7/14/05
CONNECTING
R.O.D.S. NEWSLETTER
MEMBER
CLUB
2005
#3 NSRA
- GOODGUYS - SSRA
The Connecting R.O.D.S. newsletter,
is sponsored by the Ramblin Oldies of Denham
Springs, Inc. to promote street rodding and the
construction and preservation of pre 1949 street rods. Articles do not necessarily reflect the
opinions of the R.O.D.S. members or its officers. Classified ads are free of charge: R.O.D.S., P.O. Box #61, Denham Springs, La.
70727 or call (club secretary) Bobby Spann at (225)275-9868/E-mail:
bobbyspann@aol.com
Shop
Tours
One pastime I enjoy is checking out other Streetrodder's garages for inspiration and ideas -
especially since they are all nicer than mine!
In April Doug Schaubhut, Bruce
Broussard and I went down to Jimmy Meyer's “Industrial Fabrication
and Machining” in Harvey. I never saw so
many HUGE tools. There was a drag car
chassis on the fab table and a Peterbuilt
RV project sitting outside! In the
rafters was a Model A roadster pickup waiting to go on
some pinched ‘32 rails. Too cool. Check out
the pic of his cab over car hauler at the Nats in this month’s StreetScene!
The very next day I was at GVS Racing to
visit Joel Hedrick. He had a
customer's '55 Chevy pickup in for some chassis work, but my eyes were drawn to
his 1946 Ford convertible. Sitting on a
custom chassis with airbags and a new Ford SVO engine... wow! The top is chopped 2" and the hood pie
cut. Made me want to go work on my dad's
'46 Ford Coupe!
At the last RODS club meeting I took the
time to study Doug Miller's awesome shop up close. Big screen TV with surround sound, a dozen
motorcycles, hot rods, collector cars and neon everywhere... plus that Teracotta floor the club painted; you can’t get much better
than that!
On a smaller scale, I’d have to rate Don Zulke’s Southwestern theme shop on the top of my
list. Adobe walls with his own stained
glass accents, rock garden landscaping with cacti and scruffy plants - did I
mention he has a fireplace, flat screen TV and leather couch in the “sitting
area?!” Everything is neat and clean
like Doug’s Toy Box, with the painted/stained floors and custom cabinets along
the walls. Plus his wild ‘sunset’
painted Thames lives there. Oh yeah!
“2005 R.O.D.S. Run”
What a nice change of pace-
holding our annual R.O.D.S. Run in the quaint little antebellum town of St Francisville. Over a
hundred street rods were on hand to check out the antique shops, tour
plantation homes, or just kick back in the park by their cars and listen to
good music all day long from the Angola Prison band. Cars from as far away as Texas and Florida
enjoyed the perfect weather and Southern hospitality we are well known
for. And talk about some good food! Red Rayburn cooked a Friday night brisket
that was restaurant quality, then we showed a mix of
hot rod “Drive In movies” on the side of the hotel. In addition to the Best
Western Inn on the Lake, a lot of participants stayed in bed and breakfasts
around town - me and the kids stayed at the St Francisville Inn next to Glenn and Sue Callahan, and it was
so neat with a quiet little courtyard.
And the full breakfast..!
The ladies enjoyed shopping around the area
Saturday and picked up some poker cards while they were at it. Then most people took the short cruise over
to Jackson La for museum tours, the DCI band and a ride on the steam train. Back at the hotel that night “3 Blind Mice”
played some rockin’ tunes, and as always Larry and
Louise Teal’s church service Sunday morning was inspirational.
We gave away some really nice door prizes
PLUS some BBQ pits, a free weekend at the Bluff’s Golf Resort, a $100.00 ladies
grand prize purchased one of the local merchants and the grand prize of
$500.00 cash. We also raised $400.00 for
the Hospice Foundation of Baton Rouge.
This year there were some new faces in the Top 10, as well as some
return winners:
Carl Cobb - 30 Chevy Coupe Tony Burt - 34 Chevy Coupe
Glenn Callahan - 39 Ford Conv. Larry Teal -
36 Ford Coupe
Don Zulke - 48 Thames Panel Doug
Brock - 48 Packard Conv.
Ronnie Favaron
- 40 Ford P.U. Gerry Milto - 40 Ford Sedan
Roy Harrington - 33 Ford
Coupe Robert McGehee
- 37 Packard
**Please note the RODS club
is no longer associated in any way with the St Francisville
“Cruising in the Country” car show. ***
JUST
CRUISIN' by
Bobby
I had an article already written for this
section, but I felt everyone should know what’s going on with our rod run. Some of you old timers (me included) remember
what happened to the Shades of the Past club - after
hosting their “Grand Run” for several years in Pigeon Forge, the hotel
owner decided he could do the run himself and ‘fired’ the club! Well after only one year that has happened to
us with “Cruising in the Country.” In
our planning meeting for 2006 the promoter informed us he has decided to
run all future shows himself.
