Sata Spray Guns -Best Product Display at SEMA 2010 How funny is that dude in the reflection?! At some point walking SEMA, just before your legs give out and you hear a very nearby bar calling your name, there's always one more thing to draw you back in.  Often that's a booth babe or some amazing custom car, but sometimes it's something so creative you owe that vendor a much closer look! Check this short video from SATA Paint Guns display at SEMA 2010: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoI7pAFw-Ro[/youtube] See what's happening there?  The SATA guys put together a fantastic display that included this table of SATA auto guns all following people as they walked by.  A  discretely mounted camera nearby made it all happen... that and some pretty trick controls! How cool is that?! I think most people, like me, didn't even know they were being followed, but once they saw it agreed. Very cool! Couple the freaky paint guns with the tried and true hot rods and customs in your booth and you see why SATA had one of the best at SEMA 2010.  The Chip Foose influenced 2010 Camaro SS you might recognize, but have you seen...

Best Product Display at SEMA 2010 How many different ways can you show a car battery? At some point, are there new ways to show anything?  I could recommend a SEMA babe or a radical custom car in your booth... or of course both!  Optima chose a different path with their "Wall of Power" display and I dig it. It's a "Best Product Display of SEMA 2010". Assembled inside the glass "Power" display were several red top, yellow top and blue top batteries that were all bought back from users and all tested to be in proper working condition. No small feat given the extreme duty these batteries endured! Shown here is a blue top battery taken straight from the land speed racing effort of the North American Eagle. The North American Eagle is your every day 43,000 horsepower, F104 Jet Chassis and J-79 jet engined rocket ship! The controls, data acquisition and something you might agree is important, the parachutes, are all controlled by a series of deep cell batteries like these blue top Optimas. After the chutes failed at 300mph plus due to the extreme temperatures and...

SEMA 2010 Car Show Mistakes In case you didn't know, SEMA is a business convention or call it the biggest business meeting of everyone and everything that's related to the automotive industry. Want to go? Sorry, can't! SEMA is only open to SEMA Members and Automotive Industry Professionals like the guy above. Welcome to "Wrong at SEMA 2010". I managed to make it to most halls, save the entire floor of truck accessories, and see plenty that made me ask, "What the..." (Insert your own expletive.) As I'm bashing SEMA trends and pointing out styles or designs that are OUT or just plain wrong, keep in mind that these are my opinions and as you know, "My Ride is Me" so opinions vary.  Feel free to chime in to agree or disagree... I dare you! The automotive design tragedy above is a creation from Rich Evans and was part of the Mopar/Dodge booth. The turn-table spinning this normally cool looking Challenger only added to the nausea. As it spun, I challenged myself to find the angle that showed all of it's disastrous lines.  Here you go.  What's worse: Those nasty wheels...

SEMA 2010 Trends - Flat Paint Jobs Cruising SEMA, certain booths draw a crowd. The serious business people (eh..) who attend SEMA still like a model here and there to add some beauty to the mechanical toughness of the rides or parts in the booth. I gotta be honest... I don't mind it either! This is not a new trend, but flat paint jobs are! (for some rides) I searched around about the car above and found it's an NSX? That's what I'm going with. Whatever body kit it has, it's working to make me think there's some Italian heritage at play. Note the paint though... not the bold red or even the other trend I'll bring up, "Black", it's a suede yellow that fit perfectly. Tip-of-the-hat to the lovely Standard Suspension model shown here. I think she was my favorite. I wrote about this Lexus GS in the Custom Cars of SEMA day 1 story. It's cool that another car style has fully embraced flat paint jobs or call it satin, suede, matte, whatever. Traditional style hot rodders have been reviving (or maybe inventing?) flat painted rat rods...

SEMA Car Show - Our Favorite Engines I gotta be me! How could I resist the power packed old school nastiness of this blown small block Chevy riding in an authentic nostalgia dragster? Why would I want to? I talked to Dennis Overholser from Painless Performance wiring about his new ride. It's almost ready to run the full Comp Cams roller equipped Dart block at a "Drag strip near you!"  Dennis can't terrorize an existing Nostalgia Drag Racing class because of the electronic fuel injection he used but he'll still be able to tear up the quarter mile! Did I sense a little hesitation to drop the hammer Dennis? Prove me wrong! Dennis already has the Truckster featured here from 2009 SEMA Coverage, so check it out! Something like the custom fuel injected LS motor, I'm a sucker for stand up fuel injection. This bad 66 Chevelle also runs Hilborn fuel injection, but this time it's the original mechanical setup that put Hilborn on the map and made many weekend tuners wear a thinner head of hair. I don't know much more about this 427 Chevy big block beast,...

SEMA Car Show - Our Favorite Engines I tripped over my normally aspirated tongue on the way to this insane twin turbo Dodge Viper in the K&N booth at SEMA 2010 in hot rod alley. How do you take it all in?  I was so "blown" (I'm hella funny) away that I didn't grab any overall pics or get the rest of the details. I'll leave that to our friends at Speedhunters.com: From Speedhunters: What you're looking at is a stroked 510 CI Viper V10 featuring two Bullseye Power Borg Warner T-4 80mm turbos with a MoTeC M800 Engine Management System that was calibrated by Shane Tecklenburg. The result? Roughly 2000 horse power at 12 psi. No biggie. I agree, tame and ordinary! The guys at Twins Turbo Motorsports built this beast. From their website's "About Us" page,  "Twins Turbo Motorsports specializes in fuel injected turbo systems for race and street vehicles. We have been building and setting up vehicles for competition as well as for the street since 1996." It shows and their efforts landed them a prime spot at SEMA with K&N. Read the rest of the...

