Car show opinions

[Steve_Mack_CT]

35 minutes ago, Paul Dobbin said:

  Mark,

  With this boy living so close, I hope you can arrange with his parent to take him for a ride in your car.   That will be a lifetime memory for him to talk about when he's a

   a  old  guy of 50 showing his 2020 Electric 4 door Mustang at a AACA Show

Paul the only thing better is if he is caretaker of a prewar car when he is that old guy of 50!

[TTR]

“Car show opinions” ???

 

Hmm, I’m pretty sure most of mine would be considered inflammatory and/or worse, so I refrain myself by just saying that in 40+ years in this hobby and dozens (100+ ?) of vintage cars I’ve owned during that time, I haven’t bothered to “show” many of them and the few occasions I have, they were due to somewhat unusual circumstances.

 

OTOH, I have “presented” some of my clients cars (ones I’ve restored) and receive invites to judge at some concours events, although for aforementioned unspecified reasons, seriously considering to decline latter activities in the future. 

Edited November 15, 2021 by TTR (see edit history)

[Mark Wetherbee]

10 hours ago, Paul Dobbin said:

  Mark,

  With this boy living so close, I hope you can arrange with his parent to take him for a ride in your car.   That will be a lifetime memory for him to talk about when he's a

   a  old  guy of 50 showing his 2020 Electric 4 door Mustang at a AACA Show

Absolutely going to do this before his family relocates - I’m just outside USMC Camp Lejeune and my neighbors change with the deployment rotation…

[MCHinson]

14 minutes ago, Mark Wetherbee said:

Absolutely going to do this before his family relocates - I’m just outside USMC Camp Lejeune and my neighbors change with the deployment rotation…

 

If they ever travel to Wilmington, I can get them in a 1937 Buick Roadmaster Convertible Phaeton or a 1937 Buick Century Sedan. We have had a lot of local events in the Wilmington area lately. At every opportunity, I get interested young people behind the wheel for their parents to get photos of them. 

[F&J]

10 hours ago, MCHinson said:

At every opportunity, I get interested young people behind the wheel for their parents to get photos of them. 

 Me too. I don't go to shows, but drive a 1932 car as my primary car year round and when I park wherever, if young kids drag the parents to look, I always say "they can sit in it if you want".  If more than one, they scramble to be the one in the drivers seat!  

 

I worked too hard on my cars to not want the car to be enjoyed by others. These kids smiles mean the world to me, much more than adult smiles.   I have a hidden battery kill switch that is always off whenever I park, so I don't worry if they'd push the starter button on the dash.  Hand brake is always on, too.  I feel very confident that they won't get hurt.

[CarNucopia]

I enjoy doing shows and find that the occasion of people not respecting my car is extremely rare. When it does happen, it’s almost always a child not old enough to know better with an inattentive parent.

 

Quite often, I’ll see a kid who really likes my car, so I’ll offer to let them sit in it. Their eyes go wide and they look at their parent with surprise and for permission. When the parent says yes, they get in gingerly and almost always have their picture taken. The whole thing ends with a sincere thank you from the parents who are delighted to see their kid so happy. To give them both this treat is super enjoyable for me and hopefully something that will plant the seeds for a next generation enthusiast. Obviously, we all enjoy the hobby our own way. As much as I love driving my cars, sharing them with people at shows is almost as satisfying.

 

I’d say the one thing you need to be careful of is sometimes other kids see this and want in as well. It doesn’t take long for a line to form.

[Larry Schramm]

On 11/14/2021 at 9:31 PM, rocketraider said:

But if I were 71 years old I'd be grumpy to start in the morning too. 

 

Not me.  I am closer to 70 than you are but I wake up between 5:30-6:00 almost every morning without an alarm clock. 

 

I am ready to go out as see friends(breakfast twice a week with different groups of car guys), work on cars and keep busy. 

 

Moss does not grow on a rolling stone.

Edited November 27, 2021 by Larry Schramm (see edit history)

[Larry Schramm]

This picture is probably heresy to some of you, but I encourage our grandsons to be comfortable around our vehicles.  He was at my shop helping me and wanted to do this, so I let him.  Just told him to be careful and respectful.  He was.  He loves being with grandpa and his old cars at the shop. 

