CLICK HERE IF YOU MISSED THE PREVIOUS JOE GRIPPO GALLERIES 

Walking into Blair’s is like stepping back into time. Don’t expect a spotless, sanitary white glove environment, this is a hardcore speed shop with oil-stained floors, with boxes and parts everywhere. Various engine builds are lined up and waiting to be paid for and picked up.  We spied a FE Ford ready to rumble on the run stand, a few 351 Cleveland’s and of course a few big and small block Chevys. The walls are lined with chrome do-dads and serious race equipment. Looking deeper we see lots of cool hand lettered sings, and vintage awards and photos from years of Drag Strip activities. Heading to the back rooms we find the well-used machine shop, fully equipped with mills, lathes and other heavy machinery needed to crank out high performance engines. Check out the inventory of cylinder heads, cranks and blocks waiting to roar again. After showing up unannounced, Phil gave us free reign to wander around the entire shop and shoot some photos. It was a great experience chatting with Phil about the old days and hearing a few war stories of all the past names and personalities that have passed through Blair’s over the years. We bought a few t-shirts, thanked Phil for the hospitality and headed out. This experience got me wistfully thinking about my local shop, K&G Speed Associates that closed a few years ago. These remaining speed emporiums need our support, so, when possible, buy local when you can, long live Blair’s Speed Shop!

Our next destination was another Southern California staple of hot rodding, Mooneyes Equipment in Santa Fe Springs. The Moon name and logo is ubiquitous in land speed, drag racing, and all facets of the automotive hobby. From fuel blocks, tanks, and wheel discs to custom accessories for motorcycles, VWs, and trucks Moon Equipment has what you need to add the finishing touch to your ride. I personally have a silver Moon metalflake steering wheel on my race car! The Santa Fe Springs location is part retail store, part shipping warehouse and part fab shop, and part museum. The store is great with so much cool stuff in every square corner. Check out the Ed Roth scale model diorama featuring all Big Daddy’s creations, an amazing amount of detail work is in there. Exiting through the gift shop leads to another room that takes you back in time. Check out the huge display case and shelves full of vintage speed parts and insanely cool artifacts from the history of Mooneyes. And upon turning around, there sits Dean Moon’s personal ’34 hot rod with wire wheels, bobbed fenders, and glowing yellow paint. Adjacent to the roadster is a perfect recreation of the old Mooneyes Dragmaster rail job, complete with a gorgeous Potvin blown little Chevy mill. The dragster was rolled out into the bright sunshine and was simply stunning. The back area of the Moon complex is the shipping and receiving section, nothing too exciting, unless you know the story of Carroll Shelby coming to Moon in 1962 with the idea of building his own sports car. I was standing right where it happened. The lore goes something like Shelby, ever the promoter, was telling all the magazines he had multiple Cobras ready to road test, when he had only one! So right there in in the Moon shop that single Cobra was painted numerous times for the car mag scribes to drive and report on, giving the illusion of a fleet of cars ready to be sold. Wild stuff!

Across the parking lot is the fab shop. Moon tanks and wheel discs are spun, welded and hand finished right there on site. Once again, the laid-back Moon staff gave us carte blanche and we wondered around trying not to bother the dudes actually working. We checked out the machines, tooling, welders and all the other stuff utilized to produce these iconic speed parts. Hanging from the rafters was another complete Dragmaster chassis, and a bitchin’ ‘glass Anglia gasser front end hung on back wall. A few Bonneville and El Mirage running Streamliners with Moon livery were being maintained in house, as well. So much neat eye candy was everywhere.
To paraphrase Ice Cube, “…Today was a good day”.

CLICK HERE IF YOU MISSED THE PREVIOUS JOE GRIPPO GALLERIES 

Us BangShifter’s need to support these places, as they are truly hallowed ground for us hot rodders, we ended the trip by grabbing a few more t-shirts. I went with the classic black and white Mooneyes tee in double fat!

