We have all heard the remark that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. For hot rods, no statement has ever been more true. Hot rods are, by definition, vehicles that have been changed from their stock with an emphasis on making them go faster and look different. Each builder’s finished product is unique. Some have a certain period of hot rod history in mind, while others have a clear vision to build a car that reflects their likes and tastes. Still, others start adding parts until they end up with a dog’s breakfast of a car. That may be the case with this 1930 Ford Model A hot rod for sale on eBay in Claremont, New Hampshire. There are a lot of different parts and pieces on this running and driving hot rod, and more than a few may end up being expendable when the next owner sets to work on it. The good news is that bidding has reached $7,500, with a Buy It Now price of $10,000 just around the corner. Do you think this car can be had cheaply enough to make the changes needed to put your personal touch on it?
When a hot rod is right, it is a work of art. I have buried in my rabid mind a memory of a 1932 Ford roadster that I saw one night on one of the secondary roads in my hometown. An older gentleman had just taken his grandson (I assume) for an ice cream cone at Dairy Queen. Yet it was the car itself that was the coolest part of the picture. It was painted in black, shiny as a new penny, and had a large set of headlamps set low in the front. The headlights had that magical 6-volt glow that brightened and darkened with the engine revolutions. Riding on steel rims with period correct bias ply tires, the Flathead sound rumbling from the pipes was unmistakable. This rolling time machine eventually turned off into a neighborhood never to be seen by me again.
It was then that I fell head over heels in love with the early hot rod theme. To me, a car built like this is as gorgeous as any da Vinci painting. On my list of things to accomplish before I shuffle off this mortal coil is to build a hot rod like that. Other folks may have a deep fondness for the kind of cars that Boyd Coddington and Chip Foose made famous. There are countless other themes to choose from and directions to take in your hot rod build. Yet it can be easy to get lost in the process due to a lack of clear vision, finances, or just the desire to put all those parts and pieces lying around into a single automobile.
That may have been the case for the builder of this 1930 Ford Model A roadster hot rod. The seller purchased the car from an older gentleman who only drove the car occasionally during the summer until their health declined. It is described as a “Very basic build, nothing special.” It has a newer steel frame with a 350 cubic inch Chevrolet small block V-8 under the hood. That powerplant is backed by a Turbo 350 automatic. There is no mention as to what rear end is under it. According to the owner, it runs and drives well and it starts right up every time. The seller claims to have driven it 30 miles with no trouble at all. They even managed to get up to 60 MPH.
While all of this can be expected with a build that has a new frame and a proven powertrain, the real issue is how the car looks. A first glance draws your eyes to the two chrome spears riding horizontally along the upper part of the body. They are unique to be sure, and not entirely off-putting visually. They make this car stand out from the thousands of other hot rods of this type. What detracts is the parts catalog approach to much of the rest of the car. You can see everything from a late-model steering system to some of the more garish accessories from the parts catalogs nobody ever admits to ordering from. There are many quality pieces on this car, and there are a few head-scratchers. Take for example the Harbor Freight battery-powered switch plate light.
Fortunately, all of these bits and pieces can be exorcised to strip this car down to the bare essentials of chassis, drivetrain, and body. From there, the next owner will have to decide what direction they want to go. With little work, this would be a great fifties-era hot rod. Drop the headlights down, throw away the stone guard strapped to the radiator shell, back-date every component you can on the engine, throw those headers into the drink, and so on. Working from front to back, you can simultaneously wear out a credit card and vastly increase the appeal of this hot rod.
That would be my plan. What would you do to make this hot rod with good bones your masterpiece? Please share your dreams and plans in the comments.
To the phantom commentator… why do all those changes to a perfectly good car? All I would do is remove the strips (hoping they are stick on), get the wall switch off the dash, and color sand and polish the paint. It’s a basic hot rod. If you don’t like it go buy something else.
It’s not really a wall switch.
It’s a battery powered LED lamp.
Dome or map light I guess.
But yes, it should go.
This a definitely a car without an overriding theme, but that would be easy to fix by swapping out some parts. It’s never going to be a representation of a period “correct” hot rod, there is nothing wrong with that, most hot rods aren’t. Like you said it’s a catalog build, that was obviously built in a budget, it’s something that can be driven and enjoyed for what it is, but improved with some minor tweaking.
I’ve got a couple of friends that are into “period” builds, one has a Model A roadster pickup he finished 5-6 years ago with a target date of the early-50’s, it took him a couple of years to piece the correct parts together, the most difficult component to find were the nuts and bolts and other hardware. Now he’s finishing another Model A with all vintage Fenton speed equipment, some of which he’s had since the early-70’s. Not many people are going to go through that much effort, and only a few people will recognize it for what it is. He’s fine with that, he drives the pickup to hot rod runs several times a year when he’s not out swapmeeting.
This car, at its price point looks to be a good entry level car that is probably safe and can be enjoyed once the weather in that part of the country warms up.