 

I do not wonder if the offspring will be interested in the vehicles after I am gone. 

[prewarnut]

Unfortunately at that age I was sliding down the hood of our neighbor's '73 911T which he left on the driveway often. I don't know how many scratches I put in it....🤪

[Larry Schramm]

1 hour ago, prewarnut said:

Unfortunately at that age I was sliding down the hood of our neighbor's '73 911T which he left on the driveway often. I don't know how many scratches I put in it....🤪

 

Paint can be fixed, but the memories last forever.  You still remember that sliding on the hood experience.  How much money did you have on that day for candy at the store?  Don't remember.

 

If the Model T Club does another coast to coast tour again, God willing and the creek don't rise my wife and I will be on the tour with our grandsons(2) for the experience. 

 

If it happens, I figure that they will either love us, hate us, but they will never forget us or the trip.  

 

You can always give them more money, but it is the experiences and memories that last for a lifetime. 

[Professor]

I had someone touch my paint while I was showing it at a car show, and their fingerprints were firmly embedded in the clear coat on my paint.  It seems that they had sunscreen or some other chemical on their hands that etched the clear coat.  I could not buff it out without the fear of going through the clear coat.  Every time I would wash my car, I would stare at their fingerprints and wish to hell that they had not touched my car.

 

On another note, when I am at a gas station with my 1936 Chrysler and someone wants to take pictures, I will sometimes invite them to sit in the seat and I will take a picture of them.  It really makes me happy to have people enjoy my car.

 

Joe

[MCHinson]

14 minutes ago, Moderator and Professor said:

I had someone touch my paint while I was showing it at a car show, and their fingerprints were firmly embedded in the clear coat on my paint.  It seems that they had sunscreen or some other chemical on their hands that etched the clear coat.  I could not buff it out without the fear of going through the clear coat.  Every time I would wash my car, I would stare at their fingerprints and wish to hell that they had not touched my car.

 

On another note, when I am at a gas station with my 1936 Chrysler and someone wants to take pictures, I will sometimes invite them to sit in the seat and I will take a picture of them.  It really makes me happy to have people enjoy my car.

 

Joe

 

While nobody should have touched your car, I suggest you take the car back to your painter. He or she should be able to fix that issue quickly. I can't imagine any type of clearcoat that would be damaged by a simple touch after it had dried. I could see a problem if the clearcoat was not yet properly cured, but that sounds really weird. 

[Professor]

9 hours ago, MCHinson said:

 

While nobody should have touched your car, I suggest you take the car back to your painter. He or she should be able to fix that issue quickly. I can't imagine any type of clearcoat that would be damaged by a simple touch after it had dried. I could see a problem if the clearcoat was not yet properly cured, but that sounds really weird. 

Whatever it was etched the clear coat.  I suspect you are correct, any automobile painter or detailed worth their salt could have fixed the issue.  The problem was in an area that almost anyone else other than me would have never noticed it, so I left it fearing that someone might make the issue worse.  Essentially, I lived with it.

[Ed Luddy]

Due to many unpleasant scenes at local car shows I've decided to not participate in 90% of them. Here in Ontario Canada it seems most people that come to a car show have to donate or pay to get in. So do the cars in the show which I'm ok with donating to a good local cause.

Then they feel it's their right to climb in, crawl all over, have their unrestrained offspring  jump on the hood, etc. without even asking. So this summer's limited cruise in's  were  small and somewhat  a better behaved crowd........ NOT.

 My 1972 442 Olds convertible was subject to a few new scratches, rude comments and just plain ignorance. I just bit my lip and left early.

[Mr. Reed]

3 hours ago, Ed Luddy said:

Due to many unpleasant scenes at local car shows I've decided to not participate in 90% of them. Here in Ontario Canada it seems most people that come to a car show have to donate or pay to get in. So do the cars in the show which I'm ok with donating to a good local cause.

Then they feel it's their right to climb in, crawl all over, have their unrestrained offspring  jump on the hood, etc. without even asking. So this summer's limited cruise in's  were  small and somewhat  a better behaved crowd........ NOT.