Join the Blair’s Speed Shop Facebook group to check the history:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1460627117571926

And buy something cool from Mooneye Equipment:
https://www.mooneyesusa.com/

The post An East Coasters Tour Of So Cal Hot Rodding History: Part 2 – Mooneyes Shop Tour Photos From Joe Grippo. appeared first on BangShift.com.

Walking into Blair’s is like stepping back into time. Don’t expect a spotless, sanitary white glove environment, this is a hardcore speed shop with oil-stained floors, with boxes and parts everywhere. Various engine builds are lined up and waiting to be paid for and picked up.  We spied a FE Ford ready to rumble on the run stand, a few 351 Cleveland’s and of course a few big and small block Chevys. The walls are lined with chrome do-dads and serious race equipment. Looking deeper we see lots of cool hand lettered sings, and vintage awards and photos from years of Drag Strip activities. Heading to the back rooms we find the well-used machine shop, fully equipped with mills, lathes and other heavy machinery needed to crank out high performance engines. Check out the inventory of cylinder heads, cranks and blocks waiting to roar again. After showing up unannounced, Phil gave us free reign to wander around the entire shop and shoot some photos. It was a great experience chatting with Phil about the old days and hearing a few war stories of all the past names and personalities that have passed through Blair’s over the years. We bought a few t-shirts, thanked Phil for the hospitality and headed out. This experience got me wistfully thinking about my local shop, K&G Speed Associates that closed a few years ago. These remaining speed emporiums need our support, so, when possible, buy local when you can, long live Blair’s Speed Shop!

Our next destination was another Southern California staple of hot rodding, Mooneyes Equipment in Santa Fe Springs. The Moon name and logo is ubiquitous in land speed, drag racing, and all facets of the automotive hobby. From fuel blocks, tanks, and wheel discs to custom accessories for motorcycles, VWs, and trucks Moon Equipment has what you need to add the finishing touch to your ride. I personally have a silver Moon metalflake steering wheel on my race car! The Santa Fe Springs location is part retail store, part shipping warehouse and part fab shop, and part museum. The store is great with so much cool stuff in every square corner. Check out the Ed Roth scale model diorama featuring all Big Daddy’s creations, an amazing amount of detail work is in there. Exiting through the gift shop leads to another room that takes you back in time. Check out the huge display case and shelves full of vintage speed parts and insanely cool artifacts from the history of Mooneyes. And upon turning around, there sits Dean Moon’s personal ’34 hot rod with wire wheels, bobbed fenders, and glowing yellow paint. Adjacent to the roadster is a perfect recreation of the old Mooneyes Dragmaster rail job, complete with a gorgeous Potvin blown little Chevy mill. The dragster was rolled out into the bright sunshine and was simply stunning. The back area of the Moon complex is the shipping and receiving section, nothing too exciting, unless you know the story of Carroll Shelby coming to Moon in 1962 with the idea of building his own sports car. I was standing right where it happened. The lore goes something like Shelby, ever the promoter, was telling all the magazines he had multiple Cobras ready to road test, when he had only one! So right there in in the Moon shop that single Cobra was painted numerous times for the car mag scribes to drive and report on, giving the illusion of a fleet of cars ready to be sold. Wild stuff!

Across the parking lot is the fab shop. Moon tanks and wheel discs are spun, welded and hand finished right there on site. Once again, the laid-back Moon staff gave us carte blanche and we wondered around trying not to bother the dudes actually working. We checked out the machines, tooling, welders and all the other stuff utilized to produce these iconic speed parts. Hanging from the rafters was another complete Dragmaster chassis, and a bitchin’ ‘glass Anglia gasser front end hung on back wall. A few Bonneville and El Mirage running Streamliners with Moon livery were being maintained in house, as well. So much neat eye candy was everywhere.
To paraphrase Ice Cube, “…Today was a good day”.

Us BangShifter’s need to support these places, as they are truly hallowed ground for us hot rodders, we ended the trip by grabbing a few more t-shirts. I went with the classic black and white Mooneyes tee in double fat!

