OK, let me post a hypothetical question.

Say that you are die hard drifter and after years of learning the sport/art/skill of drifting you have nearly completely destroyed your AE86. The engine & trans needs to be rebuilt, suspension, brakes, everything mechanical has to be gone over and replaced...otherwise the car has to be scrapped. You invest in doing all the mechanical work getting the car back in shape and your down to like $500-750 bucks. Do you spend that money trying to make the car look half-way presentable or do you leave the car looking like a banged up tin can?

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88 Chrysler Conquest TSI
87 Dodge Raider Turbo

Logic says tin can. Me persunally, I'd throw some paint on it.

I'd rather drive around a beat up bomber with good running gear than a "half-way presentable" car. I hate seeing nice old cars with cheap, half-assed bodywork. I would do the bodywork that I could do for free, or close to it, and leave it at that until I had the money for a proper restoration.

As the owner of what could technically be considered "rad rod" I have a love/hate relationship with the looks. Yes I desperately wish to re-remove the rust on the car and get it painted sooner than later, but its kinda fun laying the smack down on guys in Porshces with something that looks like this. The paint/primer has flaked off where I rolled the rear fenders to clear some decent sized tires, the rear fenders have some rust holes (can't see them in the pic but there are there.) I hesitate to shoot some rattle can primer over the area as it won't match what is there making the car look even worse. That is why the front fenders have the burn through rust areas from welding the tabs for the air dam on. (The body shop thought JB weld was good enough when they "fixed" it after a hit and run in '06. I had to go back and weld the tabs on.)



Thoughts?

Will

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1969 Datsun 2000 (track car, driven daily)
1959 Alfa Romeo 101.02 Sprint (big project)
1969 Alfa Romeo 105.51 GTV (R.I.P)
'87 BMW M3

Your car: Form follows function. Hence, cool

The car that started this discussion: form with no function. Uncool.

/puts editor hat back on

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RAD2LTR,

I think there is a huge difference between this:


and This:


Your Dat-Rat isn't forcibly made to look rugged, It just is. You would like to fix these things that make the car look used and abused, but you just don't have time. You wouldn't make your car look more abused on purpose would you? I think not. Therefore, your car rocks!

88TSI_Rob,

Sure, you fix whats mechanically wrong with it, then what? Start riveting scrap metal to it? This guy forcibly made his car look worse off. Presentable does not include gluing on a side skirt made from a river raft.

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Play: 89 Z31 Turbo
Blowing Away: 71 S30 Sr20det

Good! I'm glad. The kind of mean spirited cynisism that motivates someone to criticize and ridiucle for the sport of it may be quite fashionable,but I feel very strongly that positivity and dignity should be key words for the editorial style of Japanese Nostalgic Car Magazine,and I'm glad to see the nice dudes in charge agree!

I f'n hate rust for any other reason except organic weight reduction!

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31 3000gt vr4
88 starion x2, 83 starion
88 cordia turbo
87 Montero swb turbo, 1987 Minicab van Supercharged
86 mighty max 4x4
84, 85, and 86 lancer ex1800 turbo
78 lancer
73 galant coupe
65 Debonair Deluxe
80's Hero

The drift crowd needs to get a clue. At some of the autoXs that I do they turn up in just ugly looking cars. Half the time we end up picking body parts off the course when we reset cones. I don't get the trend either. AE86s that look like they have been through a war, S13/14s that are missing front or rear bumpers (sometimes both). No my car won't win any beauty contests, but at least when I show up the thing is near spotlessly clean and nothing is going to fall off it. The airdam does have duct tape on it, and it is broken (took a cone dead center to the thinnest part at near 60 mph) but the tape is almost the same color as the rest. I'll call that a war wound, not something that was done to make it look worse.

