April 22, 2025 • 54 mins
Click here to tell us about your favorite car, car story or automotive trivia !
Join Doug and Christian on To All The Cars I’ve Loved Before as they reflect on several epic car museum—visiting the Tallahassee Auto Museum, AACA Museum in Hershey, and more—and dive deep into automotive culture, automotive history, and restoration stories.
On this episode of To All The Cars I’ve Loved Before, Doug and Christian take you on an immersive ride through car museums—from the Tallahassee Auto Museum to the AACA Museum in Hershey—uncovering automotive culture, car history, and restoration stories. Guest Andrew, a volunteer firefighter and paramedic, shares his automotive adventures: learning to drive on a $100 VW Bug, rescuing an East German Trabant, and chasing minimalist beloved cars like a ’49 Chevy coupe and the legendary 1948 Tucker. He also reveals how family road trips and creative homemade scooter rods fuel car memories and inspire a lifelong passion for cars.
Whether you’re an automotive enthusiast or simply love classic cars, car lifestyle, and car stories, this episode delivers insider tips for planning family road trips to top car museums, inspiring tales of automotive experiences and two‑stroke surprises, and a deep dive into the vehicle culture that connects us all. Tune in now and let your love for cars rev to life.
New episodes drop every other Tuesday. Please Follow, Like, and Subscribe to be the first to hear our latest content and past episodes - https://linktr.ee/carsloved
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome back planet Earth to All the Cars I've Loved
Before your automotive podcastwhere, hey, we talk about life
lessons through cars and we knowthat every car tells a story.
Because this is what we get,email after email, text after
text, phone call after phonecall, engagement after
engagement.
We have a lot to get to today.
(00:24):
Check us out carslovecom, andremember to, or the show.
If you find it interesting,we're going to run into you at
the nearest Cars and Coffee, orthe nearest car show, as the
weather's changing here.
We're going to get to that in aminute.
Make sure you're following,downloading, sharing, help us to
(00:45):
kind of get the word out as wecan here.
And, very important, we'resaying as the weather changes
here in Florida.
You won't believe, doug, thisstunning weather transformation.
We've gone from 80 degrees with80% humidity to about 76% with
(01:06):
80% humidity.
I pulled out the parka and thethermal socks.
You know how it is right.
You got that.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yet we're in the 50s and 60s now.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
In fact, I think it was 49 degrees this morning.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
How many igloos do you bet, do you and the kids
make?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
oh you just used to live up here.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
You're just spoiled, can't do it.
Can't do it, man, I cannot doit.
But hey, we did want to mentionhere moving away from weather.
All right, so get out and enjoythe communal events with cars.
They're happening down here onthe Gulf Coast too, as the
weather changes.
But we're real happy we'restarting to get a lot of
(01:57):
responses coming in from ourepisode with Nicole Johnson.
Check it out.
Just a huge thank you to her.
She was a blast to talk with.
We mentioned her name inpre-show prep to today's guest
who pivoted to a wall and ofcourse he's got.
He's got some some monstertruck love there too.
So yeah, just wanted to haveyou been in touch with her
recently, or have we have weheard back from her?
(02:20):
She was so gracious with hertime she's been so busy, you
know she talked about contentcheck out her youtube channel.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Check out um.
We have a great link toeverything um carslopecom, slash
nicole johnson, and it'll takeyou to all her stuff perfect.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah, her show detour is a trip.
It is so much fun Check it out.
What else were we talking abouthere?
So the past few weeks we'vebeen talking a bit about car
themes in pop culture, in music,in movies, in books, in TV
shows.
A little bit of a differentcurveball today, and this is
(03:00):
going to be a callback later ontoday, today's show is we pull
Andrew into the discussion.
But car museums, car museums.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
Doug and.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
I had this bucket list item.
Well, this podcast was a bucketlist item, so we did the check
that one off.
But when the kids his kids areat the house, my kids are at the
house we're going to go on thisworld epic, worldwide legendary
car museum tour.
Many in italy, germany,obviously, but detroit, you got
(03:34):
it.
West coast, east coast,everywhere.
You know.
There's a really neat one inhere.
This just popped into my mindand I'm gonna say it apropos of
nothing.
It's the tallahassee automuseum, which doug has been to
neat, neat place.
You would not believe the cars,it's also got boats in the
collection, antique cashregisters, anything mechanical.
(03:57):
This place has it in spades.
So we went there before.
I've taken my kids there.
It's a few hours down I-10.
And check it out if you can.
But one that came to mind wasthe we want to give a quick
shout-out here too was the AA.
Oh, let's see, I thought I hadit here.
The Museum in Hershey,pennsylvania, the.
(04:20):
Oh goodness, I had it up.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
AACA America's Transportation Museum.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Yeah, blast, so much fun.
Vintage Pontiacs Did they havelike a Duesenberg, a Bugatti, a
bunch of Tuckers, et cetera, etcetera.
So yeah, we just wanted to getthe conversation going.
Send us some notes, send ussome emails.
If you've been to one, what wasyour experience?
What did you like?
(04:49):
Which one Doug's been to?
The Peterson Took your kids tothe Peterson on the West Coast,
right, no, not the kids, theywouldn't have lasted there but
the Peterson.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
I spent four hours there and I needed more time.
Just getting started, yeah,just getting started.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Yeah, just getting started with it.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Excellent, but as I often do, and I seem to not be
able to not get through anepisode without saying it, at
the museum in Hershey which, bythe way, is near Hershey Park,
which is the world of chocolateis there.
Hershey Park is awesome.
I took my son there at the endof this summer.
They have.
(05:25):
You have to check to make sureit's on display.
They have the only DeLoreanprototype remaining in the world
.
There were two.
There is only one left.
It is there and it is soawesome seeing it, especially
side by side with a, the actualdelorean itself.
(05:46):
So that car that helped him,you know, get the rest of the
money he needed to prove that hecould build a car is uh just
yeah, gorgeous, fantastic yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Before we introduce andrew real quick, just wanted
to pop in with a little bit moreinformation on the Museum in
Hershey.
Check them out aacamuseumorgAgain, aacamuseumorg, it's all
one word.
It's at 161 Museum Drive inHershey, pennsylvania, hours
(06:22):
nine to 5.
I think they're open daily.
Very reasonable, neatexperience.
So check that out.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Christian.
We'll link to them just to makelife easier for the listeners.
So it'll be carslovecom slashAACA.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Good deal, good deal.
Thank you for that.
And with no further ado, we gotto bring in today's guest,
who's got so many really goodstories, interesting experience.
So how did Andrew come intoyour life?
Speaker 2 (06:52):
Doug yeah, so it's a.
It's one of those stories thatinvolves coffee and Facebook and
I just happened to see on Ilive on what Andrew would call
the Western Shore of Maryland.
He lives on the Eastern Shoreof Maryland and I just happened
to see that the Cars and Coffeein.
(07:15):
Let's see what is it.
Is it Queenstown?
Queenstown?
Thank you, I always want to sayQueensland.
In Queenstown was somebody wasgoing to have a Trabant.
I'm like I got to go there.
I got to meet this guy and youknow, in the small world we live
in, I happen to mention to ourbuddy, james McRae, and he's
(07:37):
like oh yeah, andrew, andrew'sgot the Trabant.
You should definitely interviewhim for your podcast.
You should definitely interviewhim for your podcast.
And I went to this small,really nice, you know, they're
all great but just different,meeting different people than I
would meet normally around town.
And there's Andrew, onlyTrebant there, and so you know
(08:03):
it.
And we've stayed in touch.
He's referred me to, he'sreferred me to some other cars
and coffees that I have to go to.
And you know, andrew, I justsaw today the Spy Museum is
having a maybe I saw it from youthey're having a Trabant parade
(08:23):
.
It was from you Now I remember.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
And so that's in DC in November and I assume your
Trabant will be there.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Well, sadly, no, sadly no.
My wife and I we're localcoordinators for one of the big
au pair agencies and that secondweekend in november is always
our national meeting wherehundreds of the local
coordinators get together andand do training and networking
(08:51):
together.
And so every year I miss theparade of trabanz which is tied
to that, um, the second weekendof november, because it's, uh,
the closest weekend to to whenthe wall came down and the
anniversary of the wallcrumbling and when Trabant's
left East Germany, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
And there's a great story and connection with your
wife and Trabant's and hernative country, country of
origin.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
Yeah, so my wife.
I've been a car guy almostlonger than I can remember from
matchboxes driving on my knees.
And then I was five, maybe six,I think I was five when we had
a family movie night and I sawthe movie American Graffiti for
the first time.
Of probably a thousand timesI've seen it, I bet.
(09:45):
But I've been a diehard car guyand, unlike a lot of fellas, my
parents didn't care about cars.
I didn't have an uncle oranybody to show me, so I
probably destroyed many carsbefore my late teenage years
when I finally got connected tosome, some fellows who could,
(10:05):
who could teach me the right way.
Uh had a great farm.
A friend who was a farmer, um,that taught me how to, how to
work on stuff and repair stuffand take care of stuff.
He sold me my very first car,um, which was a 69 VW bug.
I bought it.
It was a hundred dollars.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Uh, and at the age of 10, I was, you know, helping to
feed cows and clean.
It doesn't even sound legal 10.
Speaker 3 (10:33):
We're on the Eastern shore in Maryland.
We're like 40 years behindeverybody else, especially in
those days Right.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
So um, he didn't have it registered.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
He wasn't driving it, though we did have somebody
recently who I did drive it alot, oh, but it wasn't
registered.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
We did, we did have somebody on recently, uh, or we
did a recording with somebodywho's from uh south dakota and
they can get a license at age 14out there, and he had one at
age 14 really that's fine.
Speaker 3 (11:00):
I I got my my first license, uh, at the age of 15 in
maine, because at the time thatwas that was the age and I was
there for boarding school in myfreshman year or so.
I thought it was very funny toget a lot of speeding tickets
because Maine didn't have anyreciprocity agreement with
Maryland.
So I'd come to Maryland and getspeeding tickets and laugh
about them.
And then when I returned homeand got my Maryland license at
(11:24):
the age of 16 and immediatelygot an invitation from the NBA
to have a point systemconference because of the six
points that were already on mylicense, it was not so funny
then.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
You know, we had a policy of not having vigilantes
from justice on the program, butI think we just broke it with
this guy.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Holy mackerel.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
I'm the lamb from the law Before we go.
No go ahead, go ahead, go ahead.
I was going to say no, I'm not.
As far as I know, I'm notcurrently wanted.
It's been decades since thosedays.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
We'll see.
I think I hear sirens in thebackground.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
But, andrew, you do work with law enforcement, you
do work with first responders,you do work with firefighters
and I know we really jumped intoyou a little bit, but, if you
don't mind, tell us, tell ourlisteners, right, I know, tell
our listeners what you do andwhen you're not buying cars for
your family.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
So, yeah, I well, I grew up in the town of
Centerville, which at the timewas about 2,000 people, which
now, you know, years later,decades later it's you know,
there's twice as many houses asthere were people in those days.
But it was sort of a quietlittle town.
There was nothing to do, and soI joined the fire company
(12:41):
because I had I had no noconnection to the neighbors or
or anything.
Um, I went to, uh, you know,and sort of said, hey, this is a
lot of fun, and went to got myEMT license at the age of 16 and
uh, started you know I was a.
I was a volunteer fireman andvolunteer EMT and and sort of
(13:01):
parlayed into getting my, myparamedic license and a
full-time job.
And here I am, 23 years later,still doing it, and between you
and me, like when I'm in theback of the ambulance and I'm
with the sick and injured, I'mjust as excited and into it as I
(13:21):
was at the age of 16.
Fortunately, I've learned a fewthings along the way and I'm
probably a lot better at it now.
I hope, um, I, um, I, I feellike it keeps me young and and,
uh it, it can be a tough job, um, but you know, I, I think, uh,
and I think before the show wewere talking a little bit and I
(13:43):
said you know, I, I, I would be,I would literally be be hating
my life, rotting underfluorescent lights for eight
hours a day, five days a week,right?