Steve R
I hear that dig at JC Whitney. When I was 13 in 1978 the JC Whitney catalog was my nightly bedtime read. I’d peer at the Hot Rod sections, the military Jeep and dunebuggy sections picking all the parts I needed to make the best car in town. I also learned how to cross reference parts across brands, that really helped later. I still have those issues.
Same here for me with the JC Whitney catalogs. As a kid in the 70s I used to look at them, I REmember the Jeep parts and you could get interior parts for Square Body Chevys and old Fords and Dodges too. The infamous steering wheel made of chain links. And the list goes in and on. That was a great memory V8TR4. THANKS .
I wish I still had some of those.
Put me on your list. Hub caps, acorn nut covers for the flathead, chrome exhaust tips, chrome air cleaners,etc.
Yes J.C. was a great mag. for after market parts. Bought a rug for my 55 chrysler 30 years ago and still looks great. Seat covers–fuel pump–and the list goes on and on. They seem to have left the old car market. But I still can by parts for my M.C. When I was 17 loved it when that catalog came in the mail.
Made me look for my 1970 catalog … “jazzed” up my ’59 Chevy 2door, 283, three-on-the-tree … valve covers, hub caps, spring lifts, aah-oooh-gah horn – it was a Louisiana red neck’s delight … sorta like finding the Holy Grail when I actually went to Archer Ave after I moved to Chicago … those were the days …
As a teenager in the early 70s I had a 30 Model A coupe. You get just about anything for it from JC. I wore out every copy I got.
Those chrome strips have to go.
Do you still have the JC Whitney catalog issues or issues with reading it in bed and cross referencing parts? 😉
P.S.- I used to read them from cover to cover as a kid. I would show my dad items to trick out his Renault Dauphine.
It’s more of a dig at Summit, Jegs and any other mail order supplier that have supplanted local speed shops. J. C. Whitney might have been relevant, but that’s not really the case today, nor has it been for years if not decades. This car doesn’t date back that far.
Steve R
Yes JC Whitney taught me a lot back then and head my face in it more often than school books.
I’m still trying to find one of those $50 “Jeep-in-a-crate” that I saw in Popular Mechanics magazine.
Just Enough Essential Parts. What a concept.
Chopped 32 grille would help and different wind screen
My thoughts exactly that windshield belongs on a greyhound bus. Wouldn’t take much to make it a true 50’s hot rod we put together in ” auto shop class”. Remember that? Im an old guy I do.
Hey, I even BOUGHT a few things from JC Whitney back in the day.
There was more than just bathroom-reading material there.
A co-worker of mine bought a “water injection” system from JC, back I the early ’80’s, for his Dodge custom van. Put it on the thing, and gave me a ride in the van, raving about the performance increase. I had a 351powered Ford van at the time, and his van was a 318. After the test ride, I just smiled and nodded. “Oh yeah man! This thing flys!” Back in my van, on the way home, I couldn’t help thinking, “that Dodge must have been running on 7 cylinders.”
I have learned my lesson. I’m not even going to mention the ‘Ford in a Ford’ thing. I am beginning to understand, ‘because it’s cheap and the junk yards are full of them’ thing. The builder of this hot rod obviously didn’t have the big bucks to spend on his car. I get it, I’ve been there myself. That switch on the dash looks like something I might have done back in the day. But I still don’t understand why GM would put a TURBO on their automatic transmissions. I guess it spins up and forces the fluid through the torque converter faster. Thank God I’m a FORD guy!
Torque Flite, Dyna Glide, Power Glide, Cruise-O-Matic? Because they’re catchy, that’s why. As far as the hot rod goes, I think it’s kind of cool. Take house switch off of the dash, lose the intake system and replace it with 3 Strombergs, spruce it up overall and presto you’ve got yourself a 50s style hot rod. Or my favorite, put tunnel ram on it, 10″ 5 spoke wheels in back with Mickey Thompsons, and 10 spoke gasser style wheels in front with disc brakes and you’ve got yourself a 60s or early 70s street rod.
There’s a so much “wrong'” with this one you have to suspect that it was put together by someone who just wanted a “rod”, but didn’t have any real building or even more importantly welding skills. The first thing that sticks out the most is the wheelbase is wrong and the rear wheels are too far forward. Likely he bought the chassis, put in the engine and where the body ended up well, that’s where it was bolted down. Then he just bought as many catalog parts and bolted them on. To fix it would take almost as much time as starting over and likely isn’t worth the effort, hence the low ask. The body needs to be pulled and stripped, it looks like it was painted with a brush to cover the rust. Lose the silly venturi intake, put on a top hood and 3 duces, some chrome pipes and a 32 grill shell would clean it up but that’s pretty much putting lipstick on a pig until you fix the wheelbase.
After all these ears of building cars I never knew there was a standard wheelbase for hot rods. Learn something every day.
