Chuck Most

I started with a piece of plastic tube and just kind of went from there. It's approximately a 9" motor- the idea was that it was rebuilt using the guts from a much newer Warp9 motor.

After the success of his Gratiot County Historical Tours venture, Jerry sold part of the business to a partner. For the first time in a while, he had income AND spare time. It had been a while since he'd messed around with a car just for fun, so he decided to build a rat rod. Not a traditional rod, unfinished rod, or what have you.... a rat rod. Surveying the farm for bits and pieces, he located a 1940's electric motor and decided then and there his rat would be an electric car. The motor also dictated the front wheel covers- Jerry went with '65 Ford Galaxie wheel covers as they somewhat resembled the front of the motor. A 1919 Olds touring body was dug out of a hay loft, and the chassis was made from a small trailer used to transport a cement mixer. Jerry hit the junkyard and nabbed some I beams from a '93 Ranger and made his own radius arms for the front suspension. The Woodlite headlights are something Jerry had kicking around in a box in his attic for ages, so he finally used them here. He used some teardrop cab lights up front as turn signals to mimic their shape. The bed and floor were all made from various bits of scrap metal. Jerry found an old knife switch and rigged it with a cable to use as a parking brake. An on board generator, driven by the driveshaft, was an idea Jerry had to charge the car in motion. Fact is the generator created quite a bit of drag and wasn't of much use below 70 MPH or so. Maybe in the future he'll replace it with a gas-powered generator... a hybrid rat, then. The car quickly earned the nicknames "Power Wheels" and "Jetson's Rat" for the sound it made in motion. Jerry had fun throwing it together and puttering around in it, and all for about the cost of some new wide whites and junk he had laying around.

In 1972, Tim Pierce bought his first new truck, the all-new Dodge D200. He got it at a pretty deep discount too, as the local dealer had mistakenly ordered one too many orange ones for a local road commission and refused to try to stick them with the extra truck they didn't need. Not that Tim cared- it somewhat blended in with the red-orange Flambeau Red on the Case equipment he used at the farm. The pickup served Tim faithfully for years- it was used to haul trailers when he began selling trailers at his farm, and it helped carry building supplies when he built a dedicated trailer shop in 1977. By 1994 though, the old truck was getting a little ripe and Tim replaced it with a new 3500 dually... in MDOT Orange, of course. The truck mostly sat until 1996 when his oldest son Brad got his license Brad is the one who did a little rust repair in auto shop, located a new tailgate, and gave the truck it's nickname, "Ancient Orange". He also ended up replacing the hood after it blew open on the way home from a football game one night. When Brad moved out he left the old Dodge behind, but Tim still uses it around the farm and at the trailer dealer. He keeps telling himself he'll restore it one of these days. The model itself started out as the MPC monster truck. I bought it about a week or so before news broke that the MPC Dodge long bed kit was to be reissued. Such is life. I returned it to stock using the front and rear suspension from a Little Red Express kit. The wheels and hitch came from Scenes Unlimited, and the gooseneck hitch in the bed is scratchbuilt. The grille is a slush casting I got from a fellow member, I'll let him come forward and identify himself if he wants to. I will say I hope the upcoming MPC reissue fits together a tad better than this 1987-ish reissue did. And if these pics look different than what you're used to from me, I can explain. My normal photo stand is under several inches of snow and ice, and I used my phone instead of my camera for the photos.

I love it! I did something similar much more recently- mine is even painted blue, but I went with a bit more of a modern theme with mine.

I had an idea what I wanted the finished model to look like, then worked all of that in. It looks worse in person. I tried a rusty road-salt effect with thinned gray paint that didn't quite work out how I wanted. The model took about a weeks' worth of evenings off work, and the story probably only took about three times as long to write as it does to read.

Nice! I do hope they'll sell the sheet for it. I believe the graphic scheme changed little (if at all) between '77 and '79.

They're in more or less a straight line across the state. I loosely based the story on a couple of brothers who owned car dealerships across the state of MI- they had one as far west as Muskegon and one all the way out in Bay City. It was a good three hour trip between the two widest spread locations, which was why the further-flung dealers were sold off over the years.