So, um, I worked 24 hour shiftsand, and they can be long and
they can be tough and they canbe easy and they can be
everything in between, but, um,you know it, it really is.
It's a lot of fun and when youwork two days a week, it gives
(14:05):
you a lot of time to for yourhobbies and so if you, you know,
if you have expensive hobbieslike golf and fishing and
traveling, and then you don'tget to play with cars, but if
you play with cars and and youplay with cheap cars like I do,
you know, you get to have a lotof fun.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
And you know you get to have a lot of fun.
I want to thank you for whatyou do.
You could do what I do.
I could never do what you do,and hats all the way off for you
.
My man, that is impressive.
That is impressive.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
And we are the guys who rot under fluorescent lights
, right.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
And tell by my ghastly power.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
Grass is always greener, on your on, at least on
the other side.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
For me, yeah, well, okay, usually because it's
fertilized some kind of way,right good call, good call.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
So my, my big question is did you ever work
off the hundred dollars thatthis, your 10 year old self,
bought the VW buck for?
Speaker 3 (15:07):
I did, and so the fellow who has now passed, but
his name was John Adams and hewas a great friend and mentor.
I was really small when he usedto till the fields near our
house.
Oh, wow, and every day, comingback from school as early as you
know, kindergarten I'd see himbe like oh, there's Mr Adams,
(15:28):
there's Mr Adams.
And I'd insist on getting outof the car and I'd run out to
the field and he'd let me, youknow, I'd climb in the combine
or tractor or whatever and Ijust ride around with him and
and learned, you know, learnedby watching and, uh, you know,
he taught me how to drive andhow to work on stuff and how to
swear, and he taught me a lot oflessons in life?
(15:48):
Yeah, absolutely.
But so, yes, I did so when Iwas around the time I was nine,
I started going to his farm andspending a day.
He'd come pick me up onSaturday morning and we'd start
with going to have breakfast andthen we just sort of do farm
chores and I'd spend all daywith him and he'd bring me home,
you know, around dinnertime and, um, it was a lot of fun and so
(16:13):
, and he would give me $5 a dayfor for working with him, right,
and helping him, as he calledit, although it was, you know,
and I did work off the a hundreddollars, but it's funny because
part way through the hundreddollars, um, I had my first time
driving a tractor towing the,the silage cart.
So this is a feed cart forcattle.
(16:35):
It's about 40 feet long with asingle axle right in the center.
Well, and so we went down thefarm lane, which is probably a
half a mile, and across thestreet and then down maybe
another quarter mile is wherethe silage pit was, where the
feed was.
So the farm John's nephew, bill,and I each had a tractor and a
silage cart and we went out andBill had the loader on his
(16:58):
tractor, so he loaded my cart.
And then he loaded his cart andI helped him get hooked back up
and we took off and I thought,oh, I'm gonna get him right.
And so I made it a race and soI I had that, I had that.
It was john deere 3020 modeland I had it.
Uh, I had it in high gear and Iwas hauling my you know I was,
(17:20):
I thought I was a nascar driver,right, and I I took the turn.
I'll never forget, right, I'mcoming down the road and I took
the turn down the farm lane andI kept going and I'm like I'm
laughing because I had not onlygotten back before Bill, I'd
gotten unhooked and put thetractor away.
And here comes Bill and he'slooking at me and he's just
(17:40):
shaking his head and I'mthinking, oh ha ha, he's mad
because I beat him right.
And he's just shaking his headand I'm thinking, oh ha ha, he's
mad because I beat him rightand I'm really quite proud of
myself and you know I'm 10 yearsold.
And so he gets unhooked and hesays come on, we got to go up to
the house.
And we go to the house and wefind John who had kicked off his
boots already for the day andhe told John.
(18:01):
He said you're going to have tocome help fix this fence.
And I, and he told john, hesaid you're gonna have to come
help fix this fence.
And I'm kind of thinking whatfence?
Speaker 1 (18:10):
oh, not realizing that I tore down about that
fence.
Speaker 3 (18:11):
I tore down about 150 feet of fence because the tire
on the trailer grabbed it and Ihad momentum and, and you know,
full of piss and vinegar and Ijust I never looked back.
Speaker 1 (18:25):
Yeah, they obviously don't cover not taking out split
rail fences when a 10 year oldtakes the driving test.
So so so I gotta ask here wasthe movie footloose based on
your early life?
Speaker 2 (18:39):
I was just gonna say or did I step on?
Speaker 1 (18:44):
stepped on several punchlines here, but okay,
beautiful.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
So the fence got built?
Definitely not.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
All right.
Speaker 3 (18:50):
We had to rebuild the fence.
But you know, one of the what Ithink was one of my earliest
life lessons was as John took mehome that day.
Right, john reached into hiswallet and he handed me $5 for
my day's pay.
And I said I don't deserve that.
And he said you know.
He said you know what.
(19:10):
Everybody makes mistakes.
The important thing is to learnfrom them.
But the deal is you earn $5 aday and you put in a day's work
and here's your pay.
Wow, and it was.
It was a.
You know, it's a moment in mylife I'll never forget and it
was a.
I think it's been a valuablelesson, but you know, it sort of
ties into you know, always dothe right thing because it's the
(19:31):
right thing right and own yourmistakes.
And people make mistakes andlook past.
I mean, there was just, therewas a lot.
At the time I didn't realizehow important that lesson would
be for me.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Yeah, but yeah, well, he made it.
He was obviously a very biginfluence on your life, a big
imprint on your life.
That's so you, just from ayoung age, you just were bitten
with mechanical things, thingsthat got things done, things
(20:04):
that moved gears and stuffabsolutely absolutely um and and
and how and why they work.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
You know I I took a part in an awful lot of stuff
before I learned how to putanything together, gotcha.
But the sequence is important,you know, gotcha and so the next
, let's.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Let's move along to the next car, a 1984 nissan
centra nowhere near as cool asthe trebant no chevy yeah, well,
right.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
So the, the 84 nissan center, gilligan, uh, I bought
from, uh, from some friends offriends of our family, the lures
family, or actually, uh, lesterwas, lures was, was the
daughter's, uh, married namethat had driven the car last.
But car had been through acouple of siblings and it needed
a clutch.
(20:54):
And so, uh, a fellow named TedLester sold me that car for a
dollar and uh, it was about, itwas about 350 bucks to get a
clutch in it and do whateverelse it needed to be on the road
.
And and I was great, I was, Iwas, uh, you know, 15, almost 16
years old, and, um, gilliganwas fantastic and I took my
(21:14):
father and a friend of his namedNeil Muffin out for a ride.
Sort of outskirts of town therewas some sightseeing.
There was a we always referredto it as the Russian embassy,
but it was really just anoff-site compound that belonged
to the Soviet Union.
Outside of Centerville it's aplace called Pioneer Point,
(21:35):
which was and you should Googleit, it's a really neat history
place.
Historically, the man who builtthe house had a bunch of kids
and he was a GM executive.
So the house I think theoriginal house had like 12 or 13
bedrooms, jeez, and it's this,you know, probably I don't know,
I'm not sure how big theproperty is, probably 50 or 100
acres and it's sort of where theCorsica River hits the Chester
(21:59):
River, a big waterfront andbeach and stuff.
But we used to like to go backthere and of course there were
guards and it was considered tobe Soviet soil right, so we
weren't allowed too far backthere and as we were leaving,
you know, it was a big, big mudpuddle in the road and you know,
doing like 30 miles an hour andjust kind of blast through it
(22:19):
and the road was washed out andso the front end of the car went
underwater and water came upand, you know, slid off the
windshield and somehow we hadenough momentum to bounce
through it and the car was knownas gilligan from that point on.
And gilligan lived a verydifficult life with a teenage me
, um, not taking very good careof it but um, but it was fun and
(22:42):
I was, you know, of all thekids I went to school with and
grew up with, I was, you know,except for the farm kids, I was
the only one who could drive astick.
You know, another another, uh,life skill learned from John
Adams and farming yeah the whole.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
So driving it into the.
The first thing that came to mymind was the scene in Risky
Business when Joel Goodman putshis father's car into Lake
Michigan.
So I dig how we're just kind ofgoing through the movie theme
that we brought up kind of atthe top of the show.
So from American graffiti toFootloose, to Risky Business, I
(23:22):
want to bring in another filmhere and let's take the next two
cars as a couplet, if we can, aduo the Chevy Coupe that you
also own in 1949, as well asyour dream car, the Tucker 48.
So can we talk a little bitabout where those Tucker was its
(23:43):
own film.
Let's talk, if we can, aboutthose two cars together, because
when we met before the show,andrew was walking us around his
property and showing us hey,cars in his barn and the Chevys
here, trabants here.
So what struck you about theChevy Coupe?
(24:04):
Why did you have to have thatone?
Speaker 3 (24:06):
Well, so the Chevy Coupe, the 49 to 51 Chevys, have
always had a soft spot.
I really like the lines, right,and so one thing that we
haven't gotten into yet and youguys don't know about me is that
I'm a colorblind car guy and soI very much am about the shapes
because that's what I payattention to.
(24:27):
So paint jobs don't impress me,but I, I can you know I'm I
really like cars and I reallypay attention to their shapes
and and so that that era chevyis just very appealing to me.
Um, I had, actually I hadn'treally thought about the
similarities with that and theand the tucker, um, but I, you
know, I was probably.
(24:48):
I don't remember exactly whenthe Tucker movie came out, but
it was fairly fresh and Iwatched it and the film had it
drug me in much in the same waythat American Graffiti did, in
that it just I was fascinatedand I was fascinated with the
story and the characters.
And for those not familiar, theTucker story is story, is is,
(25:13):
you know, it's like, it's likedante's divine comedy, right, I
mean it's, it's, it's so sad andit's so wonderful and so
inspiring, um, and it just it'ssuch a the triumph of the
underdog and and much a lot ofpeople would say like oh, he
didn't triumph, right, but hereally did.
That's right.
And we're still talking abouthim, and it's still.
He brought a lot of importantthings to light and innovation,
(25:37):
despite the fact that no onewanted to talk about how
intrinsically unsafe automobileswere.
Right Because people weren'tusing seatbelts, they didn't
have padded dashes, they didn'thave safety glass, they didn't
have disc brakes weren't popular.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
Cycle pops are yeah safety glass.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
They didn't have disc .
You know, disc brakes weren'tpopular.
Yeah, right, right.
So the.
You know, tucker originally hadthe fenders and with with the
outside lights were the onesthat turned and the psychops was
supposed to be fixed.
But in wind tunnel testing theyrealized that the fenders were
were rudders and they made thecar very unstable and unsafe.
So, uh, from a safetystandpoint, having the, the, the
defenders to be fixed and thoseheadlights be fixed, and then
(26:16):
having that psych ops eye and itonly comes on when the steering
wheels turn, so when you'rejust driving straight, actually
the third eye is not on.
Um, so it uh, oh, that I didn'tknow, and um and the uh.
So I was, yeah, I becamefascinated with the, with the
Tucker story and and you knowI'm when, when most of my
there's no need either and carshow, and a buddy of mine and I
(26:37):
had gone up there for the dayand that's when I saw or at
least I thought I saw my veryfirst in-person Tucker and I
(26:58):
fell to my knees almost sobbingbecause this car from a, from a
historical significantstandpoint, the car had been
heavily modified and I washeartbroken And'm like who
messes with a tucker?
Right?
I mean like you don't?
You don't touch up a picasso,right you?
Speaker 1 (27:16):
know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
Well said right right , and so I just and and there's
some things that are justfragile and precious in life,
and you know I'm all aboutmodifying cars, but, like you,
don't mess with a tucker and Icouldn't find anybody around
this car on display, but it wasairbagged, the windows were
tinted, it was, you know.
