Ryan Cochran is the owner, founder, and sole proprietor of The Jalopy Journal and the Hokey Ass Message Board, or HAMB, a thriving Internet bulletin board dedicated to the gospel of traditional old school rods and customs. At 28 years old, Ryan has become something of an Internet icon, with thousands of gearheads around the world logging onto his site daily to get their latest dose of info, gossip, and tech advice. In fact, Young Guns is not the first group to recognize Ryan for his contribution to the hot rod world. The Kustoms of America recently gave him the KOA Lifestyle Award, which recognizes individuals who are working to improve the hobby and further the traditional custom way of life.
When we first read the spec sheet Ryan sent in on his car, we were rolling on the floor laughing, so rather than trying to interpret the info, we thought you might enjoy reading exactly what he wrote. Here's an excerpt:
Make of car: FordYear: '38Model: Deluxe CoupeCost to build your car: More than a deuce grille shell on eBay, less than a large bar of gold liberated from South American mountains.
How often is car driven: The car is driven rain or shine, but not when it's too rainy or the sun is too hot. And never on the anniversary of Hank William's death
Frame: Special TCI frame using space age titanium originally created for the Gemini program and later declassified for my use.
Make & year of rearend/suspension: An Art Morrison triangulated four-bar using steel cut from the chassis of the Mysterion and machined by an Amish man named Peter on a lathe turned by the legs of his wife Mary. The Strange 9-inch is hung by coilovers with emotional issues.
Make & year of frontend/suspension: Front suspension is an owner-fabbed Mustang II using control arms that were blessed by a Russian medium channeling the spirits of Joey Ramone at his grave site in New York. Car is sprung with Firestone airbags that were cured in a mixture of monkey blood and olive oil for 10 years while sealed in a container and buried next to my dog Jean Pierre.
Brakes: All four wheels come to a screeching halt via Willwood discs brakes-rotors turned by Germ himself.
Wheels & Tires: Hurst cheater slicks (I cheat better than anyone) spinning on 15x8 rears. Firestone fronts on 15x5s once used on the set of the musical Oklahoma!
Engine details: Race-bred Rehyer Morrison 424ci small-block Chevy used by Dale Earnhardt when NASCAR (they almost cheat as well as I do) fixed Daytona a couple years back. Detuned for the street.
Transmission: Muncie four-speed taken out of a wrecked '65 Vette found on the far side of dead man's curve.
Body: Stock Henry Ford (Monogrammed HF on the left chest) stolen in 1946, but recovered in 1998.
Paint: Bob's Big Boy black lacquer sprayed by a young Catholic girl in the '40s.
Interior details: Gangster pinstriped mohair with dash insert carved from Jim Morrison's thigh bone. Stewart-Warner gauges.
Misc. Details: Nothing special. Just a bare bones hot rod built to go fast and catch chicks. It worked, too. I got a girl to say yes in the passenger seat. Marcie and I got married in December...
As the official November Young Gun of the Month, Ryan will receive a $400 gift certificate redeemable with this month's sponsor, Wescott's Auto Restyling. With an entire catalog full of body panels, parts, and accessories, we're sure Ryan can find something he can use to spruce up his bitchin' fat-fendered flyer. Congratulations, Ryan, and thanks again for building such a cool place to hang out!