Ever wonder what Scary Jerry's daily driver is? No? Think it's something wacky and over the top? Well, prepare to be sorely disappointed! In the late fall of 1992, Jerry's formerly trusty old beater met it's end. After being sideswiped by an out-of-control Olds Custom Cruiser during a heavy rain storm, Jerry's '72 F-250 had slid off the road and into a ditch, which had demolished the front end, severed the drag link, and slammed the radiator into the fan. Other than some bruising on his palms where he'd braced himself against the steering wheel (which had bent during the crash), Jerry was fine. The elderly woman in the Olds was fine despite spinning out into the ditch on the opposite side of the road. His truck, on the other hand, didn't fare so well. The old Ford ran but was no longer driveable and in all honesty wasn't worth repairing. Jerry had always wanted a Ranger, as he had several friends, relatives, and co-workers who owned and loved them, and there was an all new Ranger for 1993, so Jerry figured now was the time to purchase his first new vehicle, and all signs were pointing to the new Ranger. One afternoon after work, Jerry walked in to G.R. Wilson Ford-Lincoln-Mercury and went to the desk of Ed Luchenbill. Though Ed was an imposing giant of a man, who bore a more-than-passing resemblance to Refrigerator Perry, he was quite soft spoken and very knowledgeable about the new Ranger, telling Jerry he was thinking of getting one himself. Jerry rattled off a list of what he wanted, and it sounded to Ed like what Jerry wanted was an XLT, seeing as how Jerry seemed keen to have something "way nicer than an Orkin truck". Upon reviewing literature showing the various features and options, Jerry agreed, and asked "You happen to have one with the 4.0 and five-speed in stock?" Ed replied with "Yes... but it is silver." Jerry had said that was one of the colors he'd have liked to avoid. But, a quick spin around town with Ed and Jerry told him he'd have bought the nasty metallic purple one with the four cylinder on the lot next too it, as he was so impressed with the new Ranger. That impression never really wore off, as Jerry drove the wheels off the little silver pick-em-up for years. In the late summer of 1996, when Jerry was promoted to third-shift supervisor at his job and a mere three months after making the last payment, he hit a deer on the highway about two miles from work. Though the Ranger was physically unscathed, the bumper had taken a pounding. The deer, naturally, had gotten up and trotted off into the twilight. That weekend Jerry went to the local junkyard to find a replacement, and the owner told him he had a brand-new chromed XLT bumper, minus the rub strip, for a mere 45 bucks. Jerry took it. He also grabbed an air dam from a Ranger in the yard. On the way back home, he also picked up a cheap set of fog lights... thinking perhaps they'd either help scare off any oncoming deer, or at least enable him to see them better and avoid them. Jerry had always planned to add the rub strip, but never got around to it. The old Ranger plugged along without incident until 1999, when, again, it had to quench it's thirst for deer blood, on the way home from work this time. The replacement bumper and air dam were okay, and so was the splash apron, but the grille had been demolished and the hood was crumpled badly enough that Jerry had to physically remove the latch to open it. Though undamaged, the passenger's side fender had been pushed back just far enough to jam the door on that side. Once more to the Junkyard, where there was a black '93 Ranger Splash that had met it's end after a hard rear-ender. He just loosened the bolts on the original right fender and pulled it forward so his passenger door could open again. Jerry had planned to paint the grille and hood (or maybe just the hood) to match the truck, but never got around to it. By 2001, Jerry had gone back to first shift, and at the end of the day he and some of his crew would often sit on the tailgate, having a smoke and gabbing about the day's events and plans for the evening. One day, as Jerry and two rather burly co-workers popped a squat on the Ranger's 'gate, there was a sharp "twang" sound as the rusted tailgate cables snapped and the tailgate slammed down onto the bumper. The three men had a good laugh, and Jerry went home with his tailgate down, as the impact had crunched the skin, ripped a hinge, and bent it just enough to where it would not latch properly. Minor blessing, the bumper escaped injury aside from a scuff on the plastic trim. Another junkyard trip, and the owner had a '93-'97 tail gate in Toreador Red on the shelf. Jerry had always had a mind to repaint the tailgate to match the truck, but opted to get a sprayed-in bedliner instead, as a local shop had just started providing the service and the deal was too good to pass up. A year later... the mismatched panels remained, but a brand-new Pioneer CD head unit had replaced the factory AM/FM/Cassette unit shortly after it had chewed up Jerry's treasured tape of Anthrax's "Persistence Of Time" album. The years wore on, and the Ranger wore out. Jerry followed the suggested maintenance schedule to the letter, and when he noticed something amiss, he fixed it or had it fixed as soon as possible. As the miles piled on, the Ranger had gone through countless front pads and rotors, one set of shoes and drums, two clutches, both radius arm brackets, rear leaf spring hangers and shackles (all casualties to rust despite a Ziebart treatment when new and periodic undercoating in the years since), and numerous normal wear-and-tear items. The driver's seat was in bad shape, both from ordinary wear and from Jerry's often horrendous farts. A fresher seat with reddish upholstery from a junkyard Ranger was swapped in. The old Ziebart treatment was beginning to wear off as well, as by this time a few spots of rust were visible at the cab corners. Jerry was often complemented on how rust free his Ranger was for a Michigan beater, but even an eternal optimist like Jerry knew it was bound to happen sooner or later. On his way back from interviewing for a new job at a metalworking shop in 2006, the spare tire carrier had broken loose due to rust. Jerry got the job, but the carrier never got replaced, and the spare took up permanent residence sliding around in the bed. Now, here we are in 2019. For just over a quarter of a century and nearly 375,000 miles, the Ranger has served Jerry faithfully through two "real" jobs as well as his various little escapades on his own. He's driven it to the theater to see every Jurassic Park movie since the beginning. Unfortunately, he also drove it to the theater to see all three Star Wars prequels. Not every trip is a success, after all. It transported parts and materials to create the Mobile Pork Incinerator and several of Jerry's other whacked creations. The Ranger is now older than the F-250 was when it was totaled, and has done nearly three times as many miles. But things aren't looking as bright these days. The cab corner and rocker rust turns out to be a bit more serious than Jerry had thought- one day after driving in a thunderstorm, Jerry noticed the carpet was getting wet. The floors are just about gone. That shocking development also solved the mystery what was causing the cab to sag and the random machine-gun click of the fan blades hitting the shroud. Jerry first suspected the cab and core support bushings had collapsed, and he was right- and those are fairly easily replaced- but the cab mounts themselves don't look so hot. The scary part is that he had it up on a hoist the previous spring and the floor looked scaly but solid then... And there's that plume of blue smoke that turns white upon startup, and persists for about five minutes of driving, despite no oil-fouled plugs or evidence of coolant getting into the cylinders. Jerry's not sure if it's just in his head, but he swears there's an ever-so-slight knock coming from somewhere under the hood, barely audible past the noise from the leaky gaskets on the cracked exhaust manifolds and the squealing alternator... But as of now, the Ranger endures, just like Jerry. So does the sprayed-in bedliner Jerry had done all those years ago, more or less on a lark. And salesman Ed Luchenbill? So does he. In fact, he's about to celebrate his 29th year as a sales rep at G.R. Wilson Ford-Lincoln. Ed ultimately didn't get a new Ranger the year Jerry did, but he's already ordered his 2019 version. Will Jerry do likewise? Who knows...