It was painted up, interior wasdone.
(27:38):
It had a cadillac north star v8in the back of it, and I'm like
who does this right?
And I'm really pretty upsetabout it.
And it had these amazing wheelson it, though, and you know, in
the late 90s, early 2000s, noone was running like a 20 inch
wheel, but they were like 20inch wheels, and there, other
than the Tucker family crest,which was about an inch and a
(27:59):
half tall, there was nothing onvisible on the face of the wheel
.
It was just a solid wall ofpolished, you know, aluminum or
chrome or whatever it wasaluminum or chrome or whatever
it was and there was no placefor hubcap, there was no seam
anywhere to hide the lug nuts.
There were no lug nuts, and Iwas fascinated and I'm like that
that was eaten at me, and foryears it ate at me.
(28:20):
Because I couldn't findpictures of those wheels online.
I searched wheel manufacturers.
I couldn't find them.
I couldn't find them and, youknow, fast forward to probably
around 2006,.
And I'm on eBay one nightlooking for parts because I was
building a Model, a hot rod, andI saw this buy it now for $125,
(28:42):
a complete drop axle front endwith disc brakes on it and split
wishbone suspension.
And I'm like this is crazy.
This is worth like a thousandbucks.
Who would?
Who in their right mind wouldsell this for $125, right?
So I whacked it by it now and Isent a message to the seller
and I said listen, this lookslike just what I'm looking for.
The price seems to be a littlebit cheap.
(29:03):
So if it's a mistake, justcancel the auction.
There's no hard feelings, right?
Because if I had made a mistakeas the seller, I would want
someone to be fair with me,right?
And the next morning I get anemail back from the guy and he
said nope, price is right, Ijust didn't want it to sit
around, I don't need it.
Glad you can use it, price tomove.
And I'm like, man, this is socool, right?
Wow.
So I drive up to the JerseyParkway and go pick this thing
(29:29):
up the following weekend and Igo to this house and there's
this sort of bland looking verylarge barn behind the house and
that's where I meet him andbehind the barn is my front end
and loaded up in the truck and Isaid, man, this is a beautiful
property.
I said if I had a barn likethis I'd have a million cars.
He said, oh, you want to seeinside, right?
So I walk inside the barn andI'm floored because outside is,
(29:53):
like you know, rustic, looks oldyou know, kind of kind of tatty
right inside.
Right, it's amazing, theremust've been at least a dozen
cars inside.
There's several lifts, there'sbillet, aluminum everywhere,
there's a CNC machine, there'slathe, there's mills, there's
all this stuff.
And I'm like, pinch me, right,I think I died.
I'm in heaven, right here it is.
(30:14):
And uh, and I said, man, Idon't, I don't mean to pry right
, but like what is it that youdo that you get to play like
this right?
And he said, oh, I have a shopdown the street right.
I build hot rods.
And I'm like man, this, is crazy, and so he shows me, shows me,
a lot of this the projects thathe's got going on and the, the
(30:35):
38 ford that he had bought thathe took my front axle out of
because he switched it over toan independent front suspension
to be his daily driver.
And so and he's telling me, hesaid, yeah, he said we actually
I had a car at SEMA not so longago.
It's a Willys, I call it theswitchback, but it was all sheet
(30:56):
metal, hand-fabricated.
So it's a tribute car, but it'sall metal, no fiberglass or
anything.
And I'm like, oh man, I'd loveto see that.
He says, oh sure, come on down.
So attached to the house there'sa three car garage and he opens
up one of the garage doorwaysand I see the most beautiful car
I could remember and this thingwas immaculate.
And I'm like, dude, this is socool.
And it had those wheels on itand I dropped to the ground.
(31:20):
I'm like, all right, explainthese wheels to me.
How do these work?
Where do you get them in?
I saw these wheels once on aTucker in Atlantic City and he
said, oh, I built that car too.
It's over here.
You want to see it?
Speaker 1 (31:31):
And.
Speaker 3 (31:32):
I about wet my pants.
I'm like, wait, that's yours,with the North Star and
everything.
And he was so surprised that Iknew it.
So the guy's name is rob idaand he and his father um,
actually his grandfather wasgoing to be a tucker dealer and
never got a car for hisdealership never got a car which
(31:52):
was part of the problem whichis part of the problem, right,
and so he and his father, bob,built a fiberglass tucker they
had.
they had a lot to do with thecar, with with the movie and the
Tucker family, and they have.
Rob and the Ida automotive teamin New Jersey has restored more
Tuckers than anybody else.
They are like the world'sauthority on everything that
(32:15):
there is Tucker and they workvery closely with the
grandchildren of Preston Tucker.
um so and the, at the end of theday, the answer to the wheels
was that rob item made them andthe lug nuts go in, the bolts go
in from the inside, like fromthe back side of the car and
they're just super cool.
But he is such a neat guy and Icontinue to follow him and stalk
(32:37):
him on social media andeverything and and, uh, we've,
we've been in contact a fewtimes and I say like, oh hey,
you probably don't remember me.
And he's like sure, I sure I do, andrew, what's up, man, and
I'm like dude, this is.
Speaker 1 (32:47):
I love it and that's interesting.
You mention that you're drawnto the shapes of those two
automobiles Right, the 48 Tucker, and your car, the 49 Chevy,
your car, the 49 Chevy.
They to me I don't know how tosay it, but there's kind of this
, this classic minimalist vibebefore the big fins of the
(33:16):
fifties and the lights in in alot of the chrome accents really
took over.
Maybe that's not fair, what?
What do you think?
Is that at all accurate?
Speaker 3 (33:21):
You know, I know, I think it is accurate and I think
that I, you know, I appreciatevery, you know, I appreciate all
kinds of different cars and fordifferent reasons, right, but
but cars of that era and notnecessarily that era.
So I'd put, like the, like theC3 Corvettes, you know, very,
very sort of swoopy and curve,you know it's like, it's like
(33:42):
the hottest girl in school,right, not necessarily the prom
queen, right, but the girl withthe, with the curves, and just
there's just something about herman and every time you look at
her you get that warm feelinginside and you just smile and
your body is like poof, rightand that's it, man, and that's.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
I have to have a glass of ice water after all
this, my goodness, all right,moving on.
Yeah, let's talk about andwe've alluded to this in the
discussion the Trabant and howdid?
We talked a little bit abouthow that came in your life, but,
Doug, you wanted to hear alittle wife, and when he first
(34:17):
saw the Trabant, or learnedabout Trabant, and I think it
was on a trip to Iceland.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
Yes, so my wife is from Iceland and she introduced
me to a whole world of cars thatI didn't because, of course,
before the internet and allthese YouTube guys and channels
and whatnot, there's a lot ofcars that never came to the US
and couldn't you know, theTrabants didn't really leave
(34:54):
East Germany until the wall camedown in 89, right and so, and
there's still, you know, to thisday, there's probably somewhere
around 200 of them in the US Tothis day.
There's probably somewherearound 200 of them in the US.
Having a Trabant and dailydriving a Trabant is a lot like
being maybe the fifth coolestguy at fat camp.
It's really not a trophy thatanybody wants, but it's fun
(35:21):
Through the cars that I've ownedand the cars that I've fined
after and bankrupted myself withand whatnot over the years.
The struggle for horsepower is acontest.
Frankly, my pockets aren't deepenough and my arms aren't long
enough to win it.
And even if you do the guydriving around in the Bugatti
Veyron, chiron, whatever, youcan know, you can't, you can't,
(35:43):
you can't go 300 kilometers anhour on on route 50 on the way
to ocean city, right, not forvery long at least.
And so you know part of part ofbeing a paramedic is having
some some sense ofresponsibility for others around
me and safety and all that kindof stuff.
So fun cars had become moreimportant to me than power and
(36:05):
powerful.
Cars are fun, right, and Doug,you know what I'm talking about.
Man, you drive a DeLoreancrying out loud, right?
So it's a quirky car.
That's not a great car either,but it's a great conversation
starter and it's a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 (36:19):
And it's history, and it's history, it's American
history, and American historyand automotive history.
Meet your history.
You got it?
Speaker 3 (36:26):
yeah, exactly and, and so the uh, you know, with
the trab on.
So, um, in, in one of my tripsto iceland, uh, because, you
know, my wife is from there andwe go frequently.
Fortunately, I love it there.
Um, so, uh, a friend of hersthat she, you know, grew up with
, was daily driving a trabant,um, and, and so, uh, I said, oh,
(36:47):
wow.
She said, oh, you gotta see,you gotta.
You gotta see buoy's car, yougotta see buoy's car.
So, um, buoy, who is uh, who hasbecome a friend of mine over
the years too, not only did heshow me his trabant, but in 2014
, in the snow, I got to drivehis Trabant, and it's the second
time in my life somebody saidhey man, just punch the gas and
(37:08):
sidestep the clutch, let her ripRight.
Um, the other time it happenedto me, it was uh, it was, it was
in a, it was in a Chevelle witha big block, uh, and things
held together and that was a lotof fun.
But the Trabant was somehowmore fun with uh, and and he had
, he had upgraded the cylinderheads on his, so I think he was
putting out almost 26 horsepower, uh, compared to the eight,
(37:32):
compared to the 18 that minedevelops.
Uh, so, um yeah, but it was.
It was a lot of fun, man, andit was.
It was as much fun as being alittle kid the first time you
drive a go-kart, except maybethe go-kart was a little bit
more refined.
So the Trabant was terrible andI was, so I was taken aback.
(37:53):
The shifting pattern of theTrabant is very strange.
It's not like a three on a tree.
The shifter comes out of thedash and it has a sort of
Imagine shifting a three on thetree with your left foot right,
and that that's what it's liketo drive a trivont for the first
time.
It just feels so unnatural andyou're, and you're sort of
(38:13):
looking for the gears and tryingto figure out the pattern.
And pushing, pulling, oh wow,when to go up, when to go down?
Um, right, and this and thisangry little weed eater engine,
that's, that's screaming, youknow, and you feel like you're,
you know, driving a trabant atany speed two-stroke engine
right, it is, it is, it's atwo-stroke, and it's two
Speaker 2 (38:33):
cylinders right, yeah yeah it is.
Speaker 3 (38:35):
And I I laugh when I pop my hood and people are like
wait, it has two coils.
I say, yeah, this is theperformance model, but in truth
they're all that way right,because they're both just kind
of on.
But no, it's a super simplething and by anybody's standard
it's a terrible, terrible car.
(38:59):
Communist east germany, andhaving a lack of resources, a
lack of skilled labor force, youknow, a lack of funding, a
desperate need for automobiles,you know, from 19 they so mine
are the, mine is the 601 model,uh, and from 1963 to 1989, they
built about three million carsand they're rumored to be as
(39:21):
many as half a million of themstill on the road.
And so, by my metrics, it's nota terrible car, right, it's a
terrible car by 2024 standards,that's right.
It is so reliable and easy towork on and just, you know,
(39:44):
you're not going to get anywherein a hurry.
I say, I joke, I said, well, itdoes zero to 50 in about a
minute and it'll do 50 to 60 inabout three minutes, more, right
?
So, um, it works.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
And it's so much fun.
You know, absolutely does.
So.
I think yours was was it yours?
The third generation of themodel and one that was so so
passable as vehicles there, andit was the mass-produced one.
Speaker 3 (40:28):
So the majority of them are limousines or the
two-door sedan version thatseats four adults, and then mine
is the combi or the wagonversion.
Um, interestingly, you know thethe rear door on the wagons is
all sheet metal.
Um and but uh, other than thepanel just below the grill, it's
(40:48):
the only sheet metal that youcan see on the exterior of the
car.
The cars are made with a.
It's like a fiberglass, it'ssimilar to fiberglass, but the?
It's a resin impregnated uh,fibers, and it was.