I must say that we were surprised by this
since the format we had in St Francisville was about
as good as it gets. We had even started
talking about what we were going to do next year (and still might). However the Chamber of Commerce wants a “Cruisin the Coast” type event... in a town with only 80
hotel rooms!? Some of their changes will
be to open the show to late model vehicles and move to the Thursday-Sunday
before Pensacola, Slidell and Shreveport, which we were opposed to.
Hey no big deal, we will do our own thing in
2006 and we wish them luck with their show!
As of right now we have several options on the table for next year
including sites in St Francisville, Baton Rouge and
Gonzales. The date will probably remain
the same but we will nail down the location and specifics at our August club meeting,
so watch our website for the News! And
we hope all of you great guys and gals will support our 28th
R.O.D.S. Run wherever it might be!
Cruise
Safe
LETS
CRUISE:
July 23rd - MDA
Benefit Poker Run & Car Show @ End of the Line Bar on Hwy 16 in Watson La. Regis 8:00 Glen (225)315-3439
August 18-21st - Two State Rodders Run, Hammond, La.
Holiday Inn @ 2000 S. Morrison Blvd. Randy (601)684-2609
Sept
2-4th - Freedom
Rod Run, Covington La. Pre-49, dash
plaques and awards for all! Bobby (985)
643-4224
Every Saturday Morning: R.O.D.S. “Cruise Breakfast”, Rick’s Drive Inn
- Florida
Blvd. At Flannery Rd, Baton Rouge 7:00am
Second Saturdays: Golden Oldies Cruise Night - Hwy 190 in the Hobby Lobby
parking lot, Hammond La. 7-11:00. BBQ
& Burgers, 50/50 and wall to wall spectators...
Third Saturdays: “Super Cruise
Night” sponsored by Gerry Lane Enterprises; Tanger
Outlet Center in Gonzales La. Next to Chili’s. Sound system, cold drinks,
50/50 & door prizes, $1.00 entry fee.
TECH
DEPARTMENT
A guy I met at the Silver Dollar Rod Run in
Pigeon Forge this year gave me a good tip to prevent a chunk of wheel weights
on your custom wheels. Get the tires
mounted but NOT seated. Put the assembly
on a bubble balancer and rotate the tire on the rim with some slippery lube
until the balance is closest then get them seated and computer
balanced.
His beautiful red ‘34 Plymouth coupe (a
special Mazda color that doesn’t turn orange under flourescent
lights) had perfect wheel/fender clearance and said the 70's Aspen rear end
only required minor spring pad modifications to work with dual leaf
springs! Some Early Mopar
rotors and calipers slipped right on the axles with matching bolt circles also.
One of our best attended club meetings was
the one where Jim Wilson spoke on making panels out of Epoxy resin and
spandex. Other guest speakers have included Brent from Performance
Paint and Body, A guy from American National Insurance and the owner
of Future Tech Transmissions. We
are continuing this format and future guest speakers will include some girls
from Hooters to show us how to take orders...
FOR SALE: 1938 Chevy Pro-Street
coupe, Must IFS, Narrow 9" w/coil overs,
Walker, Weld Stars, big meats, buildable 454/400 incl.
$10,500. Bobby (225)654-8587
FOR SALE: 1940 Olds Chevy/auto, leather int, Ididit column & wheel, Call Erik (GA)
770-735-1275
Put
it in “D”
The April RODS club dinner outing was an all day
thing. About 4 members and their wives
left Baton Rouge at 10:00 for the La War Veterans home in Jackson La. Afterward 3 or 4 more families met them at
the museum for steam train rides. Then
ANOTHER 3 or 4 members and their better halves all met at Bear Corner's for a
delicious supper.
Our July club activity will be a picnic at
Kenny Spinosa’s camp at False River. We are expecting most of our 31 members and
their families for a small hot rod get-together, some swimming, boating,
fishing and of course eating! ARH ARH ARH
.060
Over
On June 23, 2005 long time RODS club member Charlie
Woods died of cancer. The owner of “Creative
Audio,” Charlie was a common site at our rod run, usually in the Coke trailer
with a big smile on his face. He once
said the most fun he ever had was cruising around in his little yellow
T-bucket. So on June 29 a large crowd of
club members and Charlie’s friends and relatives gathered at Florida Blvd
Baptist church to pay their respects.
Charlie will be missed by us all.
Absent from this year’s rod run was Adrian
Jackson’s flamed maroon “Rats Glass” coupe.
The reason was the day before the run as he was turning in his driveway
a car rear ended him doing about 50 mph.
The Bobby Alloway pinch nosed coupe was
totaled, but fortunately Adrian was not hurt.
The R.O.D.S. club meets the first Tuesday of each month, at locations around the Baton Rouge area. We start gathering about 6:30 for supper, and the meeting starts at 7:00. Visitors are welcome to come out and see what we are all about. Call 275-9868 for details.