1934 Ford RedRat

What’s in a name?....

As the story goes elephants are supposed to be afraid of mice….in fact the Mythbusters TV show did a piece on that premises and found it to be “plausible”. Now we get in our way-back machine and go to 1964 to find Mopar putting their “new” Hemi 426 in the Dodge & Plymouth drag cars as well as NASCAR cars and the sheer size of the new motor filled up the engine bay so people started calling it the “Elephant” motor because it was so huge. At the drags Mopar was thumping most all the other makes ….almost…. But there was this guy, Bill Jenkins, which stayed with the Chevy 327 motor and was soundly thrashing all the Elephant motor challenges in the 1964-65 A/S class. And so since the Mopar guys began to fear the little Chevy, the parallel was drawn on the old tale about the elephant and the mouse….and the small Chevy motor became known as the “Mouse” motor. Then in 1965 Chevy came out with the 396 in the Corvette L78 and Chevelle Z16, which was bigger than the mouse….and to keep its name in the same family (rodentia) the big Chevy motor became known as the rat! And so shall it be known for evermore…. hooraa!

The idea of the RedRat build was begun in the early 90’s by Don Stanley. Don lives in Allen Park, Michigan (near Detroit) and worked for Ford at the time. He had the benefit of being professionally connected to the auto business….access to a fabrication area……and highly motivated to build his dream hot rod. Don did not know that when he ordered the Outlaw body in ’93 that he was going to be building my dream car too. Don is an accomplished thinker and producer able to think an idea and translate it into metal, wood or fiberglass which is one of the key elements needed to be a hot rodder. When I called Don in 2007 to ask questions about his car like where is the heater, does it have only one windshield wiper, what kind of electric fan does it have….The first part of his answer was always “it’s a hot rod” I started to get a picture of the methodology of his build, it was a growling, spartan, performance hot rod not a fancy schmancy girly man street rod. I never knew the difference till I met Don! Except for the sound system there is very little that does not contribute to raw power in the RedRat!

Don is an accomplished engine builder so he chose the GM 502 to base his motor build on. Remember this was 1993-94….GM had not released the 502 crate motor so Don bought a 502 marine short block from Scoggin-Dickey in Texas and began the motor build. He blueprinted the block and added Brodix oval port heads. He was following the late John Lingenfelter’s guidelines for a streetable torque monster motor. I won’t go into some of the details of the motor build but Don has built a very streetable 10.35 compression motor that runs on 93 octane gas while getting 12-14 mpg with one Holley 850! He could have gone wild with tunnel ram, dual 4V, more cam, more compression and many other things but the goal was a reliable, streetable well mannered motor with enough torque to change the rotation of the earth…. after driving it for 13,000 miles I can attest that he succeeded!

If you notice the car has three pedals….a hot rod…. Don was advised not to put a Richmond 5 speed behind a big block in a ’34, it would be impossible! Hmmmm That’s like saying sicum to a Rottweiler….Don engineered it, fabricated it and turned it into reality….a three pedal, big block ’34 Ford….down boy!

Don built everything in or on the car himself except for two things. He had the car together and on the road in gel coat by the spring of ’97. After shaking it down he disassembled the car and sent it to Advance Custom Paint in Ypsilanti, MI to lay on the 2 stage PPG paint. The color name?....Fast Red, what else! Everything was painted apart then reassembled. Don did the complete interior except for stitching the Dodge Daytona seats which were done by K.E. Binder Co. of Westland, MI.

Don had put 5 years of his life into building the car and enjoyed driving it for 4600 miles until 2007. As with most people their life evolves and Don wanted to change to a ride with more room inside, a sedan. So the coupe had to change garages….

I had been looking for “my” car since we got back “into cars” in ’04….I bought a ’34 Nash 4dr-454BBC, that didn’t work for me, it was a nice car but just wasn’t me. Then I got a ’37 Ford….which was nice but as I drove it I found out it was nowhere edgy enough and the Princesses car could soundly whip me anytime she chose! Then I started looking again and found a ’34 no fendered coupe in Fla. It had a blown Donovan that sounded like fun! I thought about it a couple days then we went away for the weekend and I called the guy in Fla on Monday, the car was sold! So now back to looking…. While trolling online I saw a ’34 Ford with a 502 BBC in Michigan, it was a nice car but nothing special. I kept looking elsewhere but came back to the ’34 in Michigan. Then I started looking closer at it, the rear tires, the 3 pedals….hmmmmm I showed it to the Princess and she liked it since it looked like her car (it was red) and she immediately squealed ‘then we would be twins’? Huh? Whatever! Since she approved I called Don in Michigan on Monday afternoon. I had talked to many people about buying another car and had two bad, costly experiences selling my mistakes so I was going to be tough to sell again. I began asking the owner, Don, about his car. The more I asked it became apparent that this might be the car. So I cautiously asked if the price was firm….he said it was! Hmmmmm, so I asked how I could see it, he said come up to Michigan! Hmmmmm, the more I talked to Don and thought about it the more I wanted to see the car….so I asked if I could come up in a month since we had vacation plans for our 3 week across America vacation and I would like to come up when we got back….he said someone from Illinois was going to look at the car the coming weekend! This was on Monday and I asked if he would hold it for a while till I could get to MI….he said that the ‘other’ guy was very interested and would be there that weekend with money. Hmmmmm, so I said we would need one day to get the $’s then leave the next morning for Michigan! The Princess and I launched Wednesday o-dark thirty for the 550 mile trip to Michigan and after driving all day we arrived late afternoon. I called Don and told him we were in town and would come over in the morning, he said the guy from Illinois was coming too! Don was getting upset that two people were intensely interested in his car. I know how that feels, you don’t want to miss the opportunity to sell by holding it for one guy that may not buy it….very stressful. I said I would be over to his home in a few minutes!