They use recycled clothing andblankets and things to to source
the fibers yep from cottonwhatever they have there's
(41:08):
actually there's great youtubevideos about travant production
and you can see guys you knowcutting, oh man, trimming the
edges of the panels and and youknow there's a couple of them
like literally, like there's uhon the assembly line, you know
they're trying to fit the doorsand so the guy will open the
door and stick a block of woodin it and slam the door about
five times.
Then he pulls the wood out andhe closed the door.
He's like, eh, that's good.
Speaker 2 (41:29):
Close it off.
Yeah, close it off.
Speaker 3 (41:33):
But it was funny.
One of the days I was drivingthe TriVant around town and this
woman starts waving at mefuriously and I thought, oh, she
just thinks my car's on fire,right, because the smoke coming
out of the tailpipe.
But she's waving me in and so Ipull over and she was so
(41:54):
excited.
She said oh my God, it's aTrabant.
It's a Trabant.
And I said okay, she knew right.
So we got something in commonand I said how do you know
Trabant?
And she said well, years ago myhusband and I went to Budapest
for business and there was aproblem with our rental car
reservation and we couldn't geta car and someone sold us a
Trabant in the parking lot.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
And we drove it around.
Speaker 3 (42:16):
Budapest for two weeks and when we went back to
the airport we just left thekeys in it and we gave it away
and left it there and she saidshe said does yours have hand
warmers?
and I said what?
And she said and she runsaround to the back of the car
and she looks at my back windowand she says, sort of in dismay,
(42:36):
oh, you don't have the handwarmers.
And I said what?
And she said you know the linesthat go across the glass that
keep your hands warm when you'repushing it in the wintertime.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
The performance model ?
Speaker 2 (42:49):
Yes, yeah right, it wasn't the utility model, it was
the performance model.
Yeah, it wasn't the wagonversion.
Yeah, sorry, andrew, to dispela myth.
Is it true that some animalshave actually chewed up parts of
Trabants?
Speaker 3 (43:07):
I'm sure that if they did, they met an untimely
demise, oh sure.
Speaker 1 (43:13):
Yeah the moths were after the wool.
Speaker 2 (43:16):
It's probably not good in the tummy, but I thought
, I read some pigs have eaten,chewed on them.
Speaker 3 (43:23):
Well, I think they were looking for any way to get
rid of them, because they burneda few, I think and realized
that the smoke is super toxic.
And I've heard rumors that theyground a bunch of them up and
use them as winter traction andas an affordable alternative to
(43:43):
sand, Because the cars they dieand they don't go away.
So elemental reclamation is nota thing with Durablast.
Speaker 2 (43:54):
How many Trabants are in the US?
Do you know?
I bet you have a good idea.
Speaker 3 (43:58):
Well, so it's around 200.
It would be difficult to come.
You know, there's a few thathave snuck in under the radar of
customs, um and uh, but there'sa lot of them that are, that
are out and about.
And there's a fella inbaltimore, I've come to know he
has 11 or 12.
He and his son have the what Iknow as the largest collection.
(44:19):
Uh, the first trab onth Ibought was actually with no
motor, uh, or no engine, and Iwas going to put an electric
motor in it, uh, but I bought itfrom a fella in indiana, um,
and he had nine trabants and hewas torn because he said well, I
have one I'll sell you, butit's my only wagon, it's my only
combi and so I'm president, uh,but he, we, we made a deal and
(44:43):
and got that done.
Um and uh, both of those fellowsare big into the parade of
trabants, uh, at the at the spymuseum.
So, uh, mid-november, you know,second weekend of november, in
dc there will be often like 40or 50 trabants and they attract
some ladas and and some, uh,zadastavas and some other, you
you know, soviet cars, and theyset up a cardboard version of
(45:06):
the Berlin wall and they crashedthrough it on the streets.
Speaker 2 (45:09):
Oh, that's neat.
I've got to see that now.
Speaker 3 (45:11):
Yeah, I mean it's yeah, you kind of have to, you
kind of have to.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
And that's a wow.
So between and that's a greattheme for today is cars in
movies, or or cars as theyintersect with movies, car
museums, so that's a wonderfulway to sort of move, to the move
this episode gracefully intothe off ramp.
But before we go here, andrewis doug's.
(45:36):
One of doug's favorite thingsis how this show, this podcast,
has become well unexpectedly, ormaybe expectedly depending
about family, and so he wantedyou to recall some of your
stories with your wife's newrole, about procuring new cars
as well as any as well asanything you do for your kids.
(45:58):
that involves a scooter, whichmade me think of it when you
mentioned earlier kind ofscooters, and fiberglass a
scooter, which made me think ofit when you mentioned earlier
kind of scooters and fiberglass.
Speaker 3 (46:05):
Yeah right.
So I right.
My wife sort of put her footdown.
I have a.
I don't view it as a problem, Iview it as a solution.
Right, clever solution.
Some people think I have aproblem with acquiring cars, and
a lot of times they just findme right.
I mean like if one of you guysstumbled across a Travant that
needed to be rescued or savedright, you'd probably reach out.
Speaker 2 (46:28):
You'd say hey, andrew , you know who to go to.
Speaker 3 (46:29):
Yeah, right, you know a guy now, and so, right, cars
find me and I really don't golooking for them.
But you know, amongst mycollection my wife's least
favorite vehicle is a 1976U-haul truck.
Um, that, uh, that that has a,has a different story, maybe an
episode in and of itself at somepoint.
Um, but yeah, so she told me,she said, listen, you can't have
(46:53):
any more cars, um, and so Isaid, okay, you know.
And then, uh, somebody calledme, a car that I tried to, you
know she had expressed interestin, and I tried to get for her
and couldn't strike a deal.
And about a year later theycalled me and so I made a deal
and I went and got her a 1960Fiat 600 and I titled it in her
(47:16):
name before I brought it homeand she said no more car, you
can't have any more cars.
And I said, honey, this one'snot mine, it's yours and so so
uh see, yeah, well, it was funny.
My, my son really wanted me tomy son and my youngest is six
and he really wanted me to buy a67 cadillac not so long ago.
And I said, buddy, mama's notgoing to be happy if we buy this
(47:39):
car.
It is cool, it's cool, but mamais not going to be happy if we
buy this car.
And he said, daddy, just giveit to her.
I said, buddy, I love whereyour head is.
Doing our best, yeah, we're notgoing to do that, we're not
going to get away with this one,so we're not going to try it.
But now he had a littleconsolation prize too, because
(48:08):
you've done a clever thing withthe scooters and little
fiberglass bodies on them forthe younger folk.
Yeah, so a year ago, in May Mayof 2023, we were at a car show
and some guys that I've come toknow through car shows, through
car shows uh, the big ocean citycar shows, um are looking at
the enthusiasm and my, my son,who five at the time, um was re
(48:29):
is really into cars.
And they said, man, I love hisenthusiasm, he's such a good kid
.
I want to, I want to give himsomething that I'm going to give
him a pedal car body.
That, uh.
But you got to do something.
You guys got to build somethingreally cool with it.
I w I bought it, I was going todo something.
You guys got to build somethingreally cool with it.
I bought it, I was going to dosomething.
I never did it.
It's been sitting on my in mygarage for years.
I want to give it to julian myson's name is julian, right?
So I said, all right, man, hey,thank you so much, uh.
(48:53):
And I wasn't sure if this was areal thing or if it would
follow through, but it did.
And so we get this 1962 chevyimpala convertible fiberglass
pedal car body.
It's literally just a raw bodyand I'm like, huh, so what are
we going to do with this?
And you know, my son is, youknow, is a pretty good size,
(49:13):
height wise for a five-year-oldalready, and I'm like man, he
can ride a two-wheeler, like hedoesn't really want a pedal car.
This is going to be veryshort-lived.
We ought to do something thatyou know that even I could ride,
right, something that'll lastfor a few years.
And so I went on Facebookmarketplace and I bought a
mobility scooter that was nolonger needed and we tore all
(49:36):
the mobility scooter stuff offof it and we laid everything out
and, believe it or not, thewheelbase was perfect.
I had to narrow the scooter alittle bit to get it to fit, um,
but uh, so we we out and,believe it or not, the wheelbase
was perfect.
I had to narrow the scooter alittle bit to get it to fit, but
so we did, and my son, you know, we cleaned up and we sanded it
and we did some body work andhe primed it and he painted it
and we taped off the bumpers andwe did like rattle can chrome
(49:59):
for bumpers and trim around thewindshield and the grill and
stuff.
And we've got it loaded up withLED headlights and taillights
and underglows and he's wonseveral trophies competing at
car shows, not against pedalcars and other little kids, but
he's very proud of his sixtrophies and he has a really
(50:21):
good time with it.
And he said to me he said said,daddy, uh, it's about two months
ago.
He said, daddy, you need ascooter too, so we can cruise
together and I'm like man, howdo I?
Speaker 1 (50:31):
daddy has a problem with that how do I say no?
Speaker 3 (50:35):
and I'm like, well, it's not really a car.
So daddy's not gonna get introuble, loophole right.
And so I go, absolutely, thistime I'm gonna start with the
scooter instead of starting witha body, right, I'll start with
a scooter and see where it goes.
And my 15 year old bonusdaughter.
So she's my, my, the daughterthat came with my wife.
(50:55):
I have, we have four kids total, right?
So my, my oldest is almost 22and she's mine from my first
marriage.
And then I have a bonus sonwho's 20, a bonus daughter who's
15, and we have thesix-year-old.
That's, that's ours together.
Um, but my bonus daughter.
We're driving, you know, drivingdown the highway with her, and
she said, oh god, there's one ofthose trash cans, right, she's
(51:17):
pointing to the tesla cybertruck.
And I thought, huh, what if Ijust get a stainless steel trash
can to put on my scooterchassis, because you know people
refer to these things as trashcans and that would be funny.
And I couldn't find one and Ithought, well, maybe I'll just
get a piece of stainless steelsheet metal and build my own.
And then I thought, wait aminute, I'll just build my own
(51:38):
Cybertruck.
And so my son has been learninghow to use the metal break, and
we've started with aluminumbecause it's a little easier to
work with, and now we're bendingup the stainless steel to make
our Cybertruck mobility scooter,it's just fun.
Speaker 1 (51:54):
Yeah, man, so you and he will be able to cruise
around your property and I thinkthat's the coolest thing.
Doing laps around the Trabant Ithink is going to be fantastic.
So in closing here I gotta askcould we get some pictures of
your scooters at some point andkind of share them with the
(52:15):
listening audience?
Because, I just love what you do, man.
I mean, you're, it's, it'sfamily all the way you.
You're incorporating them atevery step of your passion and I
just think it's great, it wasreally great to meet you and,
yeah, thanks for spending sometime with us.
Speaker 3 (52:47):
Our plan with the scooters is so we'll be at the
big Cruise in Ocean City show inOcean City, Maryland, in May
and we are going to ride in theboardwalk cruise.
So from 27th Street down to theinlet, on the boardwalk there's
a sort of a parade of cars andhe and I are planning on riding
that together.
Speaker 1 (52:59):
That's really neat Side by side.
Speaker 3 (53:01):
So you've already got a deadline, you've got a
deadline to keep you honest andit's something to shoot for.
Well, thank you again, hey itwas great meeting you, Andrew.
Speaker 1 (53:10):
Thanks for spending some time with us this afternoon
, man.
Speaker 3 (53:12):
Yeah man, thank you, guys so much.
All right, please blast.
Speaker 2 (53:15):
See you soon at cars and coffee.
Speaker 1 (53:17):
Yeah, I look forward to it.
Maybe I'll build a.
Speaker 3 (53:20):
DeLorean scooter.
Speaker 1 (53:22):
Yeah, please do, please do yeah.
Speaker 2 (53:26):
And I'll park next to Doug.
Very good, All right guys,thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (53:32):
Thank you for spending time with us.
That's it, boy.
Where do we start here?
The Trabant, the Chevy, all thescooters, the Tuckers that he's
loved before Talking Tuckers,dig it.
The scooters that he's lovedbefore talking tuckers, dig it.