SEMA Car Show - Our Favorite Muscle Car Engines Feast your eyes on a little on cubes 4.6L DOHC Ford modular motor that's long on horsepower. The valve covers read "720 HP". What looks like a Kenne Bell supercharger rests on top of another super clean, not-a-wire-outa-place layout that totally makes the engine bay for me. That's the detail you'll find at the SEMA Las Vegas Car Show. Outside the convention halls, I spotted this slick custom Mustang Fastback. Maybe some can say if it's a 1967 or 1968 Mustang. It's got the 68 side scoops, but doesn't have the side marker lights of 68. I could see those shaved off for this car, but I'd also say the 67 side scoops aren't as attractive as the 68's. So in the best of both worlds custom car scenario, let's call this a 1967.5 Mustang Fastback! I'd like to tell you more about this car, but unlike most cars at the SEMA show, there was no show card and I didn't notice any sponsor stickers. Clean execution all the way! (too clean?)  Too busy trying to get the best coverage...

SEMA Car Show - Our Favorite Engines This is the kind of engine that stops you in your tracks at SEMA. Among all the great rides making the SEMA car show, standing out is tough, so hats off to the "Be Cool" Bomber project 1972 Chevelle. From their show card, this is an LS1 motor punched to 388 cubic inches and built by Terry Rosebush Performance for owner Kiet Pham. Pictured right up front you'll see the ProCharger blower force feeding the custom made Hilborn fuel injection setup. It's said, "Injection is nice but I'd rather be blown."  Why not have both?! Next two photos courtesy of the Be Cool Chevelle Facebook Page The beautiful Genevieve Chappell So this is how it started. Hilborn supplied the fuel injection setup, but from there, it was all custom. The guys from the facebook page said, "The mandrel bender will be hot on Monday!" No sweat! Eight tubes all merged to one inlet, then moving backwards, you'll go through the throttle body, to the intercooler, around to the ProCharger blower and to the air cleaner. All that fits neatly under the hood....

SEMA Car Show - Our Favorite Muscle Car Engines Steve Strope from Pure Vision built this subtle but nasty 1969 Mustang Fastback with a Boss 502 stretched to 521 cubes and a mind blowing 805 ponies on pump gas. The motor is an all aluminum Boss 9 built by Jon Kaase Racing Engines. Kaase took the original Boss 429 head design and improved on it. Bolt it to a Ford 460 and have some fun! Couple the unmistakable Ford Boss looks with the ultra-clean under hood layout that's sitting completely under the Mustang's hood and it's no wonder it's a favorite engine at MyRideisMe.com. Learn more about the Boss 9 head design from the Kaase "Boss 9" page. Built for Anvil, makers of Camaro and Mustang carbon fiber body panels, this new Boss Mustang Fastback should be as fast as it is beautiful. Congratulations to the Pure Vision Crew and Anvil on a great new ride! The crew at Pure Vision did a great job documenting the build of the Anvil Mustang.  I'll start with the video of the the engine, then step back to the intro of the...

SEMA Car Show - Custom Cars that Rocked Las Vegas Troy Ladd from Hollywood Hot Rods showed strong up in the massive Ford display at SEMA. Ford has the best booth in the central hall overlooking the rest of Hot Rod Alley every year and always has great, new and old. That must be why they featured the vintage 427 SOHC motor in this Brookville bodied 32 Roadster Pickup. Fooled you too! That's not a cammer motor, that's Ford racing's 5.0L "Coyote" motor dressed up and cleaned up to look like my favorite vintage powerplant. Troy's a wizard at having the cleanest engines showing only minimal signs of the high-tech equipment on board. It's no show piece either! Look for more pictures of this Raybestos roadster at the Optima Ultimate Street Car Invitational. Straying as far away from the hot rod above as we can, dig this custom Lexus. What's old is new and there's no mistaking the hot rod or kustom car influence on this suede painted Lexus. Also note the ground scrapping airride assisted stance and the door handles shaved for the back doors, but not the...

Homebuilt Hot Rods Car shows, car club, breakdowns, wrench nights, possible near death experiences, getting things fixed, and as always adventuring in the hot rod world - these things and more are what've been goin' on for the past month as I've neglected my writing. The month started with a car club meeting (I haven't told ya'll too much about them yet...I'll have to remedy that soon!) The following day was Bedlam Ball Car Show in San Pedro. Me and the other Gasoline Girls had fun hanging out together and seeing our buddies the Throttle Kings along with some other cool cars down in the port town of Los Angeles. The next week included ongoing wrench nights to get Lori's truck finished, a 1948 Ford F1, as well as some work to be done to get Rosa's 1965 Ford Falcon working correctly again. In the meantime, Stude was tellin' me her front suspension was gone, really gone. After months of driving her knowing that her bushing were on their way out and then completely gone. With rain falling in LA and a nearly bald tire... I decided to park...

Kustom D'Elegance Winner at 2010 Motorama Custom Car Show If you're into customs, then the Long Beach Motorama is not to be missed! Although there are plenty of beautiful cars (like the ones I featured in my Motorama - First Look article) the highlight of the show is the Kustom D'Elegance award. Each of the dozen-plus contenders impressed in their own way... just being in the room sets these cars apart from the pack. However, just one could win the $20,000 cash prize along with a place on the perpetual trophy! As soon as you walk on into the Long Beach Arena, the red carpet leads you on past each of the skillful and innovative kustoms. Each one was fantastic... This roof- hammered 1959 Cadillac came all the way from Australia and was, I'm sure, one of the most customized cars present. Gene Winfield's old 1935 Ford Pickup shop truck , which had disappeared in 1965, was found in 2008 and resurrected to beautiful completion by Hatfield Restorations. This 1936 Auburn Roadster had some nice appeal. Voodoo Larry's newly completed 1946 Ford was in the running also. Those of you who...