 My 1972 442 Olds convertible was subject to a few new scratches, rude comments and just plain ignorance. I just bit my lip and left early.

Sorry to hear that. That's not the direction I meant to go in with letting people look at or sit in the cars haha. 

 

[wayne sheldon]

I have never really been into showing cars either. Most of my cars have not been restored or detailed to that level. I have never had a car judged! Many years ago, clubs used to do fund raisers for the club, where shopping centers would pay the club a little bit (usually about twenty to fifty dollars per car depending on whether the 

'showing" was one or more days. I showed my cars at a few of those a long time ago. I also showed my series 80 Pierce Arrow a couple times, including a small concourse where Pierce Arrow was a featured marque. A few other cars got shown a couple times, never judged.

One time, I came VERY close to disaster when I took my 1925 Studebaker Standard coach was taken to a show. The showing was held about a mile from a bridge across San Francisco Bay, and I had to cross that bridge to go home. Unbeknownst to me, someone had opened the hood, and tampered with the carburetor. It ran okay on flat ground, but as soon as I hit the incline for where ships would pass under the bridge, the engine just died. I tried to restart and force on up, but only gained a few feet. The sun had just set, a friend riding with us got out and walked back waiving my flashlight to signal our trouble, while I tried to quickly adjust the carburetor. I got the car running just enough to get it up the hill and to a pullout about a half mile ahead (it is a very long bridge!) where I could adjust it further in relative safety. The worst part was, that as I was moving slowly, a drunk driver swerved and clipped a modern car. (I felt really bad about it, but he got arrested for drunk driving and held responsible for his accident!) I was declared an uninvolved disabled vehicle and had no repercussions for it. 

The idle adjustment had been left almost where it was supposed to be, both the high speed and power adjustments were almost completely closed!

 

A much nicer story, almost?? No, actually hard to believe.

Not really a car show, but the funeral for one of my longtime best friends, being held at his church. I took my model T coupe I used to have, and several other good friends took their cars. The church was a busy place. After the services were over, several of us were hanging around the cars, when a young mom and her two kids maybe seven to ten years of age, were walking by. The kids were interested, and the mom made a comment to them about their (great) grandfather being involved with automobiles way back when. So I offered to let the kids sit in my coupe, assured the mom that they could not do anything that would hurt the car. The kids asked questions, and the mom asked questions, the kids pulled the Ruckstell lever and played with the spark and throttle handles. The mom said something about the transition from steam to gasoline in the early days. So I went into a short commentary of the whole electric, steam, and gasoline thing and how Andrew L Riker had been one of the worlds leading engineers for electric automobiles then went to Locomobile to help engineer their transition from steam to gasoline, therefore switching his position through all three. The mom gets this "look" on her face and says loudly "SEE! HE knows all about your GRANFATHER and what a great man he was!"

Turned out, the kids were the great grandchildren of Andrew L Riker!

 

Told you it might be hard to believe!

[J.H.Boland]

One of my pet peeves at some car shows is the blaring "music". It's so loud that the only way to converse is by shouting. I don't mind the fifties oldies. It matches many of the cars and the participants after all, but it's the VOLUME ! I've packed up and left early more than once. Maybe it's just my tinnitus .

 

I get more enjoyment out of more purposeful shows like one our local club did at a handicapped kids camp. The enthusiasm of the kids as they looked over a variety of cars was contagious.

Edited November 18, 2021 by J.H.Boland (see edit history)

[rocketraider]

11 hours ago, Mr. Reed said:

Sorry to hear that. That's not the direction I meant to go in with letting people look at or sit in the cars haha. 

 

Your call how far you're willing to go sharing your car. You'll soon learn which showgoers are car people and which are just there for something to do. Don't hover, but be close by and willing to talk with people. Be friendly and show some enthusiasm and knowledge of the car. If they show a genuine interest, that might be the time to allow some up-close-and-personal interaction with the Buick.