For many years, the three Sullivan brothers owned a quartet of service stations across Pennsylvania. Their flagship Harrisburg location's claim to fame was it's 24 hour service bays- overnight mechanics were on duty seven days a week and some holidays to help get motorists stranded during the night back on the road, or to accommodate people who were stuck at work during normal shop hours. The other three locations weren't quite as epic, but still got the job done. The vehicles used by those facilities could be described the same way. This '53 F100 was used by the Kecksburg Esso station. It had been purchased new, but by the mid '60's it had developed a character all it's own. The engine had been hopped up with Offy heads and a dual carb intake, for extra power to deal with those Pennsylvania hills. Towing mirrors, spot lights, cab lights, and a shop fabricated snow plow and headache rack had been added, along with a fabricated rear bumper and hitch. One by one the original hubcaps had fallen off, and had been replaced by '62 Mercury and Lincoln full wheel covers on the front and rear, respectively. Though tattered and road weary, the old Ford always got the job done, whether it was running parts for a customer vehicle or going out to help a motorist stranded with a flat or an empty tank. On the evening of December 9, 1965, Larry Sullivan had responded to an old lady who had a flat tire and en route to where the woman's Buick sat alongside the road, he became one of several eyewitnesses to a glowing, bell-shaped object crashing into a wooded area. Later that evening, Larry had taken the F100 back out to get a better look at the crash site, but was politely (but firmly) told to leave by two young men in military uniforms. The Sullivan Kecksburg Esso closed in 1971, and the '53 ended up parked behind the Harrisburg location for a fairly long period of time. At some point the snow plow disappeared, and the tool boxes and tools were dispersed into the service department. It was then towed to the Sullivan's station in Exeter, where the mechanics had planned to restore it during slow time at work. But there never seemed to be enough time at the busy Exeter location, and the truck sat some more, until the Exeter location closed in 1979. It languished at a Sullivan family member's farm for several more years, until another relative in Michigan picked it up as a project. It's still a project, even though for the first time in ages, the old Ford is running and road worthy once more. Now.... the model itself. It was an incomplete mid '90's issue of the AMT F100. I had the Esso graphics laying around forever. Same goes for the Mercury and Lincoln wheel covers, the '49 Merc Offy heads, and the Replicas and Miniatures two-carb intake. There were no Esso stations in Michigan, but there were (still might be?) several in Pennsylvania, and the 1994 version of this kit included Pennsylvania plates, so I went that route. This truck was based out of Kecksburg, just so I could incorporate the UFO story into it's history. This was mostly just a fun "throw it together" kind of project.

