ometime in the mid ’60s, Tommy Hrones took a call at his Oakland, California, paint shop. By then he was celebrated in motoring circles as “Tommy The Greek” and his palette of subtle and scintillating scallops, slick lines, and teardrop signatures were defining accents on hundreds of show cars, customs, street and strip hot rods.

The caller said he was with GM Design, and they wanted Tommy to come to Detroit and discuss accents and styling.

The prankster kicked in: “Who’s calling?” “What?” “Where are you calling from?” “Hold on.” “Who’s this?”

“GM in Detroit. Detroit, Michigan.‘’

“Detroit. Does it snow there?”

“Yes, it does.”

“I ain’t goin’.”

ork continues at Ironworks Speed and Kustom (ISK) on Danny Schaffer’s ’57 Ford Ranch Wagon. The interior of this car has been completely redesigned—from the custom headliner to the numerous CNC-machined components on the dash, doors, and console that are unique but made to have an OEM character. Rodger Lee, the proprietor of ISK, wanted to model the interior styling after a ’60 Ford Thunderbird, an idea inspired years ago by Fat Jack Robinson. While a few Thunderbird components were used, most of the interior was fabricated from scratch, with Tavis Highlander, from Highlander Concept Rendering, making dozens of sketches for details, large and small, before the fabrication commenced. This design utilizes bucket seats both front and back. ISK makes extensive use of 3-D printing to check the fit and style of components before committing to carving them from metal. They will commonly scan a section of the car before the components are designed to ensure precise fitment.

A Roadster Shop chassis was commissioned for the Ranch Wagon, fitted with a Ford 9-inch rearend, a supercharged Ford G.T. 500 5.4L crate engine, and Ford 4R70W transmission. Wilwood brake components are used, and a Woodward power steering rack complements the Roadster Shop–designed independent front suspension.

They started with a car in very good condition, but on any car that’s over 60 years old you can expect to find some rust damage and minor body damage. The ISK crew replaced the entire floor, the rocker panels, built a new firewall, and fabricated new patch panels wherever needed. After all the repairs, they straightened every panel to perfection and adjusted the door, hood, and tailgate gaps to precise tolerances.

hen it comes to building a traditional A/V-8 highboy roadster, one of the most challenging aspects can be modifying the ’32 Ford’s framerails to fit the body of the ’28-29 Model A. Where the flat Model A frame left a lot to be desired, the Deuce chassis has much more shape, carefully following the bottom of the body with sweeping kickups at both ends. This shape that makes the ’32 frame much more attractive, also contributes to the difficulties one faces when adapting to an early body. Not only does the rear kickup interfere with the flat floor of the Model A, but the shape of the two bodies is quite different in the passenger compartment and cowl area, requiring a rework of the shape of the perimeter framerails in the form of a pinch or two. But this work is not all for naught, for the resulting modified Deuce chassis makes for a more solid foundation and a much more attractive chassis when compared to the spindly Model A ladder frame.

With a handful of classic truck and muscle car builds under his belt, Jason Scudellari decided it was high time to build himself a legit hot rod. And by that we mean the only car truly deserving of the term: an open-wheeled, highboy roadster. Not wanting to spend half his remaining adult life repairing an original Henry Ford body, Scudellari rang the good folks at Brookville Roadster and ordered one of their all-steel ’29 Ford roadster bodies. Following that call, Speedway Motors was given a bell, resulting in a parts list that would include a pair of their ’32 Ford framerails, full-length boxing plates, dropped front crossmember, and tubular crossmember kit. This provided a solid foundation upon which Scudellari could start his hot rod build, but after some quick mock-up work he soon realized that it might make more sense to take his chassis components to a shop better equipped to build frames from scratch. Enter the gang at Old Anvil Speed Shop.

