Harley Davidson

I had an ever growing itch to have an old motorcycle for years. My family had been heavily into motorcycles even before WWII. Stories of rows of them sitting around had always sparked interest in me.

I'd never even ridden a motorcycle in my life...but I wanted one... and it had to be an old one...(hand shift)

Sold a few things... had a bit of money... searched and searched and searched...
Turned out I had a hankerin for a 45" Harley... something about the lines when stripped for racing, just spoke to me!

Eventually I spent some of my money and bought a '33 Ford Coupe race car... turned out to not be what I had hoped for... so listed it for sale... or trade for a motorcycle. Had some offers but nothing panned out to trade.

The racecar left on a boat and my bank account had a short time with a full belly...

Around Thanksgiving 2009 I came across an add online for a '51WL restored at a price I could easily afford.

Made a call... took a drive... brought it home.


There she sat... in all her 58mile glory... shiny paint, chrome, whitewalls, PERFECT...

Happy as can be... I proudly owned a realy nice old Harley Davidson...

So.. I did what any red blooded American boy would do...

Stripped her down and hopped her up!

Time Flies....

Pretty good weekend....

Started out working friday afternoon in the garage and house... I bought this place full of stuff.. And the people that owned it before were heavily involved in antique race cars...so its been a slow process of going through things deciding whats good and whats bad and then organizing all of the racing artifacts. Gave up working around dark...headed out, had some ice cream then started reading through a binder of articles I found in the house... but heavy eyelids seemed to get the best of me...

Saturday morning 7am, off to my parents to load up some Model-T parts that I've wanted to haul over to my garage. Decided to stop at a car show on the way, at the Hershey AACA museum. Walked over the the vendor area first and found a few books I didn't have (hard for me to pass up a new/old book).. Walked through the show, eventually meeting up with a friend and his dad with his '23 T touring that they recently finished...Seeing his car made it more exciting to be dealing with my own T parts again... even if it is just to move them around... We walked through the cars for a while.. nice eclectic mix....then I hit the road to get some work done.

Got to the house a bit before my girlfriend, Heidi who had to work... so I made some mini frozen taco's for us... boy are they ever good!.. Then we got to work.... She was chipping tiles off the bathroom walls while I was emptying out the bedroom... A few hours later I got a call that a friend was stopping by with a model-A industrial engine to see if I was interested in it.. apparently from a welder. This sat outside in New Jersey for years but suprizingly the crank turned over free as could be along with the distributor which means the cam was turning alright and likely all valves moving... So I bought it! Wasn't too pricey or anything, I just don't really need any more "stuff" right now(Can't believe I typed that)... Industrial engines like this apparently had a very heavy flywheel! Imagine a model-A flywheel without the clutch recess... haven't taken it off yet, but it must be 100lbs!

Back to work in the house till about 8pm then hit the road for Heidi's house. Steak and corn on the grill..Never made corn on the grill before... came out great! Relaxed a bit flipping through the new books, then hit the hay....

Sunday morning 5:30am, up with the sun and off to work for a few hours...finished cleaning out the master bedroom and its now ready for scrubbing, paint wood floor finishing, etc. Sorted through some photo albums and folders of photos... trying to organize all of the things around the place... or atleast get a grasp on whats there... Fooled with the new A motor a bit before I left...seems to be a B distributor and with the plugs out does look like the valves move! Back to Heidi's
around noon to get ready to head to Latimore for the Latimore Valley Fair.

My parents picked us up...Little Ceasers $5 "Hot and Ready" pizza on the way... you really can't beat this... its a decent sized pizza for $5... ready when you walk in the door... fed all 4 of us easily.

Arrived at Latimore for the final day of the Fair.. If you've never been to the Latimore fairgrounds... you really should make a point to stop. They restored a racetrack that last ran in '39 or '40 and also the "Eastern Museum of Motor Racing" www.emmr.org. The fair is a family event... from crafts to tractors to kids games to racecars... hey have something for everyone to enjoy.

We started out watching the cars run on the track for a while. Ran into some friends. Met a few news ones... even got a demonstration from an older guy about the workings of an Offy with a cut apart block he had laying in his truck..

After a flower buying frenzy by the girls... we went to see the museum. They recently put a huge addition on the building and it was now done enough to have some cars in it and they had it pretty filled up!

Strolled around for a while and eventually hit the road... Stopped at Cracker Barrell on the way back... won't go there again! Food was fair... service wasn't...

Stopped at McDonald's for hot fudge sundae's(best $1 you can spend) and back to relax...

All in all this was one of the most full weekends I've had in a long time... extremely productive.. saw some old cars... talked with good people...bought some cool stuff and ate some good food...

Hot Rod Magazine....