That sounds about right That's the custom air cleaner from the '65 Continental.

I love it! I've built the first-gen Q in a quasi bosozoku style, and I have two others I haven't touched yet. Might need to try something like this with one of them.

It's the charcoal color from the Testors One Coat line... I don't recall the actual name and I'm too lazy to look. I did use Tamiya Gunmetal to touch it up in a few areas though. It's a pretty close match.

A while back I picked up a nasty old built up '62 Continental convertible. Since many of the stock parts were missing I opted to rebuild it as a period custom. The engine is from a '65, an F-100 Wild Kat grille was modified to fit, and I used the triple-stripe tires and wire wheels from the recent '65 Riv reissue. The first two pics show how it looked when I got it, and the others depict it now.

This is an old custom that was recently unearthed and is being driven and slowly restored. I chopped the windshield, lowered it, and fitted some US Royal Masers from an old Revell parts pack. The stock V12 remains but it's been fitted with a "slingshot" adaptor to fit two Stromberg carbs.

Love the detail on the tracks! That guy must take recovering vintage auto parts very seriously if he's going out in weather where skis and tracks are requirements to make the journey. ?

About eight to twelve years ago, I got an old "Sisco Sizzler" issue of the AMT '53 F100. I swapped in the dropped front axle from a Revell '56, and the wheels, tires, and rear axle from a '60 Starliner. And there the project sat until a few weeks back, when I cobbled together a Lincoln 462 from spares and slid it into the chassis. I went "barn find" style with the body, added some '65 Mustang tail lights, and made the little C-shaped deluxe trim pieces for the hood emblems.

First, a recap on the backstory.... Continuing from there.... After a few months of running the sightseeing tour, Jerry found himself with a problem. Business was a little too good, and the five-passenger capacity of The Sightseer just wasn't cutting it. Adding full bench seats to the second and third row would only bring the car up to seven passengers and hardly seemed worth the effort. There were a number of 15 passenger vans for sale in the area, but Jerry felt a van lacked the kind of pizzaz his operation needed. Then, surfing the web one evening, he stumbled across another '65 Lincoln Continental. Originally built as a convertible limo, the car had been a near clone of The Sightseer at one point. At some time during the '80's the limo had been converted into a tandem axle, and a hot tub had been installed in the rear deck. Even though the car was in Indiana, Jerry went to have a look at it. The owner had a ton of documentation and photos of the car- at one point it had been painted hot pink, and served a casino with gold plated bull horns over the grille and a rather questionable custom grille treatment. The present owner had repainted it in it's original charcoal hue and reinstalled the original grille, but had opted to leave the later tandem axle conversion because he'd grown fond of the look, and it would have been too much work to convert it back to a single axle. He had made a tonneau cover to enclose the area where the hot tub had been, and there the project had stalled. A few hours and a couple grand lighter in the wallet later, Jerry had the tandem limo in his shop ready for surgery. It turned out being the easiest conversion Jerry had done to date. The car actually ran and drove perfectly when he bought it, after all! Jerry fashioned a passenger platform to fit over the former hot tub location. Fashioned from steel and padding purchased from a company that makes those super-comfy fiberglass fast food benches, it was sprayed in glossy black paint and bolted onto the car using a Jerry-engineered system of brackets and supports. A local vinyl shop printed out some signs for the side. Jerry had toyed with the idea of painting it to match Sightseer 1, but even though the older paint job was far from perfect, he liked the color (even if it was a bit somber for his tastes) and the nice appearance of the car, Jerry felt, elevated his business and gave it just a bit more credibility. At full capacity, Sightseer II could seat up to 17 in it's original seats and the seating platform Jerry had fashioned. Sightseer I was relegated to "overflow" duty at first, then after Jerry had hired a couple of other drivers, two tours would go concurrently, as Sightseer I would begin on one side of the county and II would start on the other, and each limo would meet up at Jerry's house for the customary BBQ dinner at the end of the tour.

