Concept

"TIMELESS"

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Concept

CONCEPT

The Concept for this car is centered around three (3) ideas. First, from its inception, the 1932 Ford was incredibly popular. The lines were pleasing, the original 65 horsepower V-8 engine was powerful, reliable and easily hopped up. Most importantly, it was affordable. Virtually every hot rod on the road today had its genesis as a 1932 Ford. Any non Ford hot rod was probably inspired by the ’32.

The dream of every hot rodder or drag racer born after 1945 was to own a Chrysler Hemi. This car incorporates a highly modified 392 Hemi, which is the most desirable of the old style Hemis. The fuel is metered by a specially designed New Generation Hilborn Fuel Injection System.

This car is the brainchild of Rich and Paige Udell of Swan Lake, Montana. Quality time was spent with Jimmy Smith of Jimmy Smith Hot Rod Designs who was able to capture the concept that we wanted to attain in his renderings of the car. Because of the nature of this car, every part and piece needed to be engineered and fabricated, beginning with the chassis, the full floating front suspension, the full custom rear suspension, the unibody construction, the stretch of the car, the mating of the sheet metal from 3 body styles, the hand-made one-off body panels, the design for the magnetic door and hood fasteners, down to the point where we even cut down a late model Chrysler windshield to have the curvature that was desired for this car. It is obvious that the degree of difficulty of this car far exceeds the imagination and part of the concept of this car is ‘THE MORE YOU LOOK, THE MORE YOU SEE.”

“Store-Bought” pieces are strictly out of the question. Focus on the suspension system and you can see one-off hand machined pieces to carry the Timeless hourglass theme throughout the car. Look at the control arms and half-shafts as an example.

The last element of this car is the FIT AND FINISH which Jon Watts of Lake Placid, Florida has performed. Jon was the fabricator and creator of an incredible show vehicle called The Heroes Truck. Jon Watts is a true fabricator, a body man and has honed his skills on several well-known projects and has come on board to share his engineering skills, fabrication skills and the final assembly and paint. This car is truly a labor of love, and the contributors to this car should be recognized for the incredible talents that they have displayed as well.

Paige and I showed the 1932 Ford “Chromzilla” which won the 2007 International Show Car Association World Championship. During the course of the show year, we became a part of Steve and Sheri Tracys’ family and a part of a wonderful company called Advanced Plating, Inc. We were sitting in the Tracys’ home in April of 2007 when Steve came home with a series of metal samples upon which he had perfected a new plating process. The plating process exemplified the whitest and brightest chrome we had ever seen. Steve simply made the statement that he was going to design the plating for this car, and that the plating on this car would far exceed any plating that had been exhibited thus far by anyone.

These were not idle statements, and the design and creativity of the chromium plating by Advanced Plating of Nashville, Tennessee on Timeless, is without question, unparalleled.

We met a young man by the name of Dan Rhodes from Appleton, Wisconsin on the show circuit during the 2006/2007 show season. In casual conversation, we indicated that we would like to incorporate a 392 Hemi in this car, and Dan came back to us with his find, which was a 392 Hemi that had been sitting in a garage for 26 years, and without even asking us, Dan secured the 392 Hemi. Dan owned Extreme Performance Motorsports in Greenville, Wisconsin which incorporates engine building and high performance chassis dyno work. Dan, so to speak, went back to school to a class called “392 Hemi”, and learned everything that he could about the 392 Hemi, and together with Aaron Stauber, proceeded to build an absolutely one-of-a-kind, incredible example of the old tried and true 392 Hemi.

One might notice the one-off CNC’d Fuel Rail which defies the commonly accepted concept of traditional fuel delivery. Kris Knutson of Knutson Engineering of Appleton, Wisconsin, who is an incredible design machinist, created most of the truly unique machined parts including the spectacular fuel log, plug boot covers, one-off hand machined headlights showcasing the hourglass theme, water cross-over, wire loom spacers, rear tail lights bezels, gear shift knob and dash bezel.

