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Catagories

Chevy, Racing, Restoration

Rat Rod

One of the hot rod trends that has developed in the last decade or so has been the “Rat Rod” movement and lifestyle. It started on the West Coast with gearheads building early rods using not-so-pristine bodies in primer, not a lot of chrome, plain steel wheels with narrow tires, and often ragged upholstery. In other words, 1932-40 Chevys and Fords like they used to showcase in those cheesy, 1960’s era teenaged, hot rodders-from-hell Universal International car flicks. Today’s Rat Rod owner often wears retro jeans, T-shirts with a pack of Lucky’s rolled up in the sleeve, and have a girl friend with too many tattoos, mesh stockings, platform heels, poodle skirts, and flaming red hair. (Not that there is anything wrong with that). If there is a problem it is the Rat Rod movement has developed into a clique with more rules than the IRS handbook. But here in the Midwest, where we found 18-year-old Jesse Sutton and his ’40 Chevy pickup, the Rat Rod movement isn’t quite so structured. For some young hot rodders, building a Rat Rod offers them the opportunity to build a hot rod without investing a lot of money and at the same time express their creativity. I live in a hot-rod neighborhood where burnouts and yard cars aren’t an issue. Jesse’s dad, Dennis, is an avid collector, builder and restorer of 1955-63 Chevy cars and parts, is my neighbor. His passion is four-door ‘55-56-57 Chevys, but anything with a bowtie gets his attention. As such he can be found at all of the local farm, machine shop, gas station, or car auctions looking for Chevys and Chevy parts. It was at one of these auctions that Dennis and his sons, Jesse and Thomas, came to find the ’40 Chevy pickup you see here. When they found it about the only part of the old truck that was real Chevy was the dog house, running boards chassis and rear end. The rest of the car consisted of parts from here and there. It even featured an old bedstead that might have been a roll bar, a pickup bed of an unknown origin and (need we say?) it was pretty beat up. When they found the truck Jesse was just 16 and, after working on his dad’s stuff since he was able to walk, was ready to build his own hot rod. Dad decided the old stovebolt pickup would make a good project, so he paid $1400 cash for it at the action and took it home to our hot rod ‘hood. The deal Jesse and his dad struck was that Jesse would do all of the work to make the truck into a rod. He could use whatever parts and pieces his dad had around, but he had to do the job all by himself. When they got the project home, the first thing Jesse did was disassemble it, throwing the non-Chevy truck bed and rusted out ’40 chassis away. By this time Jesse had decided on making the truck a Rat Rod project and dad agreed but, since they weren’t part of the design, he made Jesse restore and primer the running boards, front fenders and hood side covers so they could be stored for use at a later date. Once that was done Jesse began working on the frame. He found a ’39 Chevy truck and salvaged that frame. He strengthened it with 2x4 square tubing and then added a pair of Quarter-Max traction bars and some shocks to the stock ’39 rear end housing. The rear wheels and brakes are original ’39 Chevy as are (possibly) the tires. The only non-stock components are a pair of axles out of a ’67 Chevy. The front suspension is a stock straight axle from under a ’41 Chevy. Jesse added some junkyard Chevy disc brakes and fabricated the entire front suspension and steering. A stock 350 turbo trans is used. The engine is a 350 that is completely stock except for a Comp Cams hydraulic stick that had no numbers, a Barry Grant Demon carb on a Weiand aluminum intake manifold, and headers that Jesse fabricated and wrapped himself. The interior is Spartan to say the least, but Jesse does have an Indian blanket he breaks out for cruising. The steering column is from a ’64 Chevelle and the dash is from a ’54 Chevy. Since the young man lives across the street from me, I was able to observe him spend 18 months and 900 of his dollars to put this car on the street. I can attest that he did every bit of work on the car. Dad gave advice but did no labor. I’m also the one who convinced him to do a burnout after we had shot the feature. He had no problem smoking the hard, narrow, farm implement tires on the rear of the rod. He was having a blast. You ask where the next generation of hot rodders are coming from. In this case, it’s Missouri, where you can find Jesse Sutton working at Wise Speed shop when he isn’t driving his Rat Rod or working on the primo Chevelle he drives to school and work.