Speaker 2 (53:57):
Oh, the AECA museum that we mentioned before at the
top of the hour has a nicecollection of, I'm going to say,
half dozen, as well assuspension assemblies, possibly
a chassis, I think, a cutawaymotor of the Tucker.
There, too, several motors,including one of the sorry, I'm
doing it again one of theoriginal air-cooled ones.
Speaker 1 (54:05):
Before they made them water-cooled, they came from
helicopters oh yeah, oh, you canalso check out carslovecom
slash acca.
Carslovecom slash acca willtake you by way of our site to
theirs.
That's it, another episode ofthe book.
Have a great week, everybody.
(54:25):
We'll see you soon.
Welcome back planet Earth to All the Cars I've Loved
Before your automotive podcastwhere, hey, we talk about life
lessons through cars and we knowthat every car tells a story.
Because this is what we get,email after email, text after
text, phone call after phonecall, engagement after
engagement.
We have a lot to get to today.
(00:24):
Check us out carslovecom, andremember to, or the show.
If you find it interesting,we're going to run into you at
the nearest Cars and Coffee, orthe nearest car show, as the
weather's changing here.
We're going to get to that in aminute.
Make sure you're following,downloading, sharing, help us to
(00:45):
kind of get the word out as wecan here.
And, very important, we'resaying as the weather changes
here in Florida.
You won't believe, doug, thisstunning weather transformation.
We've gone from 80 degrees with80% humidity to about 76% with
(01:06):
80% humidity.
I pulled out the parka and thethermal socks.
You know how it is right.
You got that.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yet we're in the 50s and 60s now.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
In fact, I think it was 49 degrees this morning.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
How many igloos do you bet, do you and the kids
make?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
oh you just used to live up here.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
You're just spoiled, can't do it.
Can't do it, man, I cannot doit.
But hey, we did want to mentionhere moving away from weather.
All right, so get out and enjoythe communal events with cars.
They're happening down here onthe Gulf Coast too, as the
weather changes.
But we're real happy we'restarting to get a lot of
(01:57):
responses coming in from ourepisode with Nicole Johnson.
Check it out.
Just a huge thank you to her.
She was a blast to talk with.
We mentioned her name inpre-show prep to today's guest
who pivoted to a wall and ofcourse he's got.
He's got some some monstertruck love there too.
So yeah, just wanted to haveyou been in touch with her
recently, or have we have weheard back from her?
(02:20):
She was so gracious with hertime she's been so busy, you
know she talked about contentcheck out her youtube channel.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Check out um.
We have a great link toeverything um carslopecom, slash
nicole johnson, and it'll takeyou to all her stuff perfect.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah, her show detour is a trip.
It is so much fun Check it out.
What else were we talking abouthere?
So the past few weeks we'vebeen talking a bit about car
themes in pop culture, in music,in movies, in books, in TV
shows.
A little bit of a differentcurveball today, and this is
(03:00):
going to be a callback later ontoday, today's show is we pull
Andrew into the discussion.
But car museums, car museums.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
Doug and.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
I had this bucket list item.
Well, this podcast was a bucketlist item, so we did the check
that one off.
But when the kids his kids areat the house, my kids are at the
house we're going to go on thisworld epic, worldwide legendary
car museum tour.
Many in italy, germany,obviously, but detroit, you got
(03:34):
it.
West coast, east coast,everywhere.
You know.
There's a really neat one inhere.
This just popped into my mindand I'm gonna say it apropos of
nothing.
It's the tallahassee automuseum, which doug has been to
neat, neat place.
You would not believe the cars,it's also got boats in the
collection, antique cashregisters, anything mechanical.
(03:57):
This place has it in spades.
So we went there before.
I've taken my kids there.
It's a few hours down I-10.
And check it out if you can.
But one that came to mind wasthe we want to give a quick
shout-out here too was the AA.
Oh, let's see, I thought I hadit here.
The Museum in Hershey,pennsylvania, the.
(04:20):
Oh goodness, I had it up.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
AACA America's Transportation Museum.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Yeah, blast, so much fun.
Vintage Pontiacs Did they havelike a Duesenberg, a Bugatti, a
bunch of Tuckers, et cetera, etcetera.
So yeah, we just wanted to getthe conversation going.
Send us some notes, send ussome emails.
If you've been to one, what wasyour experience?
What did you like?
(04:49):
Which one Doug's been to?
The Peterson Took your kids tothe Peterson on the West Coast,
right, no, not the kids, theywouldn't have lasted there but
the Peterson.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
I spent four hours there and I needed more time.
Just getting started, yeah,just getting started.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Yeah, just getting started with it.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Excellent, but as I often do, and I seem to not be
able to not get through anepisode without saying it, at
the museum in Hershey which, bythe way, is near Hershey Park,
which is the world of chocolateis there.
Hershey Park is awesome.
I took my son there at the endof this summer.
They have.
(05:25):
You have to check to make sureit's on display.
They have the only DeLoreanprototype remaining in the world
.
There were two.
There is only one left.
It is there and it is soawesome seeing it, especially
side by side with a, the actualdelorean itself.
(05:46):
So that car that helped him,you know, get the rest of the
money he needed to prove that hecould build a car is uh just
yeah, gorgeous, fantastic yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Before we introduce andrew real quick, just wanted
to pop in with a little bit moreinformation on the Museum in
Hershey.
Check them out aacamuseumorgAgain, aacamuseumorg, it's all
one word.
It's at 161 Museum Drive inHershey, pennsylvania, hours
(06:22):
nine to 5.
I think they're open daily.
Very reasonable, neatexperience.
So check that out.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Christian.
We'll link to them just to makelife easier for the listeners.
So it'll be carslovecom slashAACA.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Good deal, good deal.
Thank you for that.
And with no further ado, we gotto bring in today's guest,
who's got so many really goodstories, interesting experience.
So how did Andrew come intoyour life?
Speaker 2 (06:52):
Doug yeah, so it's a.
It's one of those stories thatinvolves coffee and Facebook and
I just happened to see on Ilive on what Andrew would call
the Western Shore of Maryland.
He lives on the Eastern Shoreof Maryland and I just happened
to see that the Cars and Coffeein.
(07:15):
Let's see what is it.
Is it Queenstown?
Queenstown?
Thank you, I always want to sayQueensland.
In Queenstown was somebody wasgoing to have a Trabant.
I'm like I got to go there.
I got to meet this guy and youknow, in the small world we live
in, I happen to mention to ourbuddy, james McRae, and he's
(07:37):
like oh yeah, andrew, andrew'sgot the Trabant.
You should definitely interviewhim for your podcast.
You should definitely interviewhim for your podcast.
And I went to this small,really nice, you know, they're
all great but just different,meeting different people than I
would meet normally around town.
And there's Andrew, onlyTrebant there, and so you know
(08:03):
it.
And we've stayed in touch.
He's referred me to, he'sreferred me to some other cars
and coffees that I have to go to.
And you know, andrew, I justsaw today the Spy Museum is
having a maybe I saw it from youthey're having a Trabant parade
(08:23):
.
It was from you Now I remember.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
And so that's in DC in November and I assume your
Trabant will be there.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Well, sadly, no, sadly no.
My wife and I we're localcoordinators for one of the big
au pair agencies and that secondweekend in november is always
our national meeting wherehundreds of the local
coordinators get together andand do training and networking
(08:51):
together.
And so every year I miss theparade of trabanz which is tied
to that, um, the second weekendof november, because it's, uh,
the closest weekend to to whenthe wall came down and the
anniversary of the wallcrumbling and when Trabant's
left East Germany, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
And there's a great story and connection with your
wife and Trabant's and hernative country, country of
origin.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
Yeah, so my wife.
I've been a car guy almostlonger than I can remember from
matchboxes driving on my knees.
And then I was five, maybe six,I think I was five when we had
a family movie night and I sawthe movie American Graffiti for
the first time.
Of probably a thousand timesI've seen it, I bet.
(09:45):
But I've been a diehard car guyand, unlike a lot of fellas, my
parents didn't care about cars.
I didn't have an uncle oranybody to show me, so I
probably destroyed many carsbefore my late teenage years
when I finally got connected tosome, some fellows who could,
(10:05):
who could teach me the right way.
Uh had a great farm.
A friend who was a farmer, um,that taught me how to, how to
work on stuff and repair stuffand take care of stuff.
He sold me my very first car,um, which was a 69 VW bug.
I bought it.
It was a hundred dollars.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Uh, and at the age of 10, I was, you know, helping to
feed cows and clean.
It doesn't even sound legal 10.
Speaker 3 (10:33):
We're on the Eastern shore in Maryland.
We're like 40 years behindeverybody else, especially in
those days Right.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
So um, he didn't have it registered.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
He wasn't driving it, though we did have somebody
recently who I did drive it alot, oh, but it wasn't
registered.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
We did, we did have somebody on recently, uh, or we
did a recording with somebodywho's from uh south dakota and
they can get a license at age 14out there, and he had one at
age 14 really that's fine.
Speaker 3 (11:00):
I I got my my first license, uh, at the age of 15 in
maine, because at the time thatwas that was the age and I was
there for boarding school in myfreshman year or so.
I thought it was very funny toget a lot of speeding tickets
because Maine didn't have anyreciprocity agreement with
Maryland.
So I'd come to Maryland and getspeeding tickets and laugh
about them.
And then when I returned homeand got my Maryland license at
(11:24):
the age of 16 and immediatelygot an invitation from the NBA
to have a point systemconference because of the six
points that were already on mylicense, it was not so funny
then.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
You know, we had a policy of not having vigilantes
from justice on the program, butI think we just broke it with
this guy.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Holy mackerel.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
I'm the lamb from the law Before we go.
No go ahead, go ahead, go ahead.
I was going to say no, I'm not.
As far as I know, I'm notcurrently wanted.
It's been decades since thosedays.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
We'll see.
I think I hear sirens in thebackground.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
But, andrew, you do work with law enforcement, you
do work with first responders,you do work with firefighters
and I know we really jumped intoyou a little bit, but, if you
don't mind, tell us, tell ourlisteners, right, I know, tell
our listeners what you do andwhen you're not buying cars for
your family.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
So, yeah, I well, I grew up in the town of
Centerville, which at the timewas about 2,000 people, which
now, you know, years later,decades later it's you know,
there's twice as many houses asthere were people in those days.
But it was sort of a quietlittle town.
There was nothing to do, and soI joined the fire company
(12:41):
because I had I had no noconnection to the neighbors or
or anything.
Um, I went to, uh, you know,and sort of said, hey, this is a
lot of fun, and went to got myEMT license at the age of 16 and
uh, started you know I was a.
I was a volunteer fireman andvolunteer EMT and and sort of
(13:01):
parlayed into getting my, myparamedic license and a
full-time job.
And here I am, 23 years later,still doing it, and between you
and me, like when I'm in theback of the ambulance and I'm
with the sick and injured, I'mjust as excited and into it as I
(13:21):
was at the age of 16.
Fortunately, I've learned a fewthings along the way and I'm
probably a lot better at it now.
I hope, um, I, um, I, I feellike it keeps me young and and,
uh it, it can be a tough job, um, but you know, I, I think, uh,
and I think before the show wewere talking a little bit and I
(13:43):
said you know, I, I, I would be,I would literally be be hating
my life, rotting underfluorescent lights for eight
hours a day, five days a week,right?
So, um, I worked 24 hour shiftsand, and they can be long and
they can be tough and they canbe easy and they can be
everything in between, but, um,you know it, it really is.
It's a lot of fun and when youwork two days a week, it gives
(14:05):
you a lot of time to for yourhobbies and so if you, you know,
if you have expensive hobbieslike golf and fishing and
traveling, and then you don'tget to play with cars, but if
you play with cars and and youplay with cheap cars like I do,
you know, you get to have a lotof fun.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
And you know you get to have a lot of fun.
I want to thank you for whatyou do.