Join the Blair’s Speed Shop Facebook group to check the history:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1460627117571926

And buy something cool from Mooneye Equipment:
https://www.mooneyesusa.com/

The post An East Coasters Tour Of So Cal Hot Rodding History: Mooneyes Shop Tour Photos From Joe Grippo. appeared first on BangShift.com.

The only issue is parking, because WAY more people show up than there are parking spots, so the streets surrounding Mooneyes become packed with cars, trucks, and more. Dean Moon opened this location 60 years ago, and it is pure nostalgia.

It’s cool to visit, and we appreciate Wes Allison heading out there to shoot photos for us.We’ve got two galleries to share, and as always you can click on any photo to make it bigger and to scroll through the slide show.

CLICK HERE IF YOU MISSED OUR PREVIOUS PHOTOS

The post More Mooneyes Open House 2022 Photos From Santa Fe Springs: Rods, Customs, And Race Cars appeared first on BangShift.com.

The only issue is parking, because WAY more people show up than there are parking spots, so the streets surrounding Mooneyes become packed with cars, trucks, and more. Dean Moon opened this location 60 years ago, and it is pure nostalgia.

It’s cool to visit, and we appreciate Wes Allison heading out there to shoot photos for us.We’ve got two galleries to share, and as always you can click on any photo to make it bigger and to scroll through the slide show.

The post The Mooneyes Open House 2022: We’ve Got Photos Of All The Fun Stuff appeared first on BangShift.com.

Some favorites were the Ida Automotive’s absolutely killer supercharged 4 door Willys, a re-creation of one of Rod Ida’s early race cars. Dragster fans were dazzled by a variety of front motored cars like Brian Beattie’s dead nuts resto of Jim and Allison Lee’s Great Expectations II and a few Flathead urged diggers. A great collection of muscle cars and hot hods dared the raindrops, and we were glad they did. Hemi’s, a Boss Mustang, a few sweet station wagons, 55 Chevys and 32 Fords and so much more. Funny Car fanatics found themselves flabbergasted by the latest edition of the Frantic Ford Mustang and Rapid Roy Harris “Bud Man” Arrow roller, resplendent in its original paint and bitchin’ lettering and graphics. Add in a few late models and even a Bonneville Lakester, and there was something for everyone.

Bruce Larson Stoney Creek Barn is filled to the brim with his lifetime collection of Drag Racing and Hot Rodding mementos. Trophies, Awards, destroyed parts, vintage jackets, Fire suits, helmets, Bruce didn’t toss anything away. Larson’s shop is in the basement of his barn and it is open for all to walk through. Check out his current USA-1  ’68 Camaro Nitro burner, vintage tools, and equipment, plus current and used-up parts are all inter-mix with more drag racing artifacts throughout the shop and storage areas. It’s an honor to be able to check it freely. I did a little video throughout the day so I’ll share that also…

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE REST OF OUR PHOTOS FROM BRUCE LARSON’S DRAGFEST

The post Bruce Larson’s Dragfest: Photos From The Drag Racing Event That Is Part Open House, Part Car Show, And Part Bench Racing appeared first on BangShift.com.

We’re always so excited to see what is hiding in the junkyard and this year is no different. Check out these photos, we guarantee you’ll dig them and want to start spending money!

All that being said, Joe’s photos are great and the setting of the cars and trucks against the blazing colors of Fall is about as good as it gets. Click any photo below and see our freshest photos large and in charge, from this very BangShifty gathering in New Jersey.

CLICK HERE IF YOU MISSED THE PREVIOUS PHOTOS FROM FLEMING’S PUMPKIN RUN

The post Junkyard Tour, Race Cars, Hot Rods, Trucks, And More Cool Stuff From Fleming’s Pumpkin Run appeared first on BangShift.com.