If the car is ugly and an on going project to make nice again that is one thing, but have some decency and fix the thing. The oddest car I have seen that had been beaten with an ugly stick was a Ferrari 360 Challenge car. It had primered fenders on all 4 corners. I think the guy had more $ than sense considering he attacked the pit in K-rail at turn 11 at Sears Point and managed to hit all 4 corners again then drove out of the spin and continued on around the track for another lap. It happened right in front of me. I'm still not sure how he pulled that one off. He was about 5 cars ahead of me, I really didn't know where he was going to end up. He was really sporting the ugly car with that.

Thanks for the support of my car, I'm starting to think its looking really long on the tooth.

Will

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1969 Datsun 2000 (track car, driven daily)
1959 Alfa Romeo 101.02 Sprint (big project)
1969 Alfa Romeo 105.51 GTV (R.I.P)
'87 BMW M3

i dont get rat rods period!!!
how the hell your gonna say i finished my car and the damn thing looks like you havent touched it!

its different if they say its a running project and not "finished project".

to be honest im more of a traditional hot rod man.
i like em chopped channeled louvered tubbed and with a nice paint job say a candy or pearlescent with pinstripe and flames.

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damn dodge!!!!
dedicated to pre86 japanese tin!

whoa. lol.
Some people don't get autox either, but it's a motorsport, and whether you agree with it or not it's not going anywhere. The temporary fixes on an ae86 or s13 that went off track or tagged a wall is not unlike the duct tape on your dam right? There are people that would think the same thing of your roadster (I like it, dont worry ) that you seem to think of the drift cars that show up at your events. Every motor sport is going to have idiots, please don't judge the whole sport based on a few dorks knocking cones over at your events.

(also most the time when you see an s chassis or ae missing it's bumpers at an event, those are the ones who are trying to take care of their cars, their bumpers are usually safe in their garage at home)



Rat-rods are about celebrating what a car has gone through. Like embracing the battle wounds and rust spots as parts of the cars story. The damage/rust/paintpeel on most real rats is all authentic, not purposely inflicted. You see a nice rat-rod, slammed on the ground, bags, spotless whitewalls, retro interior littered with bits of nostalgia and you think of how it was treated before falling into the hands of the modder. Probably sat in a field or an old ladies shed for 30+years before being resurrected and finally given the attention it deserves.

You dont see that with a finished hotrod. You see a car that for all you know sat in a chevy or ford showroom for 60 years with 1200 miles on the clock. Even if it came from an old ladies barn or field, the stories been covered up with paint and body work.

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'70 sl350, '86 spree, '88 cressida

i think you're talking about traditional hot rods. "rat rods" are just butchered up and purposely made to look as stupid as possible

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Traditional hotrods are about sweaty buisiness men with too much money to spend paying a guy who know's what he is doing, but otherwise doesnt have the money to build on his own, to make the type of car his father had wet dreams about for him. Hot-rods are about money and speed, and mid-life crises. Rats are built by real people to express and celebrate old school car heritage.

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'70 sl350, '86 spree, '88 cressida

i hear you there but im talkin bout the dudes that claim to fix the car but really all they do is make it look worse. i know what you mean about natural rust from time. the whole idea is great. my celica was like that. it had cancer some rust all i did was buff it out. it looked great. some guys just leave the body or cab alone and do the floor pans. the whole home made crap really creeps me out though. they look sweet though when theyre chopped with white walls and still have the original flathead running. the hot rods from so cal speed shop in other words!
those are sweet!

i dont like when they take 3 years to build it and it looks like crap. missing parts and bare metaled.

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damn dodge!!!!
dedicated to pre86 japanese tin!

The abomination that started this thread is a Frankenstein of a car, an AE86enstein!...
It should not be confused with a Rat Rod. Rat Rods are a whole different breed of car from the AE86enstein. I will give props to any true JP heritaged Rat Rods that might pop up (now that might be a topic worth delving into...)

Rat Rods are...