We met Don and Anne and talked for a few minutes then walked to the garage. When don removed the cover I saw a nice red ’34 coupe….a nice car but remember we had a nice car like that parked in our garage already. Then I looked at it from the rear….the tires seemed to meet in the middle! The car was better than as advertised in the pictures and the dialog over the phone. After walking around a couple times Don asked if I wanted him to start it. Why not….When the rat woke up….any thought I might have had to negotiate the price dissolved….I think I would have mortgaged my home to buy this car….to say it sounded nice is a pathetic understatement. I might have started drooling; I can’t remember….I know my eyes probably got glassy! I couldn’t believe I was hearing the music of my dreams. Here was what I had been looking for the last three years….maybe the last 62 years!

I had been disappointed before when looking at cars because I’m so big that I can’t fit in some 33-34 Fords. The Princessmobile is fine but I had a nice yellow ‘33 cornered in MD but I couldn’t get in! So I explained to Don that I needed to see if I could fit into the beast. After I sat behind the wheel I said I wanted a ride….Don took me for a nice, docile ride around the neighborhood and that did it for me. The Rat was going to have a new home….and we were going to be a family with twins!

Don and I sealed the deal and he told me since I didn’t try to talk him down on the price, he would deliver the Rat in his enclosed trailer! We stayed a while and got to know Don and Anne a little more and found out we have had some parallel life paths and now we communicate by email on a regular basis as if we have known each other for a long time. Kindred spirits….

We still had our vacation reservations planned so I agreed to have Don deliver the car when we returned from vacation in a month. But after a couple days I realized I couldn’t wait. I called and asked if he could deliver the car sooner and he agreed, the Rat would be in Stafford before we went on vacation. In retrospect that may have been a bad decision on my part because I thought about the car all the time while we were on vacation (3 weeks)….oh well. I drove it twice before we left, it was somewhere between a religious experience and Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride in Disneyland! It had been a long time since I pushed a clutch like that and it took a few times around the neighborhood to get used to the Rat….but I’m a quick learner….hehehe. I wanted to get a few miles under my belt before I tickled the loud pedal too much, so a hard launch had to wait till we came back from vacation. The Princess disputes that and says that when I gave her a ride that afternoon I drove entirely too fast and her panic was compounded by the fact that Don had not installed an “Oh S**t” handle for the passenger to hold on to. I kept telling her it wasn’t a girly girl car but she kept yelling to take her home? When I got the car it had 4600 miles on the clock, it now has 17,700. It’s weird but I know how the car behaves on the road more than the builder because of the time I have been on the road with it. I had it for a year before I tried the sound system….I like the motor music much better! I have changed a few things since I have owned the car….It now has a Moser nodular center section and axles that have bearings that look like they came off the space shuttle. Also a yoke & U-joint set that is made for pro stock cars! The guys at A1 Speed & Custom do the work on the RedRat that I don’t want to do….like the rear end. I have also changed the mirrors inside and out. The rest I’m leaving alone, why mess with perfection?

It is a fun, easy, and dependable car to drive sensibly until you press the loud pedal….then it is the most violent acting vehicle I have ever driven. Everything happens very quickly, very deliberately and very loudly. I have to be ahead of it or I’m sure it will bite me. It’s like flying….it will not tolerate any inattention or carelessness when under acceleration. I know there are faster cars that we see and run with but for me the RedRat is king. The car weighs 2740 lbs. with ½ tank of gas….so with me and a full tank it’s hauling 3100 lbs. around and even with the largest Mickey’s you can buy nestled under the fiberglass fenders they still break loose whenever I tickle the pedal! It’s like living a dream…. After I drove the car a while we were at a show in Culpeper, VA and my Mom came to the show to visit. I gave her a ride in the Rat (she was 86) and when she got out we were talking and she said that was a lot different then my Dad’s ’34? I didn’t know he had a ’34 Ford! She said yes and she had some pictures somewhere with him standing next to the Ford….how cool is that? My Dad was a USAF fighter pilot and told me of the times he was flying his P-51 in the Pacific on the long droning flights, escorting bombers or just hunting. So now sometimes while I’m driving the RedRat I imagine I have a passenger with me that likes the old car and the motor music like I do! Rock on….