A friend of mine named Skip Bender gave me his collection of Hot Rod Magazines about 8 or 9 years ago...Almost all of them from the beginning till now... over the next year or so I collected all the missing copies (unfortunately reprints from 48). I built a bookshelf to hold these jewels in my bedroom.

There it was... a simple black wooden bookshelf with the history of all things "hot rod" right at my finger tips. There was that smell....oh that beautiful old magazine smell...all incased in red binders. My whole bedroom took on the old book smell as I studied each and every article I could. I read them cover to cover from the beginning... all the articles, all the adds...everything! The earliest ones seemed to keep my interest more then the later 50's and newer... Those old dual purpose roadsters really struck me...

You see, I had recently bought a model-A sport coupe... planning to make some sort of a "roadster".. I didn't really know what I was doing. I knew I wanted a flathead V8.. 3 speed... banjo rear... etc... but I didn't really know what was good and what was bad... I just had a dream... that may never have panned out...

Skip was a guy I had known through other friends related to bicycles... I didn't know he was an old hot rodder... I was new to the game... I randomly showed him a photo of my sport coupe... his reply "do you want some old magazines?"

Little did I know that this would inturn change my life...

Just as it had done 50-60 years earlier.... Hot Rod Magazine... made me a Hot Rodder....

I pushed the sport coupe aside... found a REAL roadster... a real '32 frame...etc

I haven't been the same since....

www.ZACHSUHR.com

Well would you look at that... www.zachsuhr.com ... why not?

I'm going to TRY to keep this thing going on a more regular basis... A journal of sorts based on whatever it is that I feel like writing... This may not be entirely old car related but obviously if you know me at all... you can guess that old vehicles will likely be the underlying theme.

I am physically working on a whole array of different things lately... some more interesting then others and many may well be a subject on this "blog".

Digging through some things in my house over the weekend I came across a scrapbook that a friend of mine put together over 50 years ago... Mostly filled with big cars and midgets... I discovered 2 pages with photos of roadster races at Williams Grove Speedway (www.williamsgrove.com) in July of 1949.. along with an envelope filled with negatives.
Now you have to understand, I have quite an affliction for roadster racing. Something about it just draws me in. I believe it may well be realted to the fact that these guys took a normal street car mixed it with parts off various other old cars and came up with something capable of impressive speeds without spending a lot of money. I think this comes back to me in the feeling that I could replicate one of these cars... I could have been one of those guys in the 1940's with an old roadster body and a wrecked later model Ford. Mixing and matching in the quest for speed. Though, maybe my feelings towards this are purely romantic...
I've never driven a race car, never gone full out around a dirt track with disregard to the world around. I have grown up around dirt track racing... It was a mainstay of my life for quite some time. From race cars being built in our basement to our whole family working at Silver Spring Speedway (www.silverspringspeedway.com). My dads stories of growing up with racing played heavily on my feelings towards this "sport". To this day I feel more comfortable on a left hand corner then right... its just how it is.... Maybe it really is in my blood? The closest I have come was a few laps in my roadster around Latimore Fairtgrounds during the Jalopy Showdown (www.jalopyshowdown.com).
Today is a different world then that of the post war years. Safety has changed the way the cars are built. Mixing this factor with the "buy and replace" attitude where the big money teams win all the races. You don't have the same courtesy in driving styles. Its not a guts for glory thinking mans game any more... spend money and stand on the gas inside a protective rollcage....

I'm not old enough to have actually lived in an era where you built your entire car in your garage with parts that you scrounged up in the junkyard. But I've tried to pay attention to those who were. I Read books, study photos...take in whatever I can... and to me... this was real racing.

Joe Devine 3-29-33 .... 5-3-2011

Joe passed away this morning...

Over the past year I've gotten to know more of Joe on a personal level then I did in the previous years of our friendship.

Joe has been fighting health problems for the past six months. A broken hip set him back a few weeks ago and I believe the onset of other related problems finally had him facing the final days.

The pain and frustration were a struggle, but Joe seemed to, as always... keep a positive outlook.

Joe was an inspiration beyond a shadow of a doubt that anything... and I mean ANYTHING is possible if you put your mind to it. He taught me many details of metal shaping as he was one of, if not THE best metal shaper around, still doing things the old way...
But more so then details of how to... Joe taught me how to diagnose and how to assess... and how to be patient in reaching your goal.

Joe's life was of simple means.. and he was happy with it that way.

I will be forever a better person for having the oppertunity to know him...


Rest in peace Joe....


As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well used brings happy death. ~Leonardo da Vinci

Euphoria?

I'm sure this is a common trend throughout the world of people obsessed with collecting things. Your search is over, that one thing(its always just one thing isn't it?) you've wanted is finally able to be bought! Your in a different world... I've related this feeling to what people must feel when sky diving.

