The Derelicts

The Derelicts a short film by eGarage from eGarage on Vimeo.

The Pagani Huayra Story

The Inverted Bike Shop

The Inverted Bike Shop from Show Love on Vimeo.

Amongst the multitude of bike shops across Manhattan and Brooklyn, 718 Cyclery (www.718c.com) stands out for their unique approach to the business. This is the “inverted bike shop.”

Created by Show Love (www.showloveworld.com). Contact Peter or Chauncey at showlove@showloveworld.com. Music by The Album Leaf

Watch 16-minutes of old school New England Dragway racing complete with its plumber’s pipe guard rail. You’ll hear long time track announcer Jan Landers, see fans packed to the rafters, and watch some of the coolest race cars of the era beating on each other while surrounded by the lush New Hampshire forest.

Burn On: Drag Racing Documentary (1973) from Brink Media on Vimeo.

“I remember taking it to work and wanting to change lanes and all you had to do was just stab the throttle and the thing would “choo-choo” and it would skid over. You didn’t have to move the steering wheel, it would just shift lanes. It was wonderful.”—Steve Pasteiner

Several years ago I was interviewed by Andrew Filippone in regards to my involvement with and my thoughts about the Buick Grand National. Others that were interviewed include Bill Porter, Steve Pasteiner, Tony Assenza, Don Sherman, Csaba Csere, Martyn Schoor, and Doug Nigro. The trailer from Vimeo is a short teaser from Andrew’s documentary.

More information is on Edmunds Inside Line, including links to Andrew’s Facebook page where you can keep up with the progress of the documentary.

Check out the other posts about the Buick Grand National on Dean’s Garage.

Black Air – “Misfit” Teaser from Andrew Filippone Jr. on Vimeo.

Epilogue

The last hurrah for the Turbo Buick was in a Pontiac. In 1989 Pontiac needed a performance boost for the Indy Pace Car and its replicas. So they shoe-horned a Buick Turbo V6 into 1,555 GTAs with all the trick SCCA suspension and brake pieces and finally the Turbo Buick found its way into a host body where the chassis was up to the power. There was no difference between the pace cars and the replicas. Pontiac’s Turbo Trans Am.

Larry Steinegger and Al Eshenbaugh teamed up in the late 50s and had other race cars before this one, which was their last. Their teamwork and friendship was solid and long lasting with Steinegger making the horsepower and Eshenbaugh pushing the pedals. This post includes a gallery of vintage photos from Phoenix, another of photos of the restored car, and two videos.

The team of Steinegger and Eshenbaugh is generally credited with bringing professional racing to the Phoenix area and they carried the Arizona banner at tracks throughout the nation. Steinegger was the builder and crew chief and Eshenbaugh drove the car at a lightning pace down the quarter mile drag strips around the country. They list many championship wins in their resume, and although not as young as they used to be, they are not through yet. They are preparing a car to run on the Bonneville salt flats.

One of the original nine Cacklefest cars, the Steinegger & Eshenbaugh AA/FD (1962-1964) comes with impeccable documentation as one of the quickest and fastest dragsters to hail from Arizona in the 1960′s. The driver was Al Eshenbaugh from Phoenix, Arizona. This car, with a 130″ Rod Stuckey chassis and a 392 hemi on 98%, saw runs of 6.98 at 208.00 during its era. In addition to winning no less than 15 Top Eliminators in a row at Beeline Dragway in Phoenix during 1964, it also took first place one year at the Arizona Fuel & Gas Championships and held the No. 9 spot on the Drag News Mr. Eliminator List for a period of time. They were Arizona State Champions in 1964 & 1965. S&E believed in function over form so the car was, by definition, no frills. This fuel dragster was built to race and that’s exactly what it did. From Cracklefest.

Vintage Drag Racing Photos

A couple of years ago I was privileged to become involved with the project of creating artwork for a body wrap using vintage photographs. Thanks to Brian Wilson of Clear Vision Printing and Graphics.

