Antique & Classic Cars Blog

Hot rodders, customizers and restorers look at cars through transformative eyes, seeing not just what is but what shall be.

Nowhere is the mind’s drafting table more active than in the low-rider community. Yeah, low rider fans do paint; yeah they do ’glass work; yeah they refurbish and hop up and engrave, embroider, pinstripe and chrome. But this crew also re-crafts the very way that automobiles move.

Take hopping. Frogs hop. Grasshoppers hop. Kids hop. Walk into a Lexus or Mercedes dealer and ask to see an LS 460 or S-Class sedan hop and you’ll get some pretty strange looks. Those cars do many things well, but they don’t hop. No car does—unless it’s a low rider.

With undercarriage reinforcements and some serious hydraulic lifts at the corners, a low rider can hop. It can pop the front end five feet off the ground. Some can leap up, all four wheels at once. Or they can rock back on one wheel and pull the diagonal tire all the way off the ground—a foot or more. Even the show cars, not built for hard knocks, can rise up to clear the deepest driveway dip or drop down low enough to make Jiminy doff his cricket top hat.

And low riders can dance too, gyrating and pivoting like a living artist.

For a hard-copy “Locals in Motion” piece, I talked to Rollerz Only’s Minnesota chapter founder, Rickie Sanders. With a couple phone calls, Rickie put together a half-dozen cars and a lot of cool guys who are into their rides. The ’59 Impala here was a trophy winner at last month’s Low-Rider Magazine Super Show in Las Vegas. My aunt had a ’59 Impala. While it was a convertible, black with red interior and a white top, it wasn’t this cool.

Even Sanders’ kids have low rider bikes. I’ve probably owned ten bicycles in my life, but nothing had flash like this. These low fliers got more style than all the scooters in Quadrophenia.

In the summer months, the Rollerz cruise with the guys and their families whenever they can. Come winter, it’s time to turn wrenches and build cars for next year. Keep an eye out for this club. You’re gonna see some sweet rides with different strides.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 11th, 2008 at 4:13 pm and is filed under Car stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.