Fittingly, STREET RODDER Photo Editor Eric Geisert shot the ex-Jim Khougaz roadster out at El Mirage dry lake. Running on methanol, it hit 141.95 mph there at an SCTA meet in July 1949.
Channeling: In hot rod jargon, that's dropping a car's body the width of the framerails, then remounting it. That major surgery results in a very low silhouette. Floor space and seat height are effectively lost, but you look kool.
If you're an East Coast rodder from the '50s, you saw a lot of channeled cars, and you probably didn't like many of 'em. With the exception of a few rods (like Bill Neumann's '31 Model A roadster, which appeared in mags on both coasts, and Andy Kassa's '32 coupe), most Right Coast channeled cars were butt ugly. Channeling affects every element. So if you simply removed the floor, spread and remounted the body with quickie welding and homemade angle iron brackets, the result looked crude. The rest of the job was often cobbled together, so typically the grille and radiator were mounted too high, the engine was insanely tilted, seats became thin pads, and the altered floors were too flat for comfort.
Dark brown interior contrasts neatly with this car's metallic blue exterior and cordovan wheels. A comfy bench seat permits three cozy passengers. Also to note is the '40 Ford column shift.
On the West Coast, where highboys ruled, channeling yielded a clean silhouette, but in dry lakes racing, it kicked a car up into the competitive modified roadster class. Channeled '32 roadsters weren't common at the lakes.Our feature roadster was campaigned successfully at El Mirage from 1946 to 1950. At first, it was a dual-purpose street and lakes car, serving its owner/builder, Jim Khougaz, as a wicked street ride and weekend racer. Running on methanol in SCTA's C Lakester class (in July 1949), Khougaz achieved a best-ever speed of 141.95 mph at El Mirage. That engine was a 286-cid Flathead with a Winfield SU 1A cam, Edelbrock heads, and four-carb manifold, backed by a three-speed, column-shifted '40 Ford box with Zephyr gears. An early Outriders Club member, Khougaz helped start the Van Nuys Roadmasters in the San Fernando Valley before serving in WWII.
Like many lucky vets, Khougaz couldn't wait to resume hot rodding. "So, in '47 I decided I'd better channel the car. It really didn't take that long, less than a month of part-time work. I cut the floor out and picked up the same mounting holes (except for the bottom ones), drilled the frame, Z'd it in the rear to clear the '46 Ford rear axle, and put the body back on it," he said.Fortunately, photos survive of the Khougaz roadster in its heyday. We looked at one where Jim's '32 is waiting in line to race. "That photo depicts the first time I ran it as a channeled car. SCTA's roadster classes were either for highboys or modifieds. After I channeled it, it became a modified roadster. That 'C' with the number referred to the engine size. The first few runs were on gas, but by the time I got it channeled, I had converted one manifold setup to methanol. We'd go up (to the lakes) on gas, then change manifolds. I had two tanks, both mounted in the car, so you could switch. And I used a pump to pressurize the tank. We had to bring methanol with us in 55-gallon drums."Khougaz maximized the airworthiness of his '32 body perhaps better than any of his Deuce driving rivals. It was channeled over 7 inches, slightly more than the depth of the shortened frame. A '32 grille shell was smoothed, peaked, and sectioned. The custom three-piece hood and louvered side panels were 2 inches longer than stock to clear the twin Wico magnetos. The hood sides were shortened to accommodate the deep channel.
If sharp-eyed readers are wondering about the missing louver on the left side hood panel, there's a story behind it. Jim related it this way: "When one of my friends was punching the louvers, something came up, and he was interrupted. He went ahead and started punching them again, and all of a sudden, we looked down and he had missed one. You should have heard me scream. There's no way in the world you can go back."
To improve high-speed aerodynamics, Khougaz fabricated an aluminum bellypan for his sleek roadster. It ran from the front frame horns under the full length of the car and ended in a smooth tailpanel.
He ran the channeled car for two years. "Then, about 1949," he recalled, "I made the bellypan out of sheet aluminum, and by 1950 we weren't driving it on the street any more. Now it was strictly for the lakes. I was running 130-plus mph; the '27 Ts were going up to the 150s, and most of 'em were still Flatheads. The bellypan worked," he noted with pride. "I picked up 6 to 7 mph."That bellypan runs from the front frame horns, under the engine, all the way to the rear, ending in a roll pan with the twin exhausts protruding through it. There's a small opening for the lower portion of the crankcase and a cutout to clear the rearend pumpkin. When Khougaz originally made it, he formed "some bumps for the differential and the pan." In the rear, the corners were covered with a contoured piece on each side. When you look under the roadster, there's a virtually unbroken flat surface from front to back, like an aircraft wing. In front of the grille, there's an aerodynamic panel to prevent frontend lift.The body was welded to the frame in front. For further rigidity, Khougaz said, "I used a big heavy piece of 1/4x1/4-inch strap steel to give it strength, and welded it to the body, following the door contour." That gave the doorjambs rigidity. "Before that," he sayid, "it was pretty flimsy. You could feel it when you slammed it [the door] shut." The frame is boxed between the K-member and the rear crossmember. And there are brackets for a rollbar.
