At 7:30 AM, Danny Zoeller, Ray Lark, and Jake Jacobs were bright eyed & ready to take on the 1400 mile trip with about 1200 of them through the desert; complete with plenty of cactus, tumbleweeds, ghost towns, and varments.

At 7:31 AM, the group starts forming in front of the Vintage Air building. There are people and cars from as far away as Northern California, Idaho, New Jersey, San Diego, etc. Kay Burrough’s well traveled 32 Roadster is ready for another cross-country trek.

 

Behind Rick Findley’s killer Roadster, you can see over 50 hotrods ready to leave Vintage Air’s parking lot. Over 60 arrived at the Roadster Show, supporting the Street Rodder Road Tour/Vintage Air leg motto: “We leave no tourer behind”

Randy Clark from San Diego, CA drove this 3-Window Coupe all the way to San Antonio, TX and then joined our tour to find his way back to his home state.

The 2006 Road Tour Car (1935 Chevy) and Rick Love’s fresh 5-Window Coupe look ready to roll!

Matt Seger & Family from Beeville, TX are veteran tourers in their 1963 Chevy Convertible.

McKool and Randy gassing up in Uvalde, TX.

How bout this bunch; Vintage Air Sales Manager George Packard drove his 1932 5-Window Coupe helping (sometimes) Jake and Randy find their way back to So-Cal.

Blues Guitarist & Real Hot Rodder Jimmie Vaughan stoked along in his1935

3-Window. This thing has a 300 C.I. flathead which took this trip with easy stride.

Landis Chisenhall checking out the Pecos River bridge and Jake’s Panel.

Landis was trying to tie a bungee cord to his ankle.

Landis and Maryland Rodder Ellis Simmons.

Rick and Linda Love at Judge Roy Bean’s office.

Jack and Landis taking a break in the 102 degree sun.

 

 

Veteran New York Rodder George Slover leads this pack of Hot Rods getting ready to get back on the road.

The first night stop was in Fort Davis, located in the Davis Mountains of West Texas. Landis crashes after the long day of activities and the afterhours star party”, where our group had exclusive access to the MT Davis Observatory Telescopes; some of the most powerful in the United States. Some of our hotel rooms were houses in the small mountain town of Ft. Davis.

1932 5-Window belonging to Texas Rodder, Ray Simons on its first long haul. It made the trip with no problems and lots of good times. 

Landis Chisenhall was blown away when Ron Clappper brought Jorge Zaragoza’s bitchin’ Brizio built 1936 Ford 3-Window. Landis is in the middle of his own 1936 Ford 3-Window project and a ride in jorge’s coupe made his year!!

Landis says, “This is definitely me”

Dirt devils and twisters were out in force on the road in West Texas and New Mexico.

Vintage Air Sales Manager George Packard in his 1932 Ford 5-Window headed West.

Deuces headed West in Arizona.

Vintage Air Vice President Rick and Linda Love leading our parade 100 miles from Tucson, AZ.

Fatman Fabrications’- Brent Vandervort cruising with veteran Indy Car wrench Lew Parks in Brent’s fresh track style 34 Sedan.

Vintage Air’s Danny Zoeller and legendary Hot Rodder Tex Smith enjoy the comfort of Danny’s Woody.

The other side of the Surf Woody

Virginia Rodder Brian Bell in his Auburn Boat-tail is a long way from water, but having a great cruise. Brian made several of the tours this year.

Brent’s Hot Hot Rod carrying the gear with the windows up and cool to boot. Check out the bitchin 1930’s Vintage Champ Car Dayton wire wheels.

San Antonio TX Rodder Ray Simons stylin in the Arizona heat. It is about 112 degrees!!

Rick and Linda Love staying cool and making the long haul.

Don’t shake up these Arizona balanced rocks on IH-10.

The Sierra Mountain range in southern Arizona supports many local legends of “Range Lore” and the Old West.

Entry to the PIMA Air and Space Museum.

Landis thinks he needs a few old airplane parts for a future project. How would this steering wheel look in a cool 1936 Ford 3-Window?

Forward ball turret of a B-17 empty

Forward ball turret of a B-17 with gunner crewman in position. “And we were complaining that we needed to stretch our legs.”