You could do what I do.
I could never do what you do,and hats all the way off for you
.
My man, that is impressive.
That is impressive.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
And we are the guys who rot under fluorescent lights
, right.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
And tell by my ghastly power.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
Grass is always greener, on your on, at least on
the other side.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
For me, yeah, well, okay, usually because it's
fertilized some kind of way,right good call, good call.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
So my, my big question is did you ever work
off the hundred dollars thatthis, your 10 year old self,
bought the VW buck for?
Speaker 3 (15:07):
I did, and so the fellow who has now passed, but
his name was John Adams and hewas a great friend and mentor.
I was really small when he usedto till the fields near our
house.
Oh, wow, and every day, comingback from school as early as you
know, kindergarten I'd see himbe like oh, there's Mr Adams,
(15:28):
there's Mr Adams.
And I'd insist on getting outof the car and I'd run out to
the field and he'd let me, youknow, I'd climb in the combine
or tractor or whatever and Ijust ride around with him and
and learned, you know, learnedby watching and, uh, you know,
he taught me how to drive andhow to work on stuff and how to
swear, and he taught me a lot oflessons in life?
(15:48):
Yeah, absolutely.
But so, yes, I did so when Iwas around the time I was nine,
I started going to his farm andspending a day.
He'd come pick me up onSaturday morning and we'd start
with going to have breakfast andthen we just sort of do farm
chores and I'd spend all daywith him and he'd bring me home,
you know, around dinnertime and, um, it was a lot of fun and so
(16:13):
, and he would give me $5 a dayfor for working with him, right,
and helping him, as he calledit, although it was, you know,
and I did work off the a hundreddollars, but it's funny because
part way through the hundreddollars, um, I had my first time
driving a tractor towing the,the silage cart.
So this is a feed cart forcattle.
(16:35):
It's about 40 feet long with asingle axle right in the center.
Well, and so we went down thefarm lane, which is probably a
half a mile, and across thestreet and then down maybe
another quarter mile is wherethe silage pit was, where the
feed was.
So the farm John's nephew, bill,and I each had a tractor and a
silage cart and we went out andBill had the loader on his
(16:58):
tractor, so he loaded my cart.
And then he loaded his cart andI helped him get hooked back up
and we took off and I thought,oh, I'm gonna get him right.
And so I made it a race and soI I had that, I had that.
It was john deere 3020 modeland I had it.
Uh, I had it in high gear and Iwas hauling my you know I was,
(17:20):
I thought I was a nascar driver,right, and I I took the turn.
I'll never forget, right, I'mcoming down the road and I took
the turn down the farm lane andI kept going and I'm like I'm
laughing because I had not onlygotten back before Bill, I'd
gotten unhooked and put thetractor away.
And here comes Bill and he'slooking at me and he's just
(17:40):
shaking his head and I'mthinking, oh ha ha, he's mad
because I beat him right.
And he's just shaking his headand I'm thinking, oh ha ha, he's
mad because I beat him rightand I'm really quite proud of
myself and you know I'm 10 yearsold.
And so he gets unhooked and hesays come on, we got to go up to
the house.
And we go to the house and wefind John who had kicked off his
boots already for the day andhe told John.
(18:01):
He said you're going to have tocome help fix this fence.
And I, and he told john, hesaid you're gonna have to come
help fix this fence.
And I'm kind of thinking whatfence?
Speaker 1 (18:10):
oh, not realizing that I tore down about that
fence.
Speaker 3 (18:11):
I tore down about 150 feet of fence because the tire
on the trailer grabbed it and Ihad momentum and, and you know,
full of piss and vinegar and Ijust I never looked back.
Speaker 1 (18:25):
Yeah, they obviously don't cover not taking out split
rail fences when a 10 year oldtakes the driving test.
So so so I gotta ask here wasthe movie footloose based on
your early life?
Speaker 2 (18:39):
I was just gonna say or did I step on?
Speaker 1 (18:44):
stepped on several punchlines here, but okay,
beautiful.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
So the fence got built?
Definitely not.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
All right.
Speaker 3 (18:50):
We had to rebuild the fence.
But you know, one of the what Ithink was one of my earliest
life lessons was as John took mehome that day.
Right, john reached into hiswallet and he handed me $5 for
my day's pay.
And I said I don't deserve that.
And he said you know.
He said you know what.
(19:10):
Everybody makes mistakes.
The important thing is to learnfrom them.
But the deal is you earn $5 aday and you put in a day's work
and here's your pay.
Wow, and it was.
It was a.
You know, it's a moment in mylife I'll never forget and it
was a.
I think it's been a valuablelesson, but you know, it sort of
ties into you know, always dothe right thing because it's the
(19:31):
right thing right and own yourmistakes.
And people make mistakes andlook past.
I mean, there was just, therewas a lot.
At the time I didn't realizehow important that lesson would
be for me.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Yeah, but yeah, well, he made it.
He was obviously a very biginfluence on your life, a big
imprint on your life.
That's so you, just from ayoung age, you just were bitten
with mechanical things, thingsthat got things done, things
(20:04):
that moved gears and stuffabsolutely absolutely um and and
and how and why they work.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
You know I I took a part in an awful lot of stuff
before I learned how to putanything together, gotcha.
But the sequence is important,you know, gotcha and so the next
, let's.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Let's move along to the next car, a 1984 nissan
centra nowhere near as cool asthe trebant no chevy yeah, well,
right.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
So the, the 84 nissan center, gilligan, uh, I bought
from, uh, from some friends offriends of our family, the lures
family, or actually, uh, lesterwas, lures was, was the
daughter's, uh, married namethat had driven the car last.
But car had been through acouple of siblings and it needed
a clutch.
(20:54):
And so, uh, a fellow named TedLester sold me that car for a
dollar and uh, it was about, itwas about 350 bucks to get a
clutch in it and do whateverelse it needed to be on the road
.
And and I was great, I was, Iwas, uh, you know, 15, almost 16
years old, and, um, gilliganwas fantastic and I took my
(21:14):
father and a friend of his namedNeil Muffin out for a ride.
Sort of outskirts of town therewas some sightseeing.
There was a we always referredto it as the Russian embassy,
but it was really just anoff-site compound that belonged
to the Soviet Union.
Outside of Centerville it's aplace called Pioneer Point,
(21:35):
which was and you should Googleit, it's a really neat history
place.
Historically, the man who builtthe house had a bunch of kids
and he was a GM executive.
So the house I think theoriginal house had like 12 or 13
bedrooms, jeez, and it's this,you know, probably I don't know,
I'm not sure how big theproperty is, probably 50 or 100
acres and it's sort of where theCorsica River hits the Chester
(21:59):
River, a big waterfront andbeach and stuff.
But we used to like to go backthere and of course there were
guards and it was considered tobe Soviet soil right, so we
weren't allowed too far backthere and as we were leaving,
you know, it was a big, big mudpuddle in the road and you know,
doing like 30 miles an hour andjust kind of blast through it
(22:19):
and the road was washed out andso the front end of the car went
underwater and water came upand, you know, slid off the
windshield and somehow we hadenough momentum to bounce
through it and the car was knownas gilligan from that point on.
And gilligan lived a verydifficult life with a teenage me
, um, not taking very good careof it but um, but it was fun and
(22:42):
I was, you know, of all thekids I went to school with and
grew up with, I was, you know,except for the farm kids, I was
the only one who could drive astick.
You know, another another, uh,life skill learned from John
Adams and farming yeah the whole.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
So driving it into the.
The first thing that came to mymind was the scene in Risky
Business when Joel Goodman putshis father's car into Lake
Michigan.
So I dig how we're just kind ofgoing through the movie theme
that we brought up kind of atthe top of the show.
So from American graffiti toFootloose, to Risky Business, I
(23:22):
want to bring in another filmhere and let's take the next two
cars as a couplet, if we can, aduo the Chevy Coupe that you
also own in 1949, as well asyour dream car, the Tucker 48.
So can we talk a little bitabout where those Tucker was its
(23:43):
own film.
Let's talk, if we can, aboutthose two cars together, because
when we met before the show,andrew was walking us around his
property and showing us hey,cars in his barn and the Chevys
here, trabants here.
So what struck you about theChevy Coupe?
(24:04):
Why did you have to have thatone?
Speaker 3 (24:06):
Well, so the Chevy Coupe, the 49 to 51 Chevys, have
always had a soft spot.
I really like the lines, right,and so one thing that we
haven't gotten into yet and youguys don't know about me is that
I'm a colorblind car guy and soI very much am about the shapes
because that's what I payattention to.
(24:27):
So paint jobs don't impress me,but I, I can you know I'm I
really like cars and I reallypay attention to their shapes
and and so that that era chevyis just very appealing to me.
Um, I had, actually I hadn'treally thought about the
similarities with that and theand the tucker, um, but I, you
know, I was probably.
(24:48):
I don't remember exactly whenthe Tucker movie came out, but
it was fairly fresh and Iwatched it and the film had it
drug me in much in the same waythat American Graffiti did, in
that it just I was fascinatedand I was fascinated with the
story and the characters.
And for those not familiar, theTucker story is story, is is,
(25:13):
you know, it's like, it's likedante's divine comedy, right, I
mean it's, it's, it's so sad andit's so wonderful and so
inspiring, um, and it just it'ssuch a the triumph of the
underdog and and much a lot ofpeople would say like oh, he
didn't triumph, right, but hereally did.
That's right.
And we're still talking abouthim, and it's still.
He brought a lot of importantthings to light and innovation,
(25:37):
despite the fact that no onewanted to talk about how
intrinsically unsafe automobileswere.
Right Because people weren'tusing seatbelts, they didn't
have padded dashes, they didn'thave safety glass, they didn't
have disc brakes weren't popular.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
Cycle pops are yeah safety glass.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
They didn't have disc .
You know, disc brakes weren'tpopular.
Yeah, right, right.
So the.
You know, tucker originally hadthe fenders and with with the
outside lights were the onesthat turned and the psychops was
supposed to be fixed.
But in wind tunnel testing theyrealized that the fenders were
were rudders and they made thecar very unstable and unsafe.
So, uh, from a safetystandpoint, having the, the, the
defenders to be fixed and thoseheadlights be fixed, and then
(26:16):
having that psych ops eye and itonly comes on when the steering
wheels turn, so when you'rejust driving straight, actually
the third eye is not on.
Um, so it uh, oh, that I didn'tknow, and um and the uh.
So I was, yeah, I becamefascinated with the, with the
Tucker story and and you knowI'm when, when most of my
there's no need either and carshow, and a buddy of mine and I
(26:37):
had gone up there for the dayand that's when I saw or at
least I thought I saw my veryfirst in-person Tucker and I
(26:58):
fell to my knees almost sobbingbecause this car from a, from a
historical significantstandpoint, the car had been
heavily modified and I washeartbroken And'm like who
messes with a tucker?
Right?
I mean like you don't?
You don't touch up a picasso,right you?
Speaker 1 (27:16):
know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
Well said right right , and so I just and and there's
some things that are justfragile and precious in life,
and you know I'm all aboutmodifying cars, but, like you,
don't mess with a tucker and Icouldn't find anybody around
this car on display, but it wasairbagged, the windows were
tinted, it was, you know.
It was painted up, interior wasdone.
(27:38):
It had a cadillac north star v8in the back of it, and I'm like
who does this right?
And I'm really pretty upsetabout it.
And it had these amazing wheelson it, though, and you know, in
the late 90s, early 2000s, noone was running like a 20 inch
wheel, but they were like 20inch wheels, and there, other
than the Tucker family crest,which was about an inch and a
(27:59):
half tall, there was nothing onvisible on the face of the wheel
.
It was just a solid wall ofpolished, you know, aluminum or
chrome or whatever it wasaluminum or chrome or whatever
it was and there was no placefor hubcap, there was no seam
anywhere to hide the lug nuts.