Masters has been a friend of BangShift ever since I first wrote up his Rambler, which he still has. I see him often, at events around Kentucky, and every time it’s a handshake, a hello, an offer of water, and some conversation about what’s new in the shop, which always sees project vehicles coming and going. I’ve meant to get back for a couple of years now, but one reason or another kept me away. This time around, I found the time and made the trek eastward to see what was sitting in the garage just off of his house. As usual, I’m both impressed and not surprised in the least. Masters has a taste for a certain era or style of car, and his son Jett, who last time I was there was restoring older bicycles, has gotten into the act as well. In fact, what better place to start than with Jett’s project?

1983 Chevrolet C-10

You like squarebodies? Of course you do, and we do too. This 1983 Scottsdale was supposed to be Jett’s first project and driver, but that isn’t going to be the case, it seems…the lady of the house has laid down the law regarding young Jett learning to drive in anything that does not have an airbag in the steering wheel, so for the time being the project plan is looking more like “shop truck” than anything else. It’s been lowered three inches in the rear, two inches in the front and has some visual tricks and a healthy combination of headers and Pypes exhaust for the small-block under the hood. It’s a nice, mild unit that anyone would be proud to take on and we hope that Mom will back down a bit and let Jett cruise in what he’s worked on.

“Home Grown”, 1955 Ford Fairlane

The last time I was out at the shop, this 1955 Ford Fairlane was the highlight of the trip. You can read up the feature I wrote back in 2015 by CLICKING HERE, but work has happened since the last time you or I saw it. The car had been sold, but a few months ago it returned to the shop. It now runs, with the “mystery” small-block Chevrolet and a TH400 automatic that was in the car last time. The only other update on this car is that Masters was able to get pictures from when “Home Grown” was located in a junkyard near Mason City, Iowa, it’s former haunt:

1968 Chevrolet Camaro

This Camaro hasn’t seen the street since the mid-1980s, when it was converted to this cool Pro Street beast. The car used to race around the Kentuckiana area for years before winding up as Craigslist fodder.  Originally a big-block automatic setup, the Camaro is currently a roller but Masters is working on a new powertrain. Somewhere, Chad is having heart palpitations looking at the shape of this car right now.

1941 Willys

The 1941 Willys looks like one of those old Tootsietoy cars that I used to play with as a kid, gigantic Cragars and all…I love this thing. It is a fiberglass body on a tube frame deal that was built by Bob Stephens out of St. Louis. He raced the car for about a year before Masters purchased it. The engine is a 460ci Chevrolet (.030 over 454) running oval port heads, a .292 camshaft, and 8.0:1 compression on E85 fuel. In it’s current state the Willys is good for about 11.20@118 MPH in the quarter-mile. It’s caged, street-legal, and needs to see something like Rocky Mountain Race Week in a hurry.

There are other cars in the shop, like the Mazda mini-truck, the Rambler and all of the neat artifacts that Masters has collected. There is the 1929 Ford Model A four-door turned pickup truck that comes out every now and then, the 1965 Buick Skylark station wagon that is a neat cruiser, and I’m pretty sure that the “Mr. Jynx” Henry J was sitting in the back corner, still as mysterious as it was when I first started asking questions about it.

If you were to meet Masters in public at a show, you’d never know he was hiding a stash like this and you could drive by his house a thousand times and as long as he doesn’t have one of these machines in plain sight or running, you would never guess what is hiding in the rolling hills. It’s why I love the place and look forward to every update on what’s left and what’s arrived.

The post The Small Shop With The Big Secrets: We Return To Short Street Rod Shop For A New Look-Around! appeared first on BangShift.com.

Vintage Planet is what happens when a German who appreciates American cars meets an American who appreciates German machinery. Robert Hall and Marcus Heurich came together by sheer luck when Heurich answered the Craigslist listing for Hall’s Buick Electra 225, and from that moment forward they have been in the business of buying, selling, consigning and servicing classic iron. Sounds like a match made in Heaven to us, and it doesn’t hurt that it’s the same complex that houses American Powertrain and The Driven Man as well.