That was the first thing I thought- "Let's do an updated version of the base '04-'05 base halogen grille and slap it on this thing." I didn't know the first gen Colorado was "retro" enough to be a design influence. Don't worry guys, with a design this ugly... they'll sell a bunch of them. Pickups have to be in your face to sell these days, it seems. We're living in strange times when the Ram is the tamest looking pickup design...

I like it! Sorry if I missed it in the text, but the bumpers... are they weathered intentionally, or has some of the chrome worn off to expose that classy late '80's tan AMT plastic? Because either way I like the "used" look it gives to the old Goat.

Ok... some of you may vaguely remember this guy. Some of you may not. Either way it's been nearly a decade since ol Jerry has haunted this forum. So here's a quick recap... The Mobile Pork Incinerator After losing his job at a metal fabrication shop, Jerry found himself looking for work. He ended up getting a deal he couldn't pass up... an old restaurant on the outskirts of town that had been closed down due to numerous failed health inspections and possibly one or two unexplained disappearances of kitchen staff. After spending a few weeks cleaning up dead cockroaches and giving the building a pretty extensive remodel, he was ready to open "Scary Jerry's International House Of Pork". Some type of rolling business card seemed appropriate. He figured an mobile pig roaster would be just the ticket, so surveying his backyard for raw materials, he dug up enough cast-off junk to build this '53 Ford, powered by a hopped up old Lincoln 430 that Jerry just happened to have laying around for some reason. Over the next several months, Jerry promoted the restaurant by going to various fairs and festivals across the state. The Ice Box Sadly, Jerry spent a bit too much time giving away free food at events and not nearly enough time charging people money for it at the restaurant, so he closed up shop. Since he fished a lot, he thought why not sell fresh fish and bait right there at the dock? Needing a vehicle, he once again dipped into his backyard junkpile and produced a refrigerated Lincoln...A '65 Lincoln Continental with a special, Jerry-fabricated extendo-trunk, with a blue tarp and a belly full of ice to keep his fresh catches fresh. When you boast about having the Pine River's Best Catches*, you've got to back up your claim. Jerry won the car in a poker game when a buddy was short 20 bucks. The friend said the car was worth at least that much in scrap at the time, and Jerry agreed. A few years later Jerry sold the grille and front bumper to a local man restoring a '65 Continental limo for fifty bucks... a tidy 30 dollar profit. The revived old Connie became a mobile ice box and Jerry was a fixture at the local rivers and lakes during the summer months. BUT... after a summer of that, Jerry thought sitting out in the sun all day drinking beer wasn't much good for his health, and besides, winter was coming. So, Jerry once again pooled and retooled his resources. *= The Pine River's Fish are great... compared to fish caught in and around the area of the Chernobyl disaster. The Portable Sawmill Jerry had an old Freuhauf flat bed trailer laying around because, well... why wouldn't a guy like Jerry have an old 40 foot flat bed trailer laying around? He converted the trailer into a makeshift sawmill, and purchased a junky but running old Dodge L700 from a local junkyard. As it turned out, Jerry was a little TOO good at being a lumberjack. After nearly de-foresting all of Gratiot County, Jerry was tied up in the infamous "Lumbergate" scandal. He decided to do the noble thing and step down, but knew he'd not only need a new occupation, but to win back the respect of his neighbors. The Crop Duster A new pest was invading the gardens and fields of Jerry's hometown, and nothing could stop it. No pesticide worked, and remedies which DID kill the pests also killed the plants. After some experimentation in his kitchen, Jerry found a mixture of regular pesticide, salt water, and the liquid wrung from his own dirty gym socks would kill the bugs without hurting the plants. Now, he needed a vehicle to deploy his miracle concoction. I think you can guess what happened next... The truck itself was a