Young Guns
Monkey See, Monkey Do
As I write this, the horrible abomination of a supposed "car movie," 2Fast2Furious, is finally leaving theaters. Hopefully it's going straight to video-rental hell, where it can rot for eternity next to Mariah Carey's Glitter. Why so angry over a stupid movie, you ask? Because every time one of these flicks comes out that showcase teenybopper wannabes shooting around town in raced-out rice rockets, a wave of imitation usually follows, accompanied by a significant increase in drag racing-related fatalities. According to a friend of mine who works for one of the major parts warehouses, when each of the two Furious movies came out, nitrous system sales nearly tripled for several months.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of drag racing. In fact, I used to do a fair amount of street racing when I was in high school, until I wrecked my precious ride and ended up working as an indentured servant at a body shop for a year in order to get my car repaired. However, the current illegal import street racing boom and the violence and carnage that accompany it are starting to take a serious toll here in California, where new laws have been passed that not only make street racing a felony, but also empower the police to take your car away forever if you get caught. You heard me right, folks, if you get nabbed street racing, they take your ride away and sell it. While this is a pretty aggressive tactic by John Law, chances are things aren't that far behind where you live. And, to tell you the truth, I can't really blame the police for what they're doing. Street racing has been going on for decades in hot rod circles, but tales of people dying and taking out innocent pedestrians are virtually unheard of. Traditionally, we have always been very careful about where and how we race, always scouting out abandoned roads where nobody can interfere with a little friendly competition. We love and respect our cars, usually taking extra care to make them not only fast but beautiful as well, and the desire to preserve our precious paint jobs is nearly as strong as the need for speed, making the action usually relatively tame and under control.
In contrast, this new breed of wannabe rice rocket racers has no concept of how or where to race, and they're becoming a menace. Nearly every night on the news I hear about some new idiot who lost control in a race and ran into another car or a stationary object. Of course, virtually none of these incidents involves early American iron. So why should we vintage tin aficionados care about what the "other" crowd is doing? Because in the eyes of the public, car guys are car guys, and there is virtually no difference between a slammed Honda and a black primer Shoebox. The people who make public policy detect a problem, and more and more rules are being passed every day that affect us just as much as the ricers. Luckily, there is something we can do.
The main reason young kids are emulating stuff like 2Fast2Furious is because "the scene" looks cool, the cars are flashy, and it's right in front of them where they can notice it. One of the most positive things to happen to the rod and custom hobby in the past few decades is the current nostalgia craze, which has influenced scores of hot rod clubs full of young people to crop up all over the country. These clubs are packed full of cool cats with killer pompadours and cuffed jeans who drive period-perfect traditional rides that haul ass and look cool doin' it. In fact, the vast majority of Young Guns members own traditional cars, either for aesthetic or financial reasons. Our "scene" is a heck of a lot cooler than what's happening with the import crowd, but most of America doesn't get to see it. What we need to do is make our cars and our clubs more visible to the public eye, and hopefully, reel in some fresh blood away from the import crowd in the process. Does that mean we'll also attract some wannabes and posers? Probably, but that is a risk we'll just have to take if want to preserve what precious little freedom we have left on the roads of this nation.
So how do we do it? Well, take a look at the Shifters car club, for example. While membership to the club is very exclusive, events they put on, such as the Anti-Blessing and Viva Las Vegas (VLV), draw thousands of people and lots of public attention, most of it good. The locals like shows like these because they give them something to do and bring in money for the local economy, and young people visiting the show get a taste of the hot rod lifestyle. The only danger are squirrels misbehaving on the roads and parking lots near the show, hooking doughnuts and burning rubber, which tends to freak civilians out. As fun as that stuff is, it should be saved for less public forums. The best way for your club to turn a local show into the next VLV is with a little planning. Book a few interesting attractions such as pinstripers and a band. Place a couple of polite calls to the local newspaper and TV station, and distribute flyers at all the local gathering points for young people, rather than limiting yourself to speed shops and the normal car show promotion sites. Most importantly, be tolerant when some newbie who has never seen a pre-war car before asks if you're running "NOS" or wants to know how fast your car runs. We have to be ambassadors for the hobby if we want this thing of ours to prosper, so let's show the public that we're really all about having fun and crafting rolling pieces of metal art, rather than racing around and causing trouble.
Man, the past really does have a tendency to repeat itself. From the tone of that last paragraph, this might as well be 1955 all over again. Kinda cool, ain't it? -Dan
Dan.Kahn@primedia.com