Having the ability to fabricate a chassis in a precise manner requires a specific combination of skill and equipment, something Old Anvil has in spades. The guys know what it takes to put together a hot rod, so they immediately set their sights on Scudellari’s roadster body so that it could be dimensioned, the overall shape noted, and the body mount locations plotted out. These specs were then transferred to a sheet of 1-inch plywood, which will act as a template as the framerails are modified. Armed with this information, the Old Anvil crew started fabricating not only the chassis, but a new chassis jig that will serve to locate future A/V-8 builds as well. As each section was heated, tweaked, and modified to better fit the confines of the ’29 body, uprights were added to the chassis table to keep things locked in place. The result is a chassis that has literally been built to suit Scudellari’s roadster in an extremely accurate manner.

or reasons that aren’t entirely clear, General Motors has never seen fit to use all the letters in the alphabet to identify the various designs of their cars. Take A-bodies as an example. The letter A was used to identify specific chassis platforms as far back as 1926 and continued through 1958. In 1982 GM introduced another round of A-bodies that were front-wheel drive, but the A-bodies that we are interested in are those that were produced from 1964-72.

Absent from the scene since 1959, GM revived the A-body designation in 1964 to identify the all-new, intermediate-sized, rear-wheel drive platform lineup that included the Chevrolet Chevelle (including the El Camino), Monte Carlo, Buick Special, Oldsmobile Cutlass, and Pontiac Tempest. All these cars used a perimeter frame, conventional front suspension with unequal-length front control coil springs, and tube shocks. In the rear, all used a four-link suspension system with coil springs and tube shocks. All A-body cars had a 115-inch wheelbase except the station wagons that were stretched to 120 inches.

Compared to the excesses of the previous decade, the ’64-72 GM A-body lineups were classic examples of simple and clean automotive styling. From a performance standpoint there were a variety of high-horsepower options that would shove passengers back in their seats. Even by contemporary standards these cars had it all, with one glaring exception, when spirited cornering is involved it’s obvious handling was not one of their positive traits. Arguably one of the reasons that many cars of the that era had handling deficiencies could be blamed on the tires of the time, but the suspension could benefit from help as well and it’s readily available from Aldan American.

avid Goodwin and the team at MetalWorks Speed Shop in Eugene, Oregon, are putting together one very tasteful, Pro Touring–style ’55 Chevy hardtop. Like most top-shelf hot rods, this one does a fine job of hiding all the cool fabrication, making it look like the car could have been built this way in 1955

He has had a string of cool cars since the ’60s, so he has learned there is no better money spent than on the original car. Paying a bit more up front for a good example saves you money in the end and leads to a better finished product. Armed with that wisdom, he found a good example of a ’55 Chevrolet Bel Air hardtop. While the car was not a 100-point restoration, it was a good, solid start.

First, team MetalWorks rolled the original chassis out from under the car and the Art Morrison Enterprises GT Sport chassis was rolled into place. Four-wheel independent suspension, Wilwood Pro-II disc brakes, and Flaming River rack-and-pinion steering are just some of the highlights under the car. It is obvious from these specs that Goodwin enjoys spirited performance. One of his past cars was a ’67 427 Corvette. Once you’ve had a 427 you never get over it. Goodwin thought another 427 would be perfect for his latest project, but this time it would be 427 inches wrapped in a tighter and lighter package, namely a modern small-block LS3.

mericans, and I suppose hot rodders, fall into this category of not being fans of ties. We like winners and we like a clear distinction … he (or she) won, he (or she) didn’t. Now, that brings up a whole other category of “participation trophies” to assuage the wounded egos but that too is a story for another story. In going back through history of some of the major shows we find that the preeminent show of all—the Grand National Roadster Show with its nearly 10-foot-tall perpetual trophy for America’s Most Beautiful Roadster—has had two ties in its storied history.

Winning twice is cool but tying, as I said earlier, is not cool. Hot rodders do not like ties. It’s possible in professional sports here in America to end up with ties but achieving it is a massive undertaking as the rules are set up to prevent ties. We like a clear and distinct winner in our sports, whether we watch on TV or at the local fairground. Having said this there have been ties in professional baseball (2016 was the last time and that was the result of Mother Nature and a forceful downpour), football (29 ties since 1974), hockey (none since the inception of the “shootout” in 2005-2006 to decide tie games), but not in professional basketball. One might consider basketball as the “purest” of all sports, making sure everyone goes home knowing who won and who lost.