OMG! Cannot believe a buy it now of only $10,000! Would buy this in a minute if only it were nearer to me. Would be a fun time making some of the small changes that are needed to make it better suit my likes.
I don’t see any issues with this car it looks like it was a fun build and the bottom line, it runs
The scary part about this is that it’s not what you see is dangerous, it’s what you can’t see that scares me. They way this was built, basically ordering parts from catalogs where if it fit’s it was bolted on, is scary. Might be fine, but not sure it was thought out at all.
Where do you think all these parts come from these days and years ago? The big players like Summit, Jeggs, and all the other specialty companies just like in the ’50s and ’60s when all of the hot rod stuff started. Dropped axles, headers, aluminum cylinder heads, cams, manifolds, etc. were mostly bought from catalogs.
I think this car was built by someone else and this guy got it cheap for all the reasons mentioned
And nobody remembered the bare foot gas pedal JC Whitney sold.
I have been into “HOT RODS” way too long to even comment on what ever this car is or could be. I have owned and built 34 and 32 Fords, roadsters and coupes, and I would be embarrassed to be seen in this vehicle. It’s a joke, it does not represent any era of a significant Hot Rod build. Call me an elitist or snob ,but don’t call this car a Hot Rod. Would you show off your botched up kit car at a Ferrari concourse and expect the participants to welcome you with open arms?
Jeez Louise Joe, I hope you never go out in the rain. With your nose so far in the air you would drown. Already mentioned in comments about this car, a hot rod is what the builder wants it to be. Actually, I’ve never seen a spec. sheet for building one. Perhaps you can put one on this site for us?
OK Joe – you asked for it – I think you are an elitist snob!
I have a friend that is building a chopped ’32 sedan, and he searched high and low until he found a correct ’57 283 block and “power pack” heads. Most people won’t know or care, but he will.
It’s better than the one I don’t have. 🤷♂️
Now paging the late great Gray Baskerville. Sure would love to hear his thoughts on this one, but they would be a bit harsh! RIP to ol’ Dad.
Somehow I don’t think that a lot of readers are even going to know who Gray Baskerville even was. Might be wrong, but I don’t think so.
Well oldrodder, I think any car buff older than 30 years old that ever picked up an issue of HOT ROD magazine would know who Gray is. I think he was the best photographer they had. I think he lived into his 80s. This is from memory, I didn’t google it. I’m an old fart too. You can see alot of his work in HOT ROD DELUXE magazine, one of my favorite mags.
Cobra seats. Nice.
As the old saying goes. “ I built my car to suit my tastes, you can build yours any way you like.”
Well I guess I knew what I said would raise a few voices. I admit it, I am a Hot Rod snob. I knew Gray Baskerville and he was a great guy and long time Hot Rodder and automotive journalist and photographer. He drove an iconic 32 Roadster. It is still exactly like it was at his passing. If you know the car you know it is not a show piece, it’s just cool and it was Gray’s. I would suspect if you could ask Gray he wouldn’t give this B/F car very high marks, just maybe not as vocal as I did. I think all of you are “SNOBS” If you think about it. What ever is your passion, Restored , Hot Rods, Muscle cars, Corvettes, Mustangs, Certain brands that you are very passion about you have studied them, owned them and restored them, they are part of your life. When you see one that really doesn’t represent what that car should be and it is not correct you will speak out, we all do. But sometimes we are not PC about it. I think B/F is a forum where you can say what you think especially if you are knowledgeable about that type of car. That’s why I like B/F I look at a posting and then I read the comments and think, WOW, I didn’t know that! And I think how much people know about certain cars and I like hearing it, just for general knowledge
Joe, while I agree with a lot of what you say, as Wayne from Oz said “I built my car to suit my tastes, you build your’s any way you like”. While this car could certainly be critiqued on technical aspects, I doubt that Baskerville would judged the quality of the build because he was a true rodder that understood that not everyone had the same talent or resources that he had. Whether it’s built by Dave Kindig or some 17 year old kid in his parents garage, it’s still a hot rod in every sense of the word.
Oldrodder, I agree with you too. I think for me sometimes what I write is taken out of context and not what I intended. I have no issue with what any one builds with their talent and budget. I am 81 years old and I have looked at my cars and always say not too bad for my age my lack of skills and a bank account that is two digits. That is the name of the game for most of us, at least it always has been for me. But what happens to anything that is creative is open for criticism, and that changes everything. I think we all want people to like the cars we built, but that’s not going to happen. I get the most compliments on cars I no longer have. Why did you sell that car, I really liked it! That’s funny you never told me that. I have a problem ,I am to vocal no matter if I love it or hate it. Good advice if you hate it, keep it to yourself. Maybe that should be my New Years resolution. I went back to my first post and it was a little harsh even for me, SORRY!
Joe, no harm, no foul. I understand the compunction to critique a thing that is something that you are knowledgeable about. We all do it. Sometimes we just should let discretion be the better part of valor and not say anything.