Paige and I were fortunate enough to build and own a 1934 Chevrolet called “Instigator” which won the 2006 International Show Car Association World Championship. While we had that car at the NSRA Street Rod Nationals in Louisville in 2004, we met an incredible lady by the name of Edris Snipes of Hilborn Fuel Injection. Edris suggested that if we ever did another car, that Hilborn would certainly like to work with us. The timing was perfect as Hilborn has just come out with its newest generation of fuel injection systems, and the fuel injection system on Timeless is the first working prototype for this system. Add the fuel delivery system previously discussed and the system defies the imagination.

In 2004 at the Goodguys show in Columbus, Ohio, a gentleman by the name of Larry O’Cull approached our Instigator car, and instantly fell in love with it. He suggested that his company, Priio, does monitoring systems for the aerospace industry, the medical industry and the automotive industry, and he would thoroughly enjoy working on our next project with us. When we began the Timeless project, I contacted Priio who quickly informed me that they had technology that had never before been incorporated in the automotive industry and they would be absolutely delighted to design a full compliment, touch screen gauge cluster and monitoring system. This system is truly one-of-a-kind and in its final application in this car, performs and displays the following functions:

The Timeless Gauge system is designed around a Windows XP Pro platform and has the

following features:

1.5GHz C7 CPU
1GB of 533MHz DR2 RAM
100GB SATA Seagate 2.5" hard drive
80w DC-DC converter with automatic startup and shutdown
BlueTooth and WiFi network capability
Dual VGA outputs with touch screens

The gauge package is a complete system status display and is capable of reporting the

following factors:

Vehicle Speed
Engine RPM
Oil Pressure
Water Temperature
Fuel Level
Turn Signals
High Beams
Odometer
Battery Voltage

The user can touch the screen and select alternate functions such as:

Guage Package in Dash
In dash rear-view camera
MP3 player with in-dash SD-Card slot & touch screen control for entire audio system
GPS
Vehicle Locator System

It also incorporates the technology of Compustar which has the ability, if the car is ever stolen, to disable it any place on the planet, and also has the ability to track the car by satellite anywhere on the planet.

We were able to make contact with Victor Moreno who is the owner of Intro Wheels, which is a small custom wheel company in Mont Clair, California. After many hours of conceptual discussions, emails back and forth and concept ideas, Victor came up with a one-off set of wheels and a one off matching steering wheel for Timeless that are incredibly spectacular in their own right. These are designed and hand machined specifically for this car and the wheels incorporate a ‘progressive spoke design’ never before utilized. They are also the perfect medium for Steve and Sheri Tracy’s magical plating processes. These incredible wheels are wrapped with 22” BF Goodrich G Force tires in the rear and 18” in the front.

Because of the one-off design throughout the car, a specialized steering column was required and ididit steering columns came to the rescue with a specialized chrome plated short column which adapted perfectly to the concept of this car.

Paige and I had heard the name Steve Holcomb and Pro Auto Custom Interiors come up several times during the outdoor show circuit, and we made a phone call to Knoxville, Tennessee and visited briefly with Steve, the owner of Pro Auto Custom Interiors. He invited us his shop, and it was apparent to us that this young man was incredibly creative and talented. He also had a very strong Christian philosophy as well as a tireless work ethic. We met with Steve for about 15 minutes and during that short time period, we were able to select the dyes for the leather of Timeless and the interior and trunk concepts which blend perfectly with the concept of the car. It was a magical experience and the only thing that Steve said to us was simply: “Leave this to me and I will make you proud.” Kevin Walls of Lokar CNC’d many one-off trim pieces for the interior of the cockpit and machined specialized ovals for the interior, floor boards, trunk and console to carry out the continuing design and theme of this unique piece.