I have never had the urge to sky dive and therefore this is entirely speculation. I picture that your standing on a plane, way up in the air... nerves are building... something made you get up here, something made you want to do this. That first step from a solid foundation of the airplane into the world of nothing but wind resistance. Theres a rush... high speed... uncertainness.....then you relax... you give in to the fact of what your doing... the parachute deploys... you see the view... you enjoy the rest of the ride at a relaxed pace back to earth.... Then, your back on earth, you did it, you survived, you want to do it again!!

This may sound odd to some people... but these are very similar emotions to what I feel when buying things that I've searched for.

Theres the initial search(airplane ride)... The find(looking out the open door)... the price!(nerves!)...the money changes hands(the jump)..... you own it!(free fall euphoria)....you get it home and sit it on the shelf or bolt it to a car or whatever you do with whatever you bought(the parachute ride to earth).... its old news (your own the ground).....DO IT AGAIN!...

Many people don't have these feelings... they don't lust after things in this manner. People need something, they buy it! Most of what they feel they need in life is readily available. They don't get to experience this thrill. They buy what they want or need, use it, throw it away, buy it again. Its nothing,it means nothing,its another day of their lives.

People may view my life as strange, may consider me a hoarder, a collector, whatever... I don't expect many people to understand.

The reason for this rambling is that last night I was able to purchase a "book" that I have been hunting for a few years now. Since buying a house, my money has been tight and I've had to severly cut down on the purchasing of things. Which inturn cuts down on the amount of times I get that "sky dive high".

I drove only a few short miles to meet up with a friend to see this book that he had for sale. Honestly I was hoping he had sold it before I saw it, as I had no idea what value he would place on it and if too much, I didn't know if I could control my spending. There it was, he handed it over... I had it... in my hands... flipping through the 60+ year old paper. Excited...but still not knowing the price... A bit of back and forth over who would make an offer... and finally a number was said... I had just enough money in my pocket... it was mine... it IS mine... I have it... This book I have been hunting for so long, never seeing another copy for sale, never seeing another copy in person or online, other then the cover... Finally... it is mine....This hand typed book about how to build a hot rod from May 1st 1947... I'm sure theres not anything in here that I haven't already learned from countless other publications. But this simple home brewed copy of how to do it, has just had me awestruck for so long that I could barely contain my excitement to finally own it...(this is when you almost forget to pull the parachute)....

I got it home... read through it immediately... took a photo of the cover... then... went to bed... happy as could be!!

Material posessions shouldn't be the things that rule your life... but from time to time... they sure do put a smile on your face!!


Now what were those other papers that were mentioned for sale.....

Why-Two-Kay-One-Ohhhhh

Its been a while...

I've missed the oppertunity to get into the "writers zone" this year. Its not that I haven't had anything to write about. More so that I've had too much.
At the beginning of this year I had thoughts about finishing some cars and looking for a house with a garage of my own. No real expectations other then relax and be happy with where ever lifes path would take me.

Early in the year oppertunity came knocking in the form of a property that I could purchase and inturn help a friend out of a rough situation. The government offered a first time home buyers incentive and for this to work I needed to meet a looming deadline. One disaster after another tried to show its ugly mug during this process. In the end persistance and A LOT of help from my family and friends, paid off. I am now the proud owner of a little piece of this earth. The end... happily ever after.... well....maybe not...quite a few more suprizes popped up. From problems with insurance to many many varieties of green leafy plants, vines and trees taking over the whole property and buildings. One thing after another has popped up but in the end gotten taken care of.

Its now been about 6 months since settlement and I couldn't be happier. We've begun the process of reworking the garage. Cleaned out the accumulation of bits and pieces, concreted half of the floor and now in the process of reassembling into an organized space. The outside of the property has been greatly improved also. Trees cut down, stumps pulled out, ground graded, etc. Everything is coming along nicely.

It will be quite some time before I am all set up and back in the business of building things. To be honest though, I've had a lot of fun working in a totally different manner then I'm used to. Finally having the oppertunity to think about laying out a building and having it be a building with some history, not just a pole barn. Thinking about a house and how to repair or upgrade things. Its opened my eyes to a lot and made me think about things from a different perspective.

I think you get stuck in a tunnel of thought a lot of times. Your world exists just as it is. You can be totally happy with it and have no reason to change. Then along comes a fork in the road. Do you keep the straight and narrow or take the road less traveled. From my experience... that less traveled road... the one made of dirt with just two trails streaming along into the darkness. Its a pretty good choice!

Theres a world of oppertunity out there... take a chance and go for it.

I think 2011 will be a year of continuing this change and continuing to live each day with a smile on my face.

Happy Holidays
Zach