Eastern Hot Rodder

I has been a half decade or so since I've been to a show in Maggie Valley, NC so we cruised Lil' Red on up to check out the 2023 C10 Nationals. This event grew a ton since my last time there. The swap meet was bigger too. There were so many LS Swapped Square body trucks you'd think they came stock that way. While square bodies dominated the show a close race for second were the 67--72 C10s and the GMT400 (OBS) style they made from 88-98 or so. The first gen C10s had a good presence (60-66) and only a few examples of early trucks prowled the fairgrounds. Overall we had a good time, saw some cool trucks and even picked up some stuff in the swap meet.

We show you how to change the pesky leaking shift shaft seal and kick down O-ring in our '63 Ford T-bird. The Cruise-O-Matic trans is notorious for leaking from the shifter shaft and our basement find low mileage Bulletbird is no exception. I had a tough time finding any real good info on fixing it, the best I found was on the www.SquareBirds.org site. There was still some vagueness to the directions, but they were pretty good. I hope this video helps you with doing the job. Having done it once, I wouldn't shy away from it at all, it wasn't too bad to do and it dried up the trans. Now the cool cruiser is that much safer and more reliable to drive.

Liberty and I took a trip to the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green, KY recently and we took some video to bring your along. Many cool old race cars, design displays and historic, low production number cars. Stuff from the 70 years Corvette has been in production, plus some earlier stuff like the Flathead Ford and the Ardon OHV conversion that Zora Arkus-Duntov invented. There were a lot of neat cars and parts on display, but there were 2 disappointments. 1) There wasn't one of every year Vette. 2) They recently took down the displays of the cars that fell into the sink hole. But, I did hear they may bring them back out, since everyone asks for them. There are some non Chevy things there too, a temporary custom car display was up just before the gift shop. Another cool thing was seeing the brand new Vette waiting in the lobby for their new owners to pick them up. If you are into Vette this is a good place to see.

Join us every Sunday night at 7:30 when we go live to talk shop, cars, and all things automotive. We cut up and have fun for an hour with rodders around the globe. Coooerhead Kustoms, Phillips Run, Drip & Bubble Co., FlatBroke Garage and others.

Join us for an hour of hot ridding stories, bench racing, and project updates every Sunday evening at 7:30 est. Australia’s Copperhead Customs, Georgia’s Steve Phillips Bubble Drip & Run Co., Tennessee’s Flatbroke Garage, and usually a special guest from somewhere else on this green Earth. (Our reach is currently limited to global, not interplanetary yet).

Join us every Sunday at 7:30 to talk hot rods and customs. There’s always at least 3 of us gearhead goons from around the world, usually more. Always a good laugh.

Join us every Sunday 7:30pm EST live to talk all things hot rods.

Live chat with a few of us hot rodders. See what we are working on and have a laugh.

Hang out and chat with EHR and the rest of us.

We took a trip down to Cartersville, GA to check out the Savoy Auto Museum. It had a big collection of early 1900s runabouts and speedsters. On display was a collection of mini cars, like an Issetta and a Gogomobile. They also had a display of gas crunch '70s cars like Vegas, a Pinto, a Gremlin, a Chevette and a Pacer. But, the coolest was the Fabulous Fin collection that had 1 of the 5 'Raindrop" Harley Earl designed Motorama Cadillac Eldorados. That was really cool to see in person.

Well, it seems that every time I get a car back to road ready it is night time. this was no exception. With a few days off for Thanksgiving and good weather I hid in the garage and thrashed on the Shop Truck in time to take it out on Black Friday. Man, it makes and transfers power better than ever! I had to fab up tail pipes, get a belt, prime the 409" sbc, make plug wires and more. This gives me a week to shake it down, get the Christmas tree and make the town parade. Check it out and tell me what you think.

We took our kids to their first real rock concert. ZZ Top! They played on Nov. 9th 2022 at the Georgia Mountain Fairgrounds in Hiawassee, GA. This band has always been closely associated with hot rods, customs and coolness in general. Elwood is a fitting replacement of the late Dusty Hill, as he worked with them for years and has the beard to go with it.

A parade, a cruise, a car show, and an air show complete with old warbirds! Wow! The 2022 Welcome Home Veterans show was a hit. Held annually at the Western North Carolina Regional Airport in Andrews, NC this was the first time it had an FAA approved air show with stunt planes. There was the 10th Annual Twin Towers/Benghazi Memorial Ride that joined forces with the Andrews Welcome Home Veterans parade to end at the airport for the show and chili cook-off. They asked that Eastern Hot Rodder get the word out that we wanted classic cars and hot rods there. We obliged. I upped the ante a bit and my students built a dozen trophies to present to various cars at the show. Trophies like Totally 80s, Most Likely to Get Pulled over, and Crowd Pleaser made it fun and lite. Everyone had a blast.

My buddy Keith has a wild mind and it translates into custom model cars, his real insane '23 Ford theme rod and his wild yard art. We hang out with him and get some details on his fine details he gives his cars, models and art creations.