cheapskaters CC meets fiesta de Kustom Kulture

You'd think I'd be car showed out after the Labor Day Weekend up north,
and yeah I was.

fiesta de kustom kulture - side show - 2013

It would have been a shame to not make it to a local car show nearby,
the Fiesta de Kustom Kulture down in old town.

dutchman motorbikes

The day before I had welded up some business card stands for a friend,
which gave a little momentum to go.
A plan was texted up with a couple car friends.

cheapskaters  CC

We rallied up late morning to get there,
and totally cheaped out and found sweet parking next to the show.
Hey at $105 for 3 cars it was an easy choice,
actually it was 4 to 1 vote.
I could either get that tranny fluid or get stuck at a show til 6pm!

fiesta de Kustom Kulture - 2013

In a funny chain of events,
instead of checking out the show,
we bee-lined to a $2.99 breakfast special at O'Hungry's!
What the heck this was a free meal now that we were $30 richer...
Brandon even treated himself to a 10 am yard of beer!

cheapskaters CC - O'hungry's old town SD

The show had some good cars.
This 39 or 40 mercury was my top pick.

1939 or 1940 chopped mercury

Considering all the custom work that was done,
there was not a flaw on it.

1940 mercury

This 51 ford has been around a while,
and was another really clean custom.

1951 ford

For a fun drive this 49 or 50 ford would be a kick in the pants.

1949 or 1950 ford

While shiny cars are fun to look at,
they would be nerve-wracking to own.
This '56 studebaker pickup looked like a fun work truck.

1956 studebaker truck

This guy had every modification done on his stingray.
If you look closely there's actually an air-powered hydraulic system.
The spring would bump up the front end.

ultimate schwinn lowrider

This was the perfect wife car.
A ford galaxy 4-door with the original 6-cylinder.
Heck I'd drive this thing.

ford galaxy

This was a good San Diego event,
but seemed geared toward a tourist crowd.
Hard to compare with the blow-out Ventura Nationals the week before.
Within an hour of walking around,
our temporary Cheapskaters Car Club was drinking beers in the dive bar.

chief

I was ready to get to work on the green 40 by noon,

at this time it was still stuck in the side lot,

so parking on the side street was a good idea.

TP

lego engineering saves the day

In my continuing effort to squeeze all the life out of our mac mini,
a temporary solution appeared while eating breakfast.

macey's lego time

A couple months ago the old mac was heating up,
and the easy solution was to vacuum out the dust,
and raise it up off the dusty desk top.
perich brothers (and sister): daisy chain
This definitely helped,
but over long periods the little computer would warm up.
The computer is the second bottom box there in the stack.
No wonder it would warm up with no aeration space.

Hey Ken!! Still use it.

I had a crazy idea to make a sheetmetal aluminum shelf,
complete with air-sink fins,
as the mac heat radiates from the bottom.
Yeah like that would be high on my STD list.

lego engineering

Now that Macey is getting her turn with the kids Lego stash,
the solution was obvious and only took a couple minutes.
Lego Stacks!
Now the hard drives don't soak up the heat from the computer.
Let's see how long this will last!

TP

El Desayuno de HAMB #3

Wow as I'm writing this,
I found out the last HAMB breakfast was at least a year ago!
perich brothers (and sister): san diego HAMB meet
Sounds about right as the mooneyes show was coming up.

Anyway,
the same thing happened at the 3rd SD HAMB breakfast.
San Diego HAMB meet up is on again! - THE H.A.M.B.
The cheerleader Paul aka "hombres ruin" started the fire over a month earlier.
Again I thought how ridiculous it was to preplan something so early.

3rd san diego hamb breakfast 2013

After all that posting 6 cars showed up!
Out of a city of a million people,
for some reason I'd thought there'd be at least 8!
In good faith there were guys with garaged projects,
so it was cool that people showed up even without cars.

barris 1940 mercury custom?

One of the big head turners was this 1940 mercury,
supposedly a barris chopped car.
With the headliner on there's no way to really know.
Most early cars were done using crude techniques - gas weld and lead.
If a car has really clean sheet metal chop work,
its gonna most likely be a newer build.
Just a pointer!

5.0 mustang in a merc - sleeper

This thing was hiding an injected 5.0 from a mustang and airbags.
Looked like a big money car redone about 7 years ago.

checkerboard firewall and hood

Never was a big fan of checkerboard paint,
but this car pulled it off.
From the patina of the checkerboard,
this may have been from the original customization.

Noel's chopped 1940 mercury

This thing had some sweet lines and great attention to detail.
Lucky owner!
Glad I don't have to take care of it!

chopped 1951 shoebox ford

Another really cool custom was this blue shoebox.
This thing was just finished 5 months ago,
and was really a show piece.

chopped 1951 shoe box ford

I like the 51's with the double bullet grille,
This one had a 70's camaro clip and running gear.
It amazes me that people can finish there cars this nice on a budget!

1957 corvette

This corvette showed up in an unconventionally unfinished state.
Most corvette guys are so picky they aren't fun to look at.
This one had the right amount of "I just want a cool driver".
His 350 was backed by a t-5 transmission.
The styling on these rearends is crazy!

1957 chevy corvette

This 28/29 roadster pulled up,
right out of an 80's time warp.

1929 ford roadster - fuzzy knight

While most 80's hot rods were trending toward pastels and bondo,
some guys kept it as traditional as possible.
This one helped me out alot as it had a SBF 302 in it,
and I studied the alternator placement,
even though it ended up the opposite.
He was also using this trick "snow white" water pump setup.

ford windsor with snow white water pump

And last but not least Paul's shoebox...
His was as clean as last time,
and again amazed me with the finish-work.

hombres ruin's 1949 shoe box ford

It was a good way to start the morning,
and helped get hot rod in my brain for the weekend project,
not to mention a tasty Perry's breakfast!