As Curt introduced me to Robert, I introduced myself to the nearly 19-foot-long black-and-red 1978 Ford LTD two-door that was occupying a healthy amount of the floor plan in the showroom. A one-owner car that was absolutely doted on since new, this is the nicest LTD of the 1970s I’ve ever seen, period. Then there was the 1971 Chevelle four-door that was also a one-owner, with dog dish caps and it’s 307/Powerglide setup intact, untouched, unmolested. I was trying to hold it together as I bounced from car to car: the Superformance Cobras (they are the distributor in the area), the big-body Mustang that looked like it’d be a riot to rip around the country roads in, the legions of R107-era Mercedes, including a very rare five-speed manual version, the actual 1955 Chevy that belonged to George Jones, a factory-fresh 1986 Trans-Am that was giving me bad ideas, the Cobra R Mustang. I say I was holding it together well, but I’m sure to my tour guides I was squeaking like a kid at the variety and range of what was present.

Then Robert asked if I would like to see the other garage. And that’s where I’ll let you go hunt through the photos for yourself. Just be sure to check out the 1928 REO that still has old travel stickers and a base pass for a location that’s been closed since the end of World War II…

The post Shop Tour: Vintage Planet – A Treasure Vault Well-Hidden In The Hills! appeared first on BangShift.com.

We are going to spread the goodness out over a few days with galleries of each of the three floors. Let’s start out on my personal favorite level, the first floor and the racers. Upon going through the vestibule entrance that has a mid-century diner feeling you are greeted by a breathtaking group of drag cars on the left and stunning road racers on the right. I immediately went left. And boom, Gas Ronda’s A/FX Mustang is the first thing you see. Displayed with the hood suspended, the Mustang’s S.O.H.C 427 is front and center, as it should be. Turning around I was punched in the gut when I saw Mickey Thompson’s Monocoque Mach 1 Funny Car and its blown fuel burning Boss 429. I geeked out and came back to this best several times throughout the day and reveled in all the details. The drag racing wing also showcases Phil Bonner’s ’68 Cobra Jet Super Stocker and the Dead End Kids Top Fueler. Along the wall were a few early roadsters with drag history. Each car is displayed with a plaque telling the history of each vehicle.

Staggering into the next room we found a cross section of road racing Fords and Mercurys. Like vintage Trans Am? Smokey Yunick’s black and gold ’69 Boss 302 cheater car lives here, and it is absolutely sinister looking. How about Dan Gurney’s Cougar sitting door handle to door handle with George Follmer’s Boss Mustang with the original Bud Moore Engineering ramp truck as the back drop. Crazy. There’s even some old time Bud Moore NASCAR stuff, I was digging the ‘70’s era David Pearson driven Torino. Meyer is a racer too and just about all his cars are track ready at any given moment. To that end, he has a fully equipped fab and restoration shop in house, with a few interesting projects underway, check out the photos. Some of the coolest road racers in the collection are from the IMSA and Camel GT Series of the ‘80’s, we were going nuts over the Roush Mustangs, Cougars and Merkurs. Very heady stuff.

Bridging the gap between street and track, Ross Meyer has some bad ass big and small block Cobras, a few Allard’s and a bitchn’ little ‘50’s era homemade sports car. While the cars are the attention grabbers don’t sleep on all the vintage signage and racing posters covering the walls. Hanging from the ceiling are amazing Radio Controlled airplanes of every type. Cool stuff everywhere and were just on the first floor! 3Dog is not open to the public, so we were very appreciative to be able to get in there with a group of gearheads for a Saturday afternoon. Next, we head upstairs to see what the next mind blower is awaiting us. Stay tuned.

The post Incredible Photos: We Tour 3Dog Garage – Is This America’s Greatest Car Collection? appeared first on BangShift.com.

The post Road Trippin’: Stumbling Into The Home Of An Iconic Automotive Brand While Cruising Vermont appeared first on BangShift.com.