 

If you're lucky someone who owned a grinning Buick will come by and share knowledge and experience. Be ready to soak it up. Just don't let the jerks among them discourage you, because they WILL be there🙄. Don't understand why some geezers think it's their God-given right to disparage younger car owners. Guess it never occurs to them that young owners are the ones who'll keep the hobby going when they're pushing up daisies!😜

[Mr. Reed]

Thanks for the advice. I appreciate it. 

[Mr. Reed]

Why do older folks discourage younger car owners around my age group anyways?

[John_S_in_Penna]

30 minutes ago, Mr. Reed said:

Why do older folks discourage younger car owners around my age group anyways?

 

That would be a rare occurrence.  Many car afficionados

are of retirement age, and they are happy to encourage

someone younger than they.  There are many threads on

this forum, where they talk of ways of getting the next

generation involved.

[rocketraider]

Depends where you go. Some areas of country are worse than others, but Ohio has always had a great old car scene with people willing to include younger folks.

 

Down here in southern Virginia, it has sometimes been all I could do to restrain myself from slapping the sh*t out of some of the so-called "car people" here. Just jerks, and they're that way in every aspect of their lives, even outside the car community. I can go to car stuff 20 miles away and it's a whole different caliber of people.

[Larry Schramm]

On 11/18/2021 at 7:11 PM, rocketraider said:

Down here in southern Virginia, it has sometimes been all I could do to restrain myself from slapping the sh*t out of some of the so-called "car people" here. Just jerks, and they're that way in every aspect of their lives, even outside the car community. I can go to car stuff 20 miles away and it's a whole different caliber of people.

 

Generally I have found that the older the car, nicer the people.

Edited November 20, 2021 by Larry Schramm (see edit history)

[89tc]

I've found that the type of car show directly affects the type of people at the car show. 20's, 30's, 40's shows have mostly seniors sitting in lawn chairs behind their cars answering occasional car questions, ratrod shows have ruffians and rockabillies, mustang, corvette and camaro shows have unkempt middle aged men wearing worn black car show tee-shirts from 1998 who aren't friendly with anybody, tuner shows have younger people, motorcycle shows have the leather-clad biker crowd, and Concourse de Elegance have a mixture of seniors wearing wicker fedoras, young rich snobs, and people that are trying to be young rich snobs. 

  In the end I'd have to say that I've never had a bad experience at any car shows. My biggest peeve at a show is when people show up with their car and then disappear an hour later, leaving a blank space in the field that could have been used for a real enthusiast to show his car. In addition, the early-leavers shortchange the spectators who pay $5- $20 to see the cars. I've learned never to go to a Good Guys car show on a Sunday because half of the cars clear out on Saturday, even though the spectators are still paying $20 per person each day... 

[rocketraider]

42 minutes ago, 89tc said:

mustang, corvette and camaro shows have unkempt middle aged men wearing worn black car show tee-shirts from 1998 who aren't friendly with anybody

Dingdingding! You must have been to a show down here at some time or other!😛

 

I believe the term is "peaked in high school and never got over it".

[JACK M]

15 hours ago, 89tc said:

I've learned never to go to a Good Guys car show on a Sunday because half of the cars clear out on Saturday, even though the spectators are still paying $20 per person each day... 

They also open up what can participate on Sundays, basically any American car. (All American Sunday)

I wonder if they did that to help replace car count that left.

I always stay for the awards.

[Buffalowed Bill]

Car events are not created equally. Just like cars and audiences that a particular venue attracts are different. IMO it behoves everyone who shows a car, to do his homework before he decides that a particular show is right for him and his car. 

[TAKerry]

Im guilty. I dont have the patience to sit around at a car show for hours on end. I enjoy driving my car and a show gives me a place to drive to. Most of the events I go to are firehouse, church kind of shows. Nothing fancy. I will walk around and look at all of the vehicles there, park my bottom on a chair for awhile, maybe grab lunch then go. The kind of show I go to I doubt I have displaced anyone with my presence so not worried about taking up a spot. A trophy would be nice, but thats the last thing on my mind so I have no need to stay around for the award ceremony. There are a couple of very large shows that once youre in youre there for the duration. I stay away from those.