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History Repeats Itself

After selling the car in 1966, Steinegger and Eshenbaugh did their own things, including raising families. The car was just a great memory for them. It wasn’t until the California Hot Rod Reunion’s became the event of the year that Steinegger’s interest in drag racing was revisited. But even then he didn’t actively seek out his old car. That happened by fate.

In early 1999 an old friend of Larry and Al, Tom Walsh was checking out wrecking yards and body shops for treasures when he found a dragster chassis behind a small body shop in Higley, Arizona. He called Steinegger and wanted him to help identify the thing. Walsh thought it was their old car but wasn’t sure. On instinct he bought it and brought it home.

Sure enough it was the S&E Stucky car. The rear end had been moved and the front axle and torsion bar were gone. The chassis also had some “new brackets” and small block Chevy motor mounts. Not “needing” a dragster, Tom Walsh was looking for racing stuff to decorate his house and Steinegger had an old windowed 392 with a couple of rods out the side. The trade was made and Walsh had a coffee table, and Steinegger had his old dragster. Everybody was happy.

Steinegger then took the car to Paul Henderson’s shop and started thrashing on it. They had lots of pictures and memories to go by and also help from Clint Brown who built the original nose and other body parts. Steinegger is a self proclaimed ‘pack rat’ and was amazed at how much stuff for the car he had stashed away. He had Hemi parts, blower drive parts and the original steering wheel. Ray Agee even had the original push bar key and he donated it to the cause. A lot of elbow grease and machine work from J.T. Stewart and the thing came together. From Cracklefest.

Restoration Completed

This is how the project turned out. Pretty cool.

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Steinegger & Eshenbaugh Dragster running on alcohol

1958–1962 Phoenix Drag Racing Home Movies.

20 minutes from the way-back machine. Thanks to Paul Henderson.

Marlowe from ALCHEMYcreative on Vimeo.

The Wright Brothers

When Orville and Wilbur Wright were designing their airplane, they were so involved with the project that they could hardly wait for morning to get back to work, and then would stay late at night trying to solve the issues that had kept man on the ground. They were deeply committed and involved—in love with what they were doing. Their airplane design was not a model of an esthetic styling study, but it nonetheless was a beautiful design in its delicate simplicity. They were perfectionists, knowing that all of the parts had to be designed to be perfectly integrated or the device wouldn’t work. A statement of minimalism. There was nothing on the airplane that didn’t have to be there for it to function.

Car design, where details, gestures, graphics, surfacing, stance, and proportion have an integrated quality that supports a clear, discernible theme are designs that tug heartstrings. It is a matter of personal preference as to what designs have this quality, but each of us have our favorites. You know the feeling—you round a corner and are suddenly eye to headlight with a stunning design that is clearly several cuts above the ordinary. Whatever group designed that car had vision, loved what they were doing, and were blessed with a system that allowed it to go into production.

There was a time where design was like that for all of us. Freedom of expression. Focused, uncomplicated creativity.

This artistic video is about a motorcycle builder in Los Angeles who loves what he is doing. He customizes old Hondas and makes them into European-style cafe racers. He’s intoxicated by the gratification of realizing his creative vision. I would imagine that Orville and Wilbur shared the same potent brew.

Cafe Cowboy

Cafe cowboy from benedict campbell on Vimeo.

Dustin Knott’s website: www.kottmotorcycles.com.

Photo by Gary Goldstine, Monterey, 2009.

Porsche 908/3 LS at Monterey

Pagani Zonda R at Nuburgring

Enter Peter Maier

Nobody I had ever encountered before could have possibly adequately prepared me for meeting Pete Maier. I worked with Pete for a year in 1976 when I was transferred into Cadillac Exterior Studio from Buick. He is immensely talented, outspoken, insightful, and pragmatic. I was aware of his fine art, but I had no realistic concept of the scale of his artwork, nor the totally unique process he has developed using Dupont waterborne automotive paints. Peter attended Pratt Institute, was a designer for General Motors, was interrupted with a tour of Vietnam courtesy of Uncle Sam, and eventually resigned his position at GM to pursue his fine art career. Part One talks briefly of his experiences at Pratt and GM, and his unique relationship with Dupont. There are several galleries of his artwork, and a video where Pete leads us on a personal tour of his studio gallery. Pete will explain the colossal scale and unique process of his paintings in Part Two. Plus more galleries.

