scene and many supporting websites with a unified online presence the whole lot leads to a strengthening of what is going on. Just look at Sweden to see a thriving American car scene. All the usual anti-government types pop up every time in threads like this. Which is always interesting as the Germans have some serious rules around who and build what,.. but they seem to manage to have a thriving hot rod scene, just check out Bottrop Kustom Kulture : www.flickr.com/photos/stereomania/sets/72157624086493873/with/4673011740/Also I've always found the hot rod scene a bit impenitrable in the UK, all the NSRA, NASC, various clubs not liking each other, a scene heirachy, rules, rules, rules etc. .. basically it has isolated itself and is now a victim of its own isolation.
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Jul 29, 2010 20:16:00 GMT
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Making government serve the people is not anti-government. It is pro-citizen. I earn a fair wage working to influence and change government policy. That isn't "anti". That is "pro".
I haven't seen a peep of anti-government anarchism in this thread, Dave.
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Team Blitz Ford Capri parts worldwide: Restoration, Road, or Race. Used, Repro, and NOS, ranging from scabby to perfect. Itching your Capri jones since 1979! Buy, sell, trade. www.teamblitz.com blitz@teamblitz.com
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Jul 29, 2010 20:39:10 GMT
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Hotwire, I was speaking with German rodders on Friday and ,in the main ,they rely on the UK scene to keep going. Re rules and regs within rodding I hate to say it but I see the same thing evolving here already . It took a long time for rodders to turn into moaning old men, many on here are old before their time Amazo...nice attitude .
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Last Edit: Jul 29, 2010 20:49:25 GMT by kapri
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Jul 29, 2010 20:49:22 GMT
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If you persist in classing all those who wish to change the regulatory regime as "anti-government moaners" and pigeonhole them as nothing more and fail to lead them and fail to use their energies and voting franchise as tax-paying citizens to foist off the encroaching banishment of their cars, then, yes, you'll get no where.
And nowhere is a lousy place to be.
And another thing, I may be getting old. But there's more flame in just one of my rectal zephyrs than what is done all day long by any random dozen teenagers! ;D
We should all be working together - in that I completely agree with Dave about the poison of tribal isolation by many rodding clubs and orgs. You're right, HW. That's holding us back as a worldwide front as well as within each of our own homelands.
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Last Edit: Jul 29, 2010 20:54:46 GMT by Team Blitz
Team Blitz Ford Capri parts worldwide: Restoration, Road, or Race. Used, Repro, and NOS, ranging from scabby to perfect. Itching your Capri jones since 1979! Buy, sell, trade. www.teamblitz.com blitz@teamblitz.com
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Jul 29, 2010 20:50:45 GMT
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If anyone is thinking about starting rodding in the UK here is a useful link : Shopping Time
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Last Edit: Jul 29, 2010 20:52:30 GMT by HoTWire
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Jul 29, 2010 20:57:47 GMT
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Hotwire, I was speaking with German rodders on Friday and ,in the main ,they rely on the UK scene to keep going. In what way?? I would have thought that the best place for parts etc. would have been Scandinavia?
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Jul 29, 2010 21:41:39 GMT
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Hotwire you have PM
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Jul 29, 2010 23:21:45 GMT
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Please forgive my ignorance but i was under the impression that 'hot rodding' was about taking an old car and fitting modern parts to it, ie engine, suspension, brakes etc! This is still being done aplenty today and one quick look through the forum pages here will show you how many people are doing it. In the 40/50's they didn't produce the quantity of cars they do today so its inevitable its going to get harder to pick up these cars, certainly for a 'fun' budget. Hot Rodding of what I'm aware of is still more than going, its just evolving as does everything in life. I've been in autogass racing for 15 years and have seen classes using solely mini's have to introduce newer model cars due to the lack of mini's available. The exact same is happening with the rodding scene. Is a 70/80s vauxhall with a Redtop and modern brakes and suspension not a hot rod?? Its faster, handles better and stops quicker than it ever would of coming out of the factory. IMO too much branding is used today and if a car doesn't look like a 32 Ford etc its not a hot rod. I don't mean its only cars that get branded but its just relevant to the topic Only my thoughts but thought i'd share them
Matt
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Jul 29, 2010 23:47:11 GMT
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^^ Intresting observation. could be intresting to see where this thread takes us. You were so right there Mork.... one of the most interesting threads on the board for a while. I've nothing to add really, except that if you believe that hotrodding is really all about taking a cheap car and sticking a hot engine into it, then it's still very much alive and kicking.... as Matt and others said before. The fact that the 'old guard' refuses to recognise it, says to me that there's a hidden agenda going on somewhere. For Norm's battlecry to be heard it would need all the different factions to come together if it's going to be an effective campaign, but I can't see that happening in the near future..... and in the longer term it may all be too late.
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Last Edit: Jul 29, 2010 23:48:46 GMT by arrocuda
'71 Arrocuda.... '71 Sunbeam Rapier Turbo (The Grim Rapier).... '63 Hymek D7076..... Audi GT5S
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Matt, that's cool. Speaking only for myself, I have a less parochial view of hotrodding. It consists to me, of putting any motor in anything, of altering factory-built anything into anything else of any year, updating or backdating any component. A 502 BB Chevy into a 2010 VW, yep, hotrodding. A 2010 VW 4-banger into a '64 Corvair, yep, hotrodding.
Not hung up.
On.
Definitions about "hotrod" or "hotrodding".
That's a nice sidebar. Meantime, we're losing the right.
Big crowds at car shows? Means nothing as to whether the HOBBY of building them is sustainable. The Carnegie Hall of Dinosaurs gets sold-out crowds too! And it's been a WHILE since the Cretaceous (70 milion plus years!) built any Velociraptors.
Same with WW2 air shows...
Same with Auto Union GP racers....
Crowds? Participants? Evidence of nothing in this context, except people want to SEE and DO something. But once it gets outlawed, like gladiatorial combat and human sacrifice (which was once also popular), it's gone. ;D
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Team Blitz Ford Capri parts worldwide: Restoration, Road, or Race. Used, Repro, and NOS, ranging from scabby to perfect. Itching your Capri jones since 1979! Buy, sell, trade. www.teamblitz.com blitz@teamblitz.com
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Last Edit: Jul 30, 2010 7:51:06 GMT by Deleted
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dan
Part of things
Posts: 589
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Jul 30, 2010 11:44:21 GMT
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Stu_B
Posted a lot
Investing in rust!
Posts: 1,266
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Jul 30, 2010 11:51:23 GMT
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Oh yeah, the spirit of hot rodding is still alive in young modifiers, just that the cars chosen will never be hotrods but they will be hotrodded That is all that needs to be said. You can modify the hell out of any car but unless it's a sedan, coupe or roadster from pre 50's it'll never be a hotrod.
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Jul 30, 2010 12:07:51 GMT
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That is all that needs to be said. You can modify the hell out of any car but unless it's a sedan, coupe or roadster from pre 50's it'll never be a hotrod. With regard to the pre-49 rule, is it actual build of pre -49, or introduction of that model, e.g a Riley RM (built '46-'55) which would look great as a rod.
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