Paige and I were fortunate enough to win the Legend Cup at the Chicago World of Wheels with the Chromzilla car in 2006. Bob Howe, who owns Howe Industries and Bob’s Rod Shop in New Berlin, Wisconsin, is the incredibly talented man that designed and built the phenomenal Legend Cup. We were fortunate enough to get to know Bob as a result of that show, and our friendship blossomed during the next few months. We spent some time with Bob in his home in New Berlin, Wisconsin and it was at that time that he simply stated: “I would be greatly honored to do the logos for the car.” That was all that needed to be said as we were honored to have such a talented and creative man come on board with this project.

We have had a long standing relationship with Dennis Silva, Ron Skyrme, and Gene Fenske and the rest of the Hot Hues by Dupont crew. They have been supportive of us in many of our previous projects, and when I started discussing this project at SEMA 2006 with Gene Fenske, our local Montana Dupont Rep, he looked at me in all seriousness, and said: “Lets formulate some special colors for this car”. That was the birth of Montana Mint, which is the Hot Hues by Dupont color that was formulated especially for Timeless, and the rest is history.

We also had the good fortune of meeting Chuck Johnson who owns Finish Line Transmissions in Woodale, Illinois. When we explained the concept and project to him, it was a very simple analysis for him. He concluded that we should run a 6 speed manual transmission, and he undertook the responsibilities to make certain that that combination mated perfectly with the Timeless 392 Hemi. Advanced Plating of Nashville, Tennessee spent countless hours grinding and polishing on the case to make it a chromium plated piece of art.

Jesse Greening of Greening Auto Company of Cullman, Alabama, the 2007 SEMA Builder of the Year, designed and CNC’d the totally unique Fuel Injection Velocity Stacks to incorporate the ‘Timeless Hourglass’ theme, together with a one-off matching exhaust tip. Jesse also CNC’d the headlight cans to his precise specifications, and created the one-off tail light LED’s, utilizing the hourglass theme.

Dave O’Connor of Wizard Fabrication of Sacramento, California machined a totally unique Steer Clear unit to specifically attain an absolutely clean and hidden steering mechanism.

In the spring of 2007, we received a call out of the blue from a young man by the name of John Myers of Kicker Audio in Stillwater, Oklahoma. John simply stated that he had been drooling over some of our other projects, and wanted to know if we had anything upcoming that he might become involved in. We sent him some concept drawings, and he fell in love with the whole Timeless concept. Obviously it was his request to leave the audio design and component system to him, which he handled marvelously.

It is sometime difficult to take a concept such as the one at hand and bring it alive on paper. During our travels, we met an incredibly talented artist by the name of Jimmy Smith and it was the uncanny ability of Jimmy’s Hot Rod Design to excise the Timeless concepts and bring it so fabulously alive on paper.

During the course of this build, we have selected several additional companies to add their expertise to the completion of Timeless. .

Powermaster provided specially designed high output compact versions of their starter and alternator.

Watsons StreetWorks of Bozrah, Ct. have shared in the project by providing a cross section of their incredible series of controllers and switches which are truly state of the art and SEMA award winning.

Dan Baker of Alumicraft designed and built the unique one-off grill to compliment the concept of Timeless.

Red Roberts of Driveline Components brought his many years of transmission and shifter knowledge by providing a 21^st century high performance, short throw shifter to Timeless.

These are just a few of the persons or companies which were involved in the creation of this incredible “Timeless” project.

Jon Watts - jonwatts445@yahoo.com

Cincinnati, Ohio 937 728-6640

Advanced Plating – stracy7645@aol.com

Steve Tracy – Nashville, Tennessee

Extreme Performance Motorsports – epm@northnet.net

Dan Rhodes – Neenah, Wisconsin

Pro Auto Custom Interiors – holcolmknoxville@aol.com

Steve Holcomb - Knoxville, Tennessee

Howe Industries – Bob’s Rod Shop bob@howeind.com

Bob Howe – New Berlin, Wisconsin

Hilborn (Fuel Injection Engr. Co., Inc.) – edris@hilborninjection.com