Pratt Institute. Considered by the professors at Pratt Institute to be the most promising 3-D design student in the freshman class, Maier was chosen to be Robert Mallary’s assistant on his sculpture “Cliffhangers.“ Mallary was one of the pioneers in the “junk art movement“ of that time, and was represented by Allan Stone Gallery, as well as being professor of 3-D at Pratt. Mallary was commissioned by architect Phillip Johnson to create a piece for the New York State Pavilion at the 1964 New York World’s Fair.

Working in a 5th story loft at 463 Broome Street, in the area which would later become known in the art world as Soho, Maier worked with Mallary throughout the entire development of the sculpture, from the summer of 1963 to its completion and installation on the pavilion in the spring of 1964. Because of his close association with Mallary, Maier met with Phillip Johnson on numerous occasions, and was introduced to many of Mallary’s artist friend, including Chamberlain, Andy Warhol, Lichtenstein, and Elaine Dekooning.

General Motors Design. At the age of 20, Maier was one of the youngest designers ever hired by General Motors Design. After seeing Maier’s work at the 1964 New York World’s Fair, Bill Mitchell offered Maier a position in Styling’s three-month summer program. Halfway through the program Maier was offered a full-time position as an automobile designer upon graduation. Offers were also made by Ford and Chrysler motor companies, but Maier’s heart remained with GM.

In 1966 Maier and a group of freshman designers were assigned to work out an extremely innovative concept for a three-wheeled vehicle.  Maier’s sketch was chosen and work began on a three-dimensional clay model in 1967. Chuck Jordan had a model of it on his desk at General Motors and kept it for many years.

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Much of Pete’s career has been devoted to the automobile. After leaving GM in 1980, he wanted to paint the automobile as a true fine art subject in a full scale, life-size format using actual automotive paint. Utilizing the automobile as subject, Pete developed an innovative process and techniques with a new paint medium that no other artist has explored to date.

Pete’s association within the automotive industry led him to contact the Dupont paint division, when he became aware that they were developing a state-of-the-art, environmentally friendly, waterborne automotive paint. After approaching Dupont in 1991 and explaining what he had in mind in terms of using this paint as a fine art medium, Pete then met with two Dupont vice presidents. Both were reluctant, but quite intrigued with his concept. After seriously considering what he had in mind, he was given the entire set of experimental tint colors on a hand shake! This was highly unusual since Dupont had never before released any experimental product to anyone outside of the company since the company’s inception when Dupont first made gun powder for the American Revolutionary Forces.

Harley-Davidson. Although Maier has sold well over 400 paintings since 1980, he has only accepted one major commission. Maier’s concept for a painting commissioned by Harley-Davidson for the company’s 100th anniversary was to have two life-size motorcycles facing one another. The original 1903 facing a new 2003 Harley-Davidson.

The painting was unveiled at the 100th anniversary celebration in Milwaukee to an audience of more than 150,000 people. It was estimated that in the three day celebration well over 100,000 people took photos of the painting. This painting is 5 feet hight and 16 feet long.

The Making of Stingray.

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A Gallery of Pete’s work. More in the next post.

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Pete leads a tour through his personal gallery.

There are a few posters available of Peter’s work.

Peter has posters available at a reasonable cost of three of his paintings—Stingray, Mako Shark, and the 100th Anniversary Harley Davidsion poster with paintings of 1903 and 2003 Harleys. If you’d like posters of his work, contact Dean’s Garage and I’ll forward your request to Pete.

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