Beware of cops hiding around corners... don't roll through this stop sign at the Southbound 805 exit at Adams Ave


Hard to see the cop car in front of the Ford truck, isn't it... but he is nice enough to walk out and wave over people who roll through thte stop sign, and give them a 300 dollar ticket for not coming to a full stop

Not easy to see him, and he parked liked that very deliberately. Well done officer

Here he is writing a ticket for the silver SUV in front

Here comes back up just rolling past on the way to 7-11 for coffee..., it's 100 feet up the road from the ticket writer, see the second photo

Here's a new way to do self guided tours of a few cities... San Diego, San Fran, Miami, Barcelona, and Lisbon

A bit pricey to me, 1st hour $49, 2nd hour $39, Each additional hour $29
But a pretty cool way to zip around the city and enjoy the perfect San Diego weather, a Time Magazine "Invention of the Year", and the typical GPS guided tour is an hour and a half: http://www.gocartours.com/sandiego/sandiego-tours-downtown.html

Get ready before the snow falls, make a snow motor from an old tractor or Model T

above: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=229248&showall=1

One of these is at the Heidrick Agriculture Museum and History Center / 1962 Hays Lane / Woodland, California 95776


Images from http://www.personal.psu.edu/jtr16/trips.htm

Watch the video if this in deep snow, and staying on top like it can levitate or something

John A McCurdy, Silver Dart, 1909, Nova Scotia

Imagine that you are in 1909, and taking this out for its maiden voyage... hoping all the nuts and bolts are tight, and that nothing was forgotten in the final assembly.

It was flown off the ice of Baddeck Bay Nova Scotia, on 23 February 1909, making it the first controlled powered flight in Canada.
The aircraft was piloted by one of its designers, John McCurdy, and built by the Aerial Experiment Association, formed under the guidance of Dr. Alexander Graham Bell.

The Peter Mullin auto museum, not open yet, but soon

Celebrating the art deco movement, the French Curves Collection exemplifies the zenith of the French automobile, including beautifully styled and amazingly engineered French-built cars covering several decades: Bugattis, Delages, Delahayes, Hispano Suizas, Talbot-Lagos and Voisins, many have won awards at concours d'elegance, and a number of the race cars have been past winners of historic races, such as the Grand Prix de Pau and Le Mans.
1421 Emerson Avenue
Oxnard, CA 93033

Previously the Otis Chandler museum, The museum is reopening as the Vintage Museum of Transportation, displaying the Peter Mullin Collection, including 12 Bugattis from the former Schlumpf collection ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandler_Vintage_Museum_of_Transportation_and_Wildlife

Great tribute website to recommend

This is the rare XK-SS Jaguar that (I didn't know) Von Dutch made a glove box door for, because the open box was always spilling it's contents, and Steve was fed up with that

http://irishrichhomage.blogspot.com/ is a bike builders other website about the influential people from his formative years... like Von Dutch, Ed Roth, Steve McQueen, Robert Williams, and others that all are very interesting write ups, even when I didn't know of the people he's talking about.

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Photos of Steve McQueen from MC Art Webzine

For the full text from this article see: http://www.angelfire.com/biz/snwvlly/bikes/steve.htm
This is a Meyers Lynx (yes, like the Meyers company that made the Manx dune buggy)

I recently learned that my granddad had a 1965 GT350, SFM5S294

After my granddad it belonged to my Uncle Kirk (pictured), and he sold it in 1969

Thanks to my cousins Caitlin, Becky, and Bruce for collectively making it possible for me to post this photo!

From my Uncle Bruce:
 "one of the first 500 GT350s actually. He also knew Carroll Shelby somehow and paid 4280 dollars for it if my memory is correct. When he died it went to your Uncle Kirk (in the photo) who had it when he died. 
My dad had put in a Boss 302 engine in it and stored the original motor in Sidnaw where it may or may not be anymore. It had been covered with a tarp but got water in it and one of the cylinders rusted. I may still have the intake and dual pump dual feed carbs from it but not sure. 

Aunt Yvonne had one picture of the car.




 It had no back seat and a spare tire sat where the seat would have been. Blue stripes ran along the running board and the rest was white with Goodyear bluedot tires. It had orange Mallory ignition and Detroit locker rear end that would go bang in a sharp turn when it unlocked. It had koni shocks and the exhaust came out in front of the rear tires straight off the headers. 
The original engine was a 289 cu inch and was very hard to start in cold weather of the UP, so dad put a battery in the trunk and hooked it in parallel to the front battery to turn it over and start in the winter. It handled very well and turned on a dime. It was very fast to around 100 mph and topped out around 135mph at 6800rpm."

I'm blown away at how cool it is that my grand dad had a GT 350, and then one of my uncles after him, and that another uncle has this incredible memory to recall the details so correctly (notice the exhaust, the colors all match his memory from about 55 years ago!)

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

A Von Dutch Thing I never heard of... wow

For all the info, go to the link: http://motorcycleart.blogspot.com/2009/09/its-von-dutch-thing.html

I dig how Von Dutch labeled stuff, and had a sense of humor
And definitely check out http://motorcycleart.blogspot.com/2009/06/dutch-treat-as-in-von.html for a Von Dutch article in a chopper magazine

I don't remember where I found these images... but they are very cool

I think this one was from Pixdaus or Shorpy

Ah HA! that's where I got them! Skylar's facebook page! thanks man!