hodge-podge of Ford F-150 and 250, which Jerry purchased from the local junkyard. Nobody was more surprised than Jerry that he didn't already have a late '80's F-Series out behind the barn to begin with. The tank is Jerry's old septic tank. (Rid-X is no match for the remnants of Jerry's Taco-Bell-heavy diet!) Jerry made his own boom for spraying fields, and the spray gun is an old power washer part, cloaked in a fake plastic rifle simply because, well, Jerry has a flair for the dramatic. An old lawnmower engine powers the boom nozzles, spray gun, and pressurizes the roof-mounted marker foam barrel. And, of course, the whole thing is soaked in Jerry-caliber rust, dust, and crust. Rumor has it Jerry has no idea what paint looks like... Once again, Jerry did his job a bit too well. He had all but completely exterminated the Gratiot County Soybean Borer. Since 2009, only sporadic sightings of the voracious creature had been reported... at one point the insect was featured on an episode of MonsterQuest. To this day Alex Jones claims that Gratiot County Soybean Borers are being dispersed by the via chemtrails by the government. But in reality, the once-dangerous pest has been kept in check. While this was good news for the farmers of Gratiot County, it was bad news for Jerry, as he now needed to find a new source of income, yet again. And that's where the series of builds ended for almost a decade, until.... The Sightseer The Gratiot County area has a rich history, if you are into the history of farming, alcoholism, and poverty, mostly. Even so, there are a number of points of interest in the area, so Jerry thought why not give people guided tours? Since Jerry had become something of a local legend in his own right, and he knew many of these areas pretty well, who better than him to be the tour guide? Remember how Jerry sold the front bumper and grille off of what became his Ice Box Lincoln, to a restorer who was working on a '65 limo? Well, turns out the limo restoration stalled for many years, and Jerry was able to purchase the hulk for a reasonable sum. It was rough, but mostly solid and complete. From past experience with the 430 engines in both the Mobile Pork Incinerator and Ice Box, as well as his very first car, a '61 Continental, Jerry had no problems getting the old MEL big block to run. Once the car was running and mechanically refurbished enough to be reliable and safe to carry passengers, Jerry thought it could use a bit of an appearance makeover. A friend said that Jerry seemed bewildered by the idea of paint. That being said, he did happen to have some generic yellow paint laying around, and applied that using a borrowed spray gun. Lettering was done by hand with some One-Shot that Jerry picked up at a hobby shop. With all that done, The Sightseer was ready to do it's thing... shuttling five passengers to the various historic sites in the county. Each tour would conclude at Jerry's house, where the Mobile Pork Incinerator was on hand to treat the tourists to a BBQ dinner.

The original owner traded it in on an SC.

Here we have an old EV conversion, based on the venerable Ford Ranger bones. In this case I started with the AMT Ranger STX kit, and fitted it with a scratchbuilt EV drivetrain. It also has a few subtle aero tricks, like the grille filler panel and smooth bumper. Over the years a couple of the Moon wheel discs fell off, so they were replaced with some old Lincoln full wheel covers the owner had around. The battery pack in the bed, which powers the old-tech anvil of a DC motor up front, has started taking it's toll on the rear springs. I borrowed the Republic name from a long-defunct local truck manufacturer, and REV stands for 'Republic Electric Vehicle', because it's a '90's EV and it needs to have a cutesy name.

Once sucked into the engine, the snow powder is heated in a special magical boiler to produce steam pressure, which then drives the engine. There- mystery solved

This is an old AMT dealer promo that was redone to resemble what a 1991 Storm would look like today, if there were any 1991 Storms left today. It's hard to see through the dirty tinted windows, but there's a case of Molson Ice in the trunk and several cassettes strewn across the top of the dash.

I'm in the process of turning a '91 Geo Storm promo into a hypermiler.