There were no lug nuts, and Iwas fascinated and I'm like that
that was eaten at me, and foryears it ate at me.
(28:20):
Because I couldn't findpictures of those wheels online.
I searched wheel manufacturers.
I couldn't find them.
I couldn't find them and, youknow, fast forward to probably
around 2006,.
And I'm on eBay one nightlooking for parts because I was
building a Model, a hot rod, andI saw this buy it now for $125,
(28:42):
a complete drop axle front endwith disc brakes on it and split
wishbone suspension.
And I'm like this is crazy.
This is worth like a thousandbucks.
Who would?
Who in their right mind wouldsell this for $125, right?
So I whacked it by it now and Isent a message to the seller
and I said listen, this lookslike just what I'm looking for.
The price seems to be a littlebit cheap.
(29:03):
So if it's a mistake, justcancel the auction.
There's no hard feelings, right?
Because if I had made a mistakeas the seller, I would want
someone to be fair with me,right?
And the next morning I get anemail back from the guy and he
said nope, price is right, Ijust didn't want it to sit
around, I don't need it.
Glad you can use it, price tomove.
And I'm like, man, this is socool, right?
Wow.
So I drive up to the JerseyParkway and go pick this thing
(29:29):
up the following weekend and Igo to this house and there's
this sort of bland looking verylarge barn behind the house and
that's where I meet him andbehind the barn is my front end
and loaded up in the truck and Isaid, man, this is a beautiful
property.
I said if I had a barn likethis I'd have a million cars.
He said, oh, you want to seeinside, right?
So I walk inside the barn andI'm floored because outside is,
(29:53):
like you know, rustic, looks oldyou know, kind of kind of tatty
right inside.
Right, it's amazing, theremust've been at least a dozen
cars inside.
There's several lifts, there'sbillet, aluminum everywhere,
there's a CNC machine, there'slathe, there's mills, there's
all this stuff.
And I'm like, pinch me, right,I think I died.
I'm in heaven, right here it is.
(30:14):
And uh, and I said, man, Idon't, I don't mean to pry right
, but like what is it that youdo that you get to play like
this right?
And he said, oh, I have a shopdown the street right.
I build hot rods.
And I'm like man, this, is crazy, and so he shows me, shows me,
a lot of this the projects thathe's got going on and the, the
(30:35):
38 ford that he had bought thathe took my front axle out of
because he switched it over toan independent front suspension
to be his daily driver.
And so and he's telling me, hesaid, yeah, he said we actually
I had a car at SEMA not so longago.
It's a Willys, I call it theswitchback, but it was all sheet
(30:56):
metal, hand-fabricated.
So it's a tribute car, but it'sall metal, no fiberglass or
anything.
And I'm like, oh man, I'd loveto see that.
He says, oh sure, come on down.
So attached to the house there'sa three car garage and he opens
up one of the garage doorwaysand I see the most beautiful car
I could remember and this thingwas immaculate.
And I'm like, dude, this is socool.
And it had those wheels on itand I dropped to the ground.
(31:20):
I'm like, all right, explainthese wheels to me.
How do these work?
Where do you get them in?
I saw these wheels once on aTucker in Atlantic City and he
said, oh, I built that car too.
It's over here.
You want to see it?
Speaker 1 (31:31):
And.
Speaker 3 (31:32):
I about wet my pants.
I'm like, wait, that's yours,with the North Star and
everything.
And he was so surprised that Iknew it.
So the guy's name is rob idaand he and his father um,
actually his grandfather wasgoing to be a tucker dealer and
never got a car for hisdealership never got a car which
(31:52):
was part of the problem whichis part of the problem, right,
and so he and his father, bob,built a fiberglass tucker they
had.
they had a lot to do with thecar, with with the movie and the
Tucker family, and they have.
Rob and the Ida automotive teamin New Jersey has restored more
Tuckers than anybody else.
They are like the world'sauthority on everything that
(32:15):
there is Tucker and they workvery closely with the
grandchildren of Preston Tucker.
um so and the, at the end of theday, the answer to the wheels
was that rob item made them andthe lug nuts go in, the bolts go
in from the inside, like fromthe back side of the car and
they're just super cool.
But he is such a neat guy and Icontinue to follow him and stalk
(32:37):
him on social media andeverything and and, uh, we've,
we've been in contact a fewtimes and I say like, oh hey,
you probably don't remember me.
And he's like sure, I sure I do, andrew, what's up, man, and
I'm like dude, this is.
Speaker 1 (32:47):
I love it and that's interesting.
You mention that you're drawnto the shapes of those two
automobiles Right, the 48 Tucker, and your car, the 49 Chevy,
your car, the 49 Chevy.
They to me I don't know how tosay it, but there's kind of this
, this classic minimalist vibebefore the big fins of the
(33:16):
fifties and the lights in in alot of the chrome accents really
took over.
Maybe that's not fair, what?
What do you think?
Is that at all accurate?
Speaker 3 (33:21):
You know, I know, I think it is accurate and I think
that I, you know, I appreciatevery, you know, I appreciate all
kinds of different cars and fordifferent reasons, right, but
but cars of that era and notnecessarily that era.
So I'd put, like the, like theC3 Corvettes, you know, very,
very sort of swoopy and curve,you know it's like, it's like
(33:42):
the hottest girl in school,right, not necessarily the prom
queen, right, but the girl withthe, with the curves, and just
there's just something about herman and every time you look at
her you get that warm feelinginside and you just smile and
your body is like poof, rightand that's it, man, and that's.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
I have to have a glass of ice water after all
this, my goodness, all right,moving on.
Yeah, let's talk about andwe've alluded to this in the
discussion the Trabant and howdid?
We talked a little bit abouthow that came in your life, but,
Doug, you wanted to hear alittle wife, and when he first
(34:17):
saw the Trabant, or learnedabout Trabant, and I think it
was on a trip to Iceland.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
Yes, so my wife is from Iceland and she introduced
me to a whole world of cars thatI didn't because, of course,
before the internet and allthese YouTube guys and channels
and whatnot, there's a lot ofcars that never came to the US
and couldn't you know, theTrabants didn't really leave
(34:54):
East Germany until the wall camedown in 89, right and so, and
there's still, you know, to thisday, there's probably somewhere
around 200 of them in the US Tothis day.
There's probably somewherearound 200 of them in the US.
Having a Trabant and dailydriving a Trabant is a lot like
being maybe the fifth coolestguy at fat camp.
It's really not a trophy thatanybody wants, but it's fun
(35:21):
Through the cars that I've ownedand the cars that I've fined
after and bankrupted myself withand whatnot over the years.
The struggle for horsepower is acontest.
Frankly, my pockets aren't deepenough and my arms aren't long
enough to win it.
And even if you do the guydriving around in the Bugatti
Veyron, chiron, whatever, youcan know, you can't, you can't,
(35:43):
you can't go 300 kilometers anhour on on route 50 on the way
to ocean city, right, not forvery long at least.
And so you know part of part ofbeing a paramedic is having
some some sense ofresponsibility for others around
me and safety and all that kindof stuff.
So fun cars had become moreimportant to me than power and
(36:05):
powerful.
Cars are fun, right, and Doug,you know what I'm talking about.
Man, you drive a DeLoreancrying out loud, right?
So it's a quirky car.
That's not a great car either,but it's a great conversation
starter and it's a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 (36:19):
And it's history, and it's history, it's American
history, and American historyand automotive history.
Meet your history.
You got it?
Speaker 3 (36:26):
yeah, exactly and, and so the uh, you know, with
the trab on.
So, um, in, in one of my tripsto iceland, uh, because, you
know, my wife is from there andwe go frequently.
Fortunately, I love it there.
Um, so, uh, a friend of hersthat she, you know, grew up with
, was daily driving a trabant,um, and, and so, uh, I said, oh,
(36:47):
wow.
She said, oh, you gotta see,you gotta.
You gotta see buoy's car, yougotta see buoy's car.
So, um, buoy, who is uh, who hasbecome a friend of mine over
the years too, not only did heshow me his trabant, but in 2014
, in the snow, I got to drivehis Trabant, and it's the second
time in my life somebody saidhey man, just punch the gas and
(37:08):
sidestep the clutch, let her ripRight.
Um, the other time it happenedto me, it was uh, it was, it was
in a, it was in a Chevelle witha big block, uh, and things
held together and that was a lotof fun.
But the Trabant was somehowmore fun with uh, and and he had
, he had upgraded the cylinderheads on his, so I think he was
putting out almost 26 horsepower, uh, compared to the eight,
(37:32):
compared to the 18 that minedevelops.
Uh, so, um yeah, but it was.
It was a lot of fun, man, andit was.
It was as much fun as being alittle kid the first time you
drive a go-kart, except maybethe go-kart was a little bit
more refined.
So the Trabant was terrible andI was, so I was taken aback.
(37:53):
The shifting pattern of theTrabant is very strange.
It's not like a three on a tree.
The shifter comes out of thedash and it has a sort of
Imagine shifting a three on thetree with your left foot right,
and that that's what it's liketo drive a trivont for the first
time.
It just feels so unnatural andyou're, and you're sort of
(38:13):
looking for the gears and tryingto figure out the pattern.
And pushing, pulling, oh wow,when to go up, when to go down?
Um, right, and this and thisangry little weed eater engine,
that's, that's screaming, youknow, and you feel like you're,
you know, driving a trabant atany speed two-stroke engine
right, it is, it is, it's atwo-stroke, and it's two
Speaker 2 (38:33):
cylinders right, yeah yeah it is.
Speaker 3 (38:35):
And I I laugh when I pop my hood and people are like
wait, it has two coils.
I say, yeah, this is theperformance model, but in truth
they're all that way right,because they're both just kind
of on.
But no, it's a super simplething and by anybody's standard
it's a terrible, terrible car.
(38:59):
Communist east germany, andhaving a lack of resources, a
lack of skilled labor force, youknow, a lack of funding, a
desperate need for automobiles,you know, from 19 they so mine
are the, mine is the 601 model,uh, and from 1963 to 1989, they
built about three million carsand they're rumored to be as
(39:21):
many as half a million of themstill on the road.
And so, by my metrics, it's nota terrible car, right, it's a
terrible car by 2024 standards,that's right.
It is so reliable and easy towork on and just, you know,
(39:44):
you're not going to get anywherein a hurry.
I say, I joke, I said, well, itdoes zero to 50 in about a
minute and it'll do 50 to 60 inabout three minutes, more, right
?
So, um, it works.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
And it's so much fun.
You know, absolutely does.
So.
I think yours was was it yours?
The third generation of themodel and one that was so so
passable as vehicles there, andit was the mass-produced one.
Speaker 3 (40:28):
So the majority of them are limousines or the
two-door sedan version thatseats four adults, and then mine
is the combi or the wagonversion.
Um, interestingly, you know thethe rear door on the wagons is
all sheet metal.
Um and but uh, other than thepanel just below the grill, it's
(40:48):
the only sheet metal that youcan see on the exterior of the
car.
The cars are made with a.
It's like a fiberglass, it'ssimilar to fiberglass, but the?
It's a resin impregnated uh,fibers, and it was.
They use recycled clothing andblankets and things to to source
the fibers yep from cottonwhatever they have there's
(41:08):
actually there's great youtubevideos about travant production
and you can see guys you knowcutting, oh man, trimming the
edges of the panels and and youknow there's a couple of them
like literally, like there's uhon the assembly line, you know
they're trying to fit the doorsand so the guy will open the
door and stick a block of woodin it and slam the door about
five times.
Then he pulls the wood out andhe closed the door.
He's like, eh, that's good.
Speaker 2 (41:29):
Close it off.
Yeah, close it off.
Speaker 3 (41:33):
But it was funny.
One of the days I was drivingthe TriVant around town and this
woman starts waving at mefuriously and I thought, oh, she
just thinks my car's on fire,right, because the smoke coming
out of the tailpipe.
But she's waving me in and so Ipull over and she was so
(41:54):
excited.