From Streetrods-online.com:


From Wikipedia:


I like the Wiki part about "function over form."
What the heck is the function of all the crap that has been tacked on to the AE86-abomination. Uh, I'd have to guess the answer is - none. It's solely there to say "look at me now, I'm here to slap you in the face and make you think, WTF!" It's just a way for the guy to get attention. Whatever.

But back to the start of this whole thing... I can really care less about what the car looks like or what the guy does with it, the stinker is, why the heck did Speedhunters even give the car a second look? I guess they were having a slow day... I'll answer myself with another resounding "Whatever" - to each his own, that's what makes the world go 'round. AE86enstein is definately not my cup of tea. All I can say is I'm glad I don't have to wake up every morning looking at that "thing" and thinking, my God, what did I do. But, if it makes someone happy, then more power to them. WHATEVER!

And now to address this ... ...


FUNCTION over form! = I like!

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Michael - Collector of Toyotamobilia ~ www.toyotageek.com
Tomica Fan Club ~ www.tomicafanclub.com

i honestly think you're mistaken. jump on http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/ to see some traditional hot rods & the culture/history that goes with it, no sweaty business men there, just die-hard car guys.

the business men who pay other people to build their rods are the guys more inclined to get a "Boyd" style modern hot rod with air con and pwr steering

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Somewhere along the way, hot rods became "customs" and grew increasingly cheesy. You can even buy complete fiberglass bodies of a '32 or '37 Ford and install mod cons like a/c, independent suspensions, billet wheels, etc. To me, that's on par with a Plymouth Prowler... a mass-produced "hot rod"... could there be anything lamer?

Not cool:


Hot rods started because people wanted to go fast without much money. At the time only land yachts were available to most Americans (before the Corvette and other muscle/pony cars). Rat rods are a celebration of that era. Here's some pics from the Mooneyes Xmas Party in Iriwindale.

Cool:





And here's some well patina'ed J-tin that's also pretty cool in my book:

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^ thank you! I was starting to think nobody agreed with me, lol.

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'70 sl350, '86 spree, '88 cressida

I should have been more specific on my drifter car statement. The ones that we get just barely pass tech, the battery is often held in with either zip-ties, or a bungie cord, (if its held in by anything), and the body panels are often partly held on by zip-ties as well. We had one guy take out more cones with pieces of his car flying off than he actually hit. Its one thing if the car is in the works so to say, but often they never change, just look more beat up and have more zip-ties on them. I mean how hard is it to replace a zip tie with a nut and bolt?

As for my car yeah I only autoX and run the occasional track day with it, but I would love to vintage race with it. The problem is, its too new... Most of the smaller vintage racing groups limit the cars to '67 and earlier. Being a '69 (and technically the same as a '67 2L as far as everything but the dash and the windshield) its not allowed. I don't have the $$$$ to get a SCCA license so I cant race with those guys either. Both VSCCA and VARA both want more cage and a fuel cell (rightly so) but I wouldn't be able to get the car to the track to race it with those. (No truck or trailer so I load it up and drive it.)

I'm glad you guys like the function over form, but I really wish it had the form to go with the function, it would get more respect.

Will

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1969 Datsun 2000 (track car, driven daily)
1959 Alfa Romeo 101.02 Sprint (big project)
1969 Alfa Romeo 105.51 GTV (R.I.P)
'87 BMW M3

Im going to have to disagree ben, that red thing IS cool.

The amount of hours, blood, sweat, tears that go into a car like that is unreal. As for mod-cons in old cars - what would you rather, make for example an RA23 Celica into your "ultimate" car [EFI, 4w discs, a/c, newer seats/stereo etc] and have a comfortable old-schooler, or just go and buy a late 90's celica?

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[F3ARED] 76 Isuzu Gemini Coupe - forged G180z, EFI, 525hp Turbo, 6years and still building...

Daily 78 Isuzu Gemini Sedan, stock G161z, Rodeo EFI, 500hp roller, 157rwkw. Fun