Definitely quality over quantity made it out,
both in people and cars.
Hopefully more projects hit the road for next time.

TP

grub

What better way to get rid of the last bit of thanksgiving ham.
So good.
Burnt to get rid of any questionables.

ham pancakes

Fake maple syrup, banana batter pancakes and ham.

Grub!

TP

bomber

Took the bridgestone down to TJ yesterday.

mb-3 in TJ

This was a quick run and I was late so I hauled butt down there.
Not too much time for pics.
It was actually a great ride through TJ traffic,
than down that hill.
The ride back was a little sketchy,
those big trucks don't really care about bikers.

150cc motorcycle

I've been wanting to get a picture of one of these motorcycles.
There are tons of them buzzing around,
very rarely parked.
This one is a random brand 150cc,
but Honda makes one that is really popular.
Hard to find in the States though.

$15

One of the perks of riding the bike is saving about $10-15 on taxis.
This is what $15 got me at the store!

TP

breezer goes to mexico

I had to make a quick run down to the dentista,
so figured this was the perfect time to ride the bike.

otay pedestrian bridge

The old Breezer Thunder mountain bike was stashed in the car,
but I was a little hesistant to ride down there after the 25 minute drive to the border.
The taxi is only $6 with tip each way,
and it is a little sketchy.

I flipped a coin and ...
 heads -
time to ride the bike.

After the short spin to the pedestrian crossing,
I was ready for some international adventure.

down the hill to Murua

The fun part of the ride is this hill down to Murua,
also called Gato Bronco or Wildcat,
the area of Tijuana/Otay where the dentista office is.
It's a good mile long bombing run with a little side trail.

dental impression

The reason for going was to make this dental impression.
After grinding down the 2 teeth for the crowns,
my gums were a little inflamed to make a proper impression.
I guess a 15 year cavity will do that.
It only took a couple days to heal,
so now the crowns will have the correct gaps.
Well worth the extra trip.

fangs

This shot cracks me up so I'm gonna post it again.
The bummer was,
the impression made it more obvious I have a screwed up molar.
So I'll need another friggin root canal.
Guess I'll be posting about more dentist trips!

chelada time

The bike ride to the dentista was probably as fast as the taxi.
Not so lucky with the uphill ride back.
Time for a chelada.

breezer thunder

I stuffed myself with a Bicholon Supremo (chelada with clams and shrimp)
 and some Tostihuates. (tostitos with nuts and hot sauce)
Before the beer hit me,
it was time to get going.

breezer thunder in TJ

The ride up was slow at first.
Belly was kinda full.
That's what I get for ordering the big bottle.

breezer thunder in TJ

Glad I brought this bike.
Upright handlebars and good gears helped to keep the beer in.
This was a stupid picture to take.
That field was full of those crazy tire popping weed thorns.

halfway

Little bit more.

wavy

Finally made it up the hill.

calimax

A quick stop at the local Calimax for the deals.
Of course I didn't bring a backpack.
One hand for the bike,
one hand for the bottle.

green grass in TJ?

At the border line there was a good wait.
Not too bad for a friday night.

otay border crossing

One of the bike hazards of the border crossings are the turnstiles.
If you look in the pic above its that rotating pipe walkway.
There are a bunch of them and they eat wheels if you're not careful.

more TJ bikes

Here you can see the similarities of my bike to a typical border bike.
Hi-rise bars, no shock...
The big difference is mexican bikes are usually 2 sizes too small for the rider.
This girl was on the phone 35 minutes of the 40 minutes in line.

ARCO deal
25 may 2012

This was kinda crazy.
The ARCO station by the border - gas $4.09 a gallon.

ARCO ripoff
25 may 2012

Than maybe 20 miles away the gas goes for $4.49 a gallon.
Crazy.
Same day, same county.

macey's treat

Here's the Calimax deal of the day.
A liter of tequila with a big blue glass mug,
and a big box of Frosted Flakes.
$22.50
Wow.
Since I had the bike,
I had parked a little farther away at the free parking,
instead of the $4 parking gouger lot.
So together with the taxi savings,
$4+6+6 = $14
this was all basically $8.50.

All in all it was a great experience.
I'll definitely do the bike ride again,
but probably won't take as many pictures!

TP

end of an era

Last week Pigpen and Sloppy came down to pick up the T-bucket.

pigpen's t-bucket

Now that he's been growing roots up in hosetown(SJ) for a year now,
it was about time!

pigpen & sloppy

Luke/Pigpen had the brilliant idea of taking it all apart,
therefore utilizing a smaller trailer.
Hopefully it will be put together before he knocks his girlfriend up!

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Grateful Dead - lovelight - april 17, 1971

The Dead had a monster east coast tour in april of 1971.
Pigpen (ron mckernan)  absolutely rocked those shows
with his 20+ minute good lovin's and love light's.

Grateful Dead Live at Dillon Gym - Princeton University on 1971-04-17 : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive

This particular version was/is a staple on the old Imac at the shop.
Try to stick around after the 7:30 mark.
The ultimate concert hook-up - if you click you click!

Check out more april '71 shows here...

Internet Archive Search: april 1971 grateful dead

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Anyway,
Luke/Pigpen was in a bit of a rush to get his long drive on,
but a banana pancake breakfast slowed him down.
Than somehow the kids suckered Sloppy and Pig into a game of Butt's Up.

butt's up - better run

The kids are killers at this game - ruthless.

pigpen's butt's up

Yeah than Luke had his revenge...

Pigpen's Revenge

And yeah I got my butt up too.

TP's butt's up

It was a fun time.
So fun that we played long enough for the truck's battery to die.
Hey I didn't know he was parked in the middle of our street!

Anyway,
end of an era!

TP