Why didn't more guys channel cars, we asked Khougaz? "It was a helluva lot of work," he replied, "and everybody said, 'What do you want to channel it for? You'll lose your seat...' and all that." For racing, Jim actually did lose his seat. In order to get as low as he could, he used an aircraft bucket. "On the street," he noted, "we had a whole seat cushion (we found) from a junkyard."With the car's low height, the King Bee headlights were mounted high alongside the grille on specially made flat brackets. There was a headlamp height rule in those early days--just another way the LAPD had found to harass hot rodders. "The cops were out there with tape measures," Khougaz said, but they didn't stop him, as period pictures show, from using his car on the street. The channel job was just part of the lowering process. In front, a 3-inch dropped and filled axle did the deed, along with a "de-arched" '35 Ford spring mounted in front of the axle. In the rear, the frame was Z'd. Finally, the windshield was chopped 3 1/4 inches. This car sits very, very low.
Not content with simply pirating an Auburn dashpanel, Jim Khougaz cut the entire Auburn dash out of an old sedan, reversed it, and cut it down to fit snugly in his Deuce.
The completed interior has a '47 Mercury steering wheel on a '32 Ford column with a '32 Ford steering box. There's a Stewart-Warner mechanical tach to the left of the wheel, and the dash is a complete unit, panel and all, from a '32 Auburn. Those gauges are all early S-W curved glass units. Jim said: "A friend of my Dad's named Perkel owned a junkyard in Van Nuys. That's where I saw this old Auburn. It was in pretty good shape and it had that dash." "In those days," he said, "everyone went after the center piece with the instruments." I didn't have much money then, but I said, 'Perk, can I have the whole thing?'
"He replied, 'If you want to take it out yourself, you can have it for two dollars.' We worked on that car during our lunch hour for three days, and finally got the whole dash out of this junk car. Then we cut it very carefully to fit in the same contour, but we reversed it and made it concave on the front. We spent a helluva lot of time welding it in. I never mounted SCTA timing plates, because I didn't want to drill any holes. I have 40 something tags...all those memories, in my toolbox." Why didn't he mount a tag? "Every time you run, you get a better time," said Jim. "I thought, 'Well, I'll put one in later,' but I never put one in."
The wheels were 16-inchers painted a dark cordovan shade of red. "They were brand-new Ford wheels on the front and wide-based Lincoln on the rear," Jim said. And the tall wire wheels shown in one of the lakes photos? "Those were not my wheels," he said. "I didn't have a quick-change. I had a 3.54:1 rearend. And I needed more gear, so the only way I could get it was to put on bigger tires. I never could afford a quick-change in those days. They were $180; it was a lot of money," he laughed. "You could build two engines at that time for that price."
This Auburn panel, with 100-mph speedo, is from a straight-eight model; Auburn V-12s used 120-mph speedometers.
"For my first engine," Jim remembered, "I ran a 3 7/8-inch stroke. That was a 1/8-inch stroke on a stock 3 3/4-inch crank, and it had a 3 5/16-inch bore. In those days, we'd offset grind the crank journals to get that 1/8-inch longer stroke. The Merc crank had larger diameter journals, so you could do that." Like many racing old-timers, Khougaz has a great memory for details. "My second engine, bored to 3 3/8, also used a 3 7/8 stroke," he noted. "Later on, we got a 4-inch Merc crank and stroked it to 4 1/8 for 296 cid. When we ran at Bonneville, I wanted to stay back a class, so I de-stroked an engine to 3 5/8 inches--that one had a 3 5/16 bore. With it, we could easily turn 5,600-5,700 rpm. My engines were always balanced, with a chopped flywheel and enough weight to just dump the clutch. To save weight there was no ring gear or starter; we just pushed it to start."
"Where ignition was concerned," Jim recalled, "I had twin Wico industrial magnetos, using a split casting mount specially made for a V-8. There was no advance; you preset the timing using a lead plate. I ran 27, 28, or 29 degrees of advance. I also used a converted Lincoln Zephyr V-12 distributor (as the car is now equipped). Manuel Ayulo, who went on to be a famous CRA (California Roadster Association) and Indy driver, did my block relieving with a die-grinder. I saw how he did it, tried it myself, broke through the casting and had to weld the block up again. That was lot of work."
Note the SCTA timing tag. Khougaz kept the original; this reproