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Cover Truck Correction!
I noticed you have my Duramax-powered Silverado on the cover of your Dec ’11 issue. While I’m very happy to see it there, I just wanted to let you know you had the owner listed as someone else in cover description.
Craig McElfresh
Rushville, Missouri

You can email your questions to Professor Hammer at covell@cruzio.com, or mail to Professor Hammer, c/o Classic Trucks Magazine, 1733 Alton Pkwy., Irvine, CA 92606. You’ll receive a personal reply! We’ll print your name and city unless you request otherwise. Ron Covell has made many DVDs on metalworking processes, and he offers an ongoing series of workshops across the nation covering all aspects of metalworking. Check them out online at www.covell.biz, or call for a current schedule of workshops and their free catalog of DVDs. Phone 800-747-4631, or 831-768-0705. You can send a request by mail to: Covell Creative Metalworking, 106 Airport Blvd. #105, Freedom, CA 95019.

Having finished a previous project a few months earlier, Brad Gortsema from Spokane, Washington, had a little too much spare time on his hands. So, he decided to purchase another project in order to fill the void of time slipping away. Brad’s plans were to pick up something on the cheap and flip it for extra cash. Well, as plans changed, things got more involved. Brad admits that he never wanted to take the project to the highest level but for some reason he couldn’t control himself and his talents. Plus, if he were to sell the rare unibody he knew that the down turned economy would bring out the tire kickers and low ballers offering pocket change compared to the worth of the ’63.

They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder. This won’t be another love-at-first-sight story. In fact, when Rob Harris of La Habra, California, won the online auction that made him the new owner of this ’39 Ford pickup, the love was slow to grow. Let’s face it, a ’39 ain’t a ’40. With a face only a sow could love, the pig-snout pickup offers a challenge, even for those with vision. Now ordinarily when it comes to vision, Rob is not without it. Rob has built hot rod cars and trucks before, and he does posses the ability to see the inner beauty in most any ol’ bucket o’ bolts. Even so, he kept this naturally homely ol’ truck hidden from view in the deepest, darkest corner of his garage as he continued with other projects. Then finally after a year or so, he decided to sell it. It was just too ugly.

Alex Kruk fondly remembers watching his father manhandle the family’s two ’61 AMC Ramblers out in the driveway when he was a young impressionable kid. “My dad was pretty mechanically inclined, and if you know anything about these cars, you know your hands were always dirty just trying to keep them running.” It was about that same time, when he was just turning double digits in age, when he realized just like his dad, he too was hooked on cars. Before he knew it, his hands were just as dirty helping his dad keep the head gaskets intact on the feisty flathead AMC’s.