She said oh my God, it's aTrabant.
It's a Trabant.
And I said okay, she knew right.
So we got something in commonand I said how do you know
Trabant?
And she said well, years ago myhusband and I went to Budapest
for business and there was aproblem with our rental car
reservation and we couldn't geta car and someone sold us a
Trabant in the parking lot.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
And we drove it around.
Speaker 3 (42:16):
Budapest for two weeks and when we went back to
the airport we just left thekeys in it and we gave it away
and left it there and she saidshe said does yours have hand
warmers?
and I said what?
And she said and she runsaround to the back of the car
and she looks at my back windowand she says, sort of in dismay,
(42:36):
oh, you don't have the handwarmers.
And I said what?
And she said you know the linesthat go across the glass that
keep your hands warm when you'repushing it in the wintertime.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
The performance model ?
Speaker 2 (42:49):
Yes, yeah right, it wasn't the utility model, it was
the performance model.
Yeah, it wasn't the wagonversion.
Yeah, sorry, andrew, to dispela myth.
Is it true that some animalshave actually chewed up parts of
Trabants?
Speaker 3 (43:07):
I'm sure that if they did, they met an untimely
demise, oh sure.
Speaker 1 (43:13):
Yeah the moths were after the wool.
Speaker 2 (43:16):
It's probably not good in the tummy, but I thought
, I read some pigs have eaten,chewed on them.
Speaker 3 (43:23):
Well, I think they were looking for any way to get
rid of them, because they burneda few, I think and realized
that the smoke is super toxic.
And I've heard rumors that theyground a bunch of them up and
use them as winter traction andas an affordable alternative to
(43:43):
sand, Because the cars they dieand they don't go away.
So elemental reclamation is nota thing with Durablast.
Speaker 2 (43:54):
How many Trabants are in the US?
Do you know?
I bet you have a good idea.
Speaker 3 (43:58):
Well, so it's around 200.
It would be difficult to come.
You know, there's a few thathave snuck in under the radar of
customs, um and uh, but there'sa lot of them that are, that
are out and about.
And there's a fella inbaltimore, I've come to know he
has 11 or 12.
He and his son have the what Iknow as the largest collection.
(44:19):
Uh, the first trab onth Ibought was actually with no
motor, uh, or no engine, and Iwas going to put an electric
motor in it, uh, but I bought itfrom a fella in indiana, um,
and he had nine trabants and hewas torn because he said well, I
have one I'll sell you, butit's my only wagon, it's my only
combi and so I'm president, uh,but he, we, we made a deal and
(44:43):
and got that done.
Um and uh, both of those fellowsare big into the parade of
trabants, uh, at the at the spymuseum.
So, uh, mid-november, you know,second weekend of november, in
dc there will be often like 40or 50 trabants and they attract
some ladas and and some, uh,zadastavas and some other, you
you know, soviet cars, and theyset up a cardboard version of
(45:06):
the Berlin wall and they crashedthrough it on the streets.
Speaker 2 (45:09):
Oh, that's neat.
I've got to see that now.
Speaker 3 (45:11):
Yeah, I mean it's yeah, you kind of have to, you
kind of have to.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
And that's a wow.
So between and that's a greattheme for today is cars in
movies, or or cars as theyintersect with movies, car
museums, so that's a wonderfulway to sort of move, to the move
this episode gracefully intothe off ramp.
But before we go here, andrewis doug's.
(45:36):
One of doug's favorite thingsis how this show, this podcast,
has become well unexpectedly, ormaybe expectedly depending
about family, and so he wantedyou to recall some of your
stories with your wife's newrole, about procuring new cars
as well as any as well asanything you do for your kids.
(45:58):
that involves a scooter, whichmade me think of it when you
mentioned earlier kind ofscooters, and fiberglass a
scooter, which made me think ofit when you mentioned earlier
kind of scooters and fiberglass.
Speaker 3 (46:05):
Yeah right.
So I right.
My wife sort of put her footdown.
I have a.
I don't view it as a problem, Iview it as a solution.
Right, clever solution.
Some people think I have aproblem with acquiring cars, and
a lot of times they just findme right.
I mean like if one of you guysstumbled across a Travant that
needed to be rescued or savedright, you'd probably reach out.
Speaker 2 (46:28):
You'd say hey, andrew , you know who to go to.
Speaker 3 (46:29):
Yeah, right, you know a guy now, and so, right, cars
find me and I really don't golooking for them.
But you know, amongst mycollection my wife's least
favorite vehicle is a 1976U-haul truck.
Um, that, uh, that that has a,has a different story, maybe an
episode in and of itself at somepoint.
Um, but yeah, so she told me,she said, listen, you can't have
(46:53):
any more cars, um, and so Isaid, okay, you know.
And then, uh, somebody calledme, a car that I tried to, you
know she had expressed interestin, and I tried to get for her
and couldn't strike a deal.
And about a year later theycalled me and so I made a deal
and I went and got her a 1960Fiat 600 and I titled it in her
(47:16):
name before I brought it homeand she said no more car, you
can't have any more cars.
And I said, honey, this one'snot mine, it's yours and so so
uh see, yeah, well, it was funny.
My, my son really wanted me tomy son and my youngest is six
and he really wanted me to buy a67 cadillac not so long ago.
And I said, buddy, mama's notgoing to be happy if we buy this
(47:39):
car.
It is cool, it's cool, but mamais not going to be happy if we
buy this car.
And he said, daddy, just giveit to her.
I said, buddy, I love whereyour head is.
Doing our best, yeah, we're notgoing to do that, we're not
going to get away with this one,so we're not going to try it.
But now he had a littleconsolation prize too, because
(48:08):
you've done a clever thing withthe scooters and little
fiberglass bodies on them forthe younger folk.
Yeah, so a year ago, in May Mayof 2023, we were at a car show
and some guys that I've come toknow through car shows, through
car shows uh, the big ocean citycar shows, um are looking at
the enthusiasm and my, my son,who five at the time, um was re
(48:29):
is really into cars.
And they said, man, I love hisenthusiasm, he's such a good kid
.
I want to, I want to give himsomething that I'm going to give
him a pedal car body.
That, uh.
But you got to do something.
You guys got to build somethingreally cool with it.
I w I bought it, I was going todo something.
You guys got to build somethingreally cool with it.
I bought it, I was going to dosomething.
I never did it.
It's been sitting on my in mygarage for years.
I want to give it to julian myson's name is julian, right?
So I said, all right, man, hey,thank you so much, uh.
(48:53):
And I wasn't sure if this was areal thing or if it would
follow through, but it did.
And so we get this 1962 chevyimpala convertible fiberglass
pedal car body.
It's literally just a raw bodyand I'm like, huh, so what are
we going to do with this?
And you know, my son is, youknow, is a pretty good size,
(49:13):
height wise for a five-year-oldalready, and I'm like man, he
can ride a two-wheeler, like hedoesn't really want a pedal car.
This is going to be veryshort-lived.
We ought to do something thatyou know that even I could ride,
right, something that'll lastfor a few years.
And so I went on Facebookmarketplace and I bought a
mobility scooter that was nolonger needed and we tore all
(49:36):
the mobility scooter stuff offof it and we laid everything out
and, believe it or not, thewheelbase was perfect.
I had to narrow the scooter alittle bit to get it to fit, um,
but uh, so we we out and,believe it or not, the wheelbase
was perfect.
I had to narrow the scooter alittle bit to get it to fit, but
so we did, and my son, you know, we cleaned up and we sanded it
and we did some body work andhe primed it and he painted it
and we taped off the bumpers andwe did like rattle can chrome
(49:59):
for bumpers and trim around thewindshield and the grill and
stuff.
And we've got it loaded up withLED headlights and taillights
and underglows and he's wonseveral trophies competing at
car shows, not against pedalcars and other little kids, but
he's very proud of his sixtrophies and he has a really
(50:21):
good time with it.
And he said to me he said said,daddy, uh, it's about two months
ago.
He said, daddy, you need ascooter too, so we can cruise
together and I'm like man, howdo I?
Speaker 1 (50:31):
daddy has a problem with that how do I say no?
Speaker 3 (50:35):
and I'm like, well, it's not really a car.
So daddy's not gonna get introuble, loophole right.
And so I go, absolutely, thistime I'm gonna start with the
scooter instead of starting witha body, right, I'll start with
a scooter and see where it goes.
And my 15 year old bonusdaughter.
So she's my, my, the daughterthat came with my wife.
(50:55):
I have, we have four kids total, right?
So my, my oldest is almost 22and she's mine from my first
marriage.
And then I have a bonus sonwho's 20, a bonus daughter who's
15, and we have thesix-year-old.
That's, that's ours together.
Um, but my bonus daughter.
We're driving, you know, drivingdown the highway with her, and
she said, oh god, there's one ofthose trash cans, right, she's
(51:17):
pointing to the tesla cybertruck.
And I thought, huh, what if Ijust get a stainless steel trash
can to put on my scooterchassis, because you know people
refer to these things as trashcans and that would be funny.
And I couldn't find one and Ithought, well, maybe I'll just
get a piece of stainless steelsheet metal and build my own.
And then I thought, wait aminute, I'll just build my own
(51:38):
Cybertruck.
And so my son has been learninghow to use the metal break, and
we've started with aluminumbecause it's a little easier to
work with, and now we're bendingup the stainless steel to make
our Cybertruck mobility scooter,it's just fun.
Speaker 1 (51:54):
Yeah, man, so you and he will be able to cruise
around your property and I thinkthat's the coolest thing.
Doing laps around the Trabant Ithink is going to be fantastic.
So in closing here I gotta askcould we get some pictures of
your scooters at some point andkind of share them with the
(52:15):
listening audience?
Because, I just love what you do, man.
I mean, you're, it's, it'sfamily all the way you.
You're incorporating them atevery step of your passion and I
just think it's great, it wasreally great to meet you and,
yeah, thanks for spending sometime with us.
Speaker 3 (52:47):
Our plan with the scooters is so we'll be at the
big Cruise in Ocean City show inOcean City, Maryland, in May
and we are going to ride in theboardwalk cruise.
So from 27th Street down to theinlet, on the boardwalk there's
a sort of a parade of cars andhe and I are planning on riding
that together.
Speaker 1 (52:59):
That's really neat Side by side.
Speaker 3 (53:01):
So you've already got a deadline, you've got a
deadline to keep you honest andit's something to shoot for.
Well, thank you again, hey itwas great meeting you, Andrew.
Speaker 1 (53:10):
Thanks for spending some time with us this afternoon
, man.
Speaker 3 (53:12):
Yeah man, thank you, guys so much.
All right, please blast.
Speaker 2 (53:15):
See you soon at cars and coffee.
Speaker 1 (53:17):
Yeah, I look forward to it.
Maybe I'll build a.
Speaker 3 (53:20):
DeLorean scooter.
Speaker 1 (53:22):
Yeah, please do, please do yeah.
Speaker 2 (53:26):
And I'll park next to Doug.
Very good, All right guys,thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (53:32):
Thank you for spending time with us.
That's it, boy.
Where do we start here?
The Trabant, the Chevy, all thescooters, the Tuckers that he's
loved before Talking Tuckers,dig it.
The scooters that he's lovedbefore talking tuckers, dig it.
Speaker 2 (53:57):
Oh, the AECA museum that we mentioned before at the
top of the hour has a nicecollection of, I'm going to say,
half dozen, as well assuspension assemblies, possibly
a chassis, I think, a cutawaymotor of the Tucker.
There, too, several motors,including one of the sorry, I'm
doing it again one of theoriginal air-cooled ones.
Speaker 1 (54:05):
Before they made them water-cooled, they came from
helicopters oh yeah, oh, you canalso check out carslovecom
slash acca.
Carslovecom slash acca willtake you by way of our site to
theirs.
That's it, another episode ofthe book.
Have a great week, everybody.
(54:25):
We'll see you soon.
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