“Captain Ron” briefs the troops on B-17 operations.

Waist gunner’s station on the B-17

Same B-17 with Landis

B-27 Liberator Bomber

B-29 Super-Fortress Bomber

Air Force “Wildcat” fighter recovered from waters of Lake Michigan where it rested for over 50 years.

Cool old stuff for sale at this museum.

Close up of some of the Vintage parts.

We stopped for a visit and a great meal at Hi Speed Rod & Custom in Tucson. The re-modeled 1950’s bread factory is Super Cool!! Hi-Speed is a full service speed shop that can do almost anything.

Hi-Speed’s showroom featured several finished Hot Rods for sale, including this neat 1935 Ford 3-Window.

South Superstition Mountains. More 112 degree temperatures and 60 miles to So-Cal Speed Shop- Phoenix.

Cool Hot Rod stuff at So-Cal Speed Shop- Phoenix. Bitchin Roadster Crew Truck and a great dinner. Still enjoying the 112 degree weather.

John Menzler and Street Rodder Tech Editor, Ron Ceridono at breakfast stop at Ray and Karen Doe’s new business location for RB’s Obsolete in West Phoenix.

Landis and Tex Smith about face waiting for the Sunset.

Desert stop- Photo opportunity: Jake heads north to the High Desert while Tex Smith rides on to LA with McKool and Landis.

Well, we all know where Jake is headed!! 

Jake departs on the last leg, to begin his ride home to Apple Valley, CA.

Wind Generators in Palm Springs pepper the landscape.

Mountain range dotted with power generating Windmills

Marcell shows Landis some of his handiwork at Marcell’s Metal Craft

A Roadster in the making.

The Petersen Museum Tour started with a once in a lifetime tour of the museum archives. The hidden treasures, all of which will at one time or another be on exhibit upstairs. The special showing was an unexpected treat for the Street Rodder Road Tour Group set up by the Museum Curator. We thought you might like to see some of this neat stuff!!

From Steve McQueen’s famous leap in the movie “The Great Escape”. The motorcycle that was used in that scene was in a special storage area.

Chili Catallos’ blue 3-Window Coupe that I have not personally seen since a Houston car show in 1961. This custom-nosed version of the car was also featured on a Beach Boys’ album cover for “Little Deuce Coupe”. Before 1961 this car had a different look, sporting a sectioned 32 grill.

Landis must have liked this Deuce by the look on his face.

Famous Old Yellar IV road race Hot Rod with Buick engine took on the Ferraris in the late 50’s & 60’s and as often as not, won. These cars were called “specials” in the day. That is what I was thinking when I started my Studebaker “Cool 200” project and a few other things as well.

Chrysler Hemi’s were often used in Cunningham road race cars like this one.

 

Cunningham road race car, one of many produced by Briggs Cunningham for a rare American effort in the European dominated post-WWII Road Race scene.

Dean Jeffries’ Twin Engine Custom from the early car show days.

Gullwing Mercedes 300SL Coupe that belonged to a famous actor.

Jerry Seinfeld’s Porsche

A 1930’s Figoni & Filachi styled Delahaye. These cars influenced early Rot Rodders to channel & chop the windshields on their roadsters. Still looks pretty good to us!!

Chrysler powered Italian Ghia probably gave a few customizers ideas when it showed up in Hollywood in the early 50’s.

What is it?

Doane Spencer’s 1956 T-Bird. Doane was one of the Hot Rodders (Doan Spencer Roadster came before this car) that got involved in the road racing wave in the postwar 50’s.

 

Doane worked at sports car shops in Hollywood building and tuning sports cars for team owners. He applied what he learned along the way to his own hot rod race cars- which were more “specials” than traditional Hot Rods that were influenced by Dry Lakes and Southern California Dirt/Oval Tracks.

Doane was working on this T-Bird when he died in August of 1995.

 

 

The Mach 5 from the popular “Speed Racer” cartoon

 

Olds Aurora powered Shelby Series One Car- Built by Carroll Shelby Cars in a series of 500 of them.

 

Each Series I vehicle had a Vintage Air performance air conditioning system in it. It was a great project and some of our employees still have their Shelby Series One Development Team jackets.