[Tim Crowder]

I’ll have to admit that I only go to car shows now for the flea markets and parts. When I was younger, we went and enjoyed looking at the older restorations or original cars. Since then, I’ve lost interest in seeing over restored vehicles. It seems that some cars are “restored” to showcase the owner’s ability to spend thousands of dollars on the project and less on keeping them as close to original specifications as possible. I would rather see a Model T that was restored by its owner several years ago than a Mustang where a shop gave it a $30k coat of paint (granted, this is often done at the owners request). Its sad that as with most other hobbies, more and more money has crept in, often making the shows more about the car owners or the restorers and less about the vehicles themselves.

[Larry Schramm]

6 hours ago, Tim Crowder said:

I’ll have to admit that I only go to car shows now for the flea markets and parts. When I was younger, we went and enjoyed looking at the older restorations or original cars. Since then, I’ve lost interest in seeing over restored vehicles. It seems that some cars are “restored” to showcase the owner’s ability to spend thousands of dollars on the project and less on keeping them as close to original specifications as possible. I would rather see a Model T that was restored by its owner several years ago than a Mustang where a shop gave it a $30k coat of paint (granted, this is often done at the owners request). Its sad that as with most other hobbies, more and more money has crept in, often making the shows more about the car owners or the restorers and less about the vehicles themselves.

 

Just because you can, does not mean you should.  I agree with the Model T statement and it is probably driven.

Edited November 20, 2021 by Larry Schramm (see edit history)

[Mr. Reed]

I wouldn't want to have a car that I would be afraid to drive because of the money I would have in it. That's just a piece of static art at that point to me. I want to drive my cars when the weather permits and make memories in them.

[Larry Schramm]

52 minutes ago, Mr. Reed said:

I wouldn't want to have a car that I would be afraid to drive because of the money I would have in it. That's just a piece of static art at that point to me. I want to drive my cars when the weather permits and make memories in them.

 

What is "weather permitting?"  This is us out on a tour with our 1913 Buick.  Memories made every time out.

[Mr. Reed]

I mean in the spring through fall time.

[Mr. Reed]

I have four cars but one is driven in the winter.

[Bill Stoneberg]

On 11/13/2021 at 4:50 PM, Mr. Reed said:

Thank you. I appreciate that. I'm looking online for more literature and pictures of my 50 Buick so I can learn more about the differences between them and colors excreta.

What are you looking for ?  I have some information on 1950 Buicks.  Paint colors, interior and the salesman's book.

[Mr. Reed]

49 minutes ago, Bill Stoneberg said:

What are you looking for ?  I have some information on 1950 Buicks.  Paint colors, interior and the salesman's book.

Can you send me a picture of what you have thanks.

[Mr. Reed]

Also do you have the parts book with the parts schematics too. Thanks Nick.

[tomcarnut]

On 11/16/2021 at 8:52 PM, Larry Schramm said:

This picture is probably heresy to some of you, but I encourage our grandsons to be comfortable around our vehicles.  He was at my shop helping me and wanted to do this, so I let him.  Just told him to be careful and respectful.  He was.  He loves being with grandpa and his old cars at the shop. 

 

I do not wonder if the offspring will be interested in the vehicles after I am gone. 

Love this picture mainly because I had hoped for grandson someday. I have a 18 month old granddaughter I have never see in person as she is in Perth Australia and we can’t get there. Also like your top Larry! In fact I am the guy that picked up the Haartz material for your Buick and my 1911 Model T and delivered it to Steve Stutzmann. I got my T back this summer. 

[Larry Schramm]

4 minutes ago, tomcarnut said:

Love this picture mainly because I had hoped for grandson someday. I have a 18 month old granddaughter I have never see in person as she is in Perth Australia and we can’t get there. Also like your top Larry! In fact I am the guy that picked up the Haartz material for your Buick and my 1911 Model T and delivered it to Steve Stutzmann. I got my T back this summer. 

 

It is a blessing to have our grandsons close, especially after their Mom died last Feb, our daughter.   I will be taking my Model T down to Steve sometime this winter. As you guessed, Steve did the top on the car. 

Edited November 26, 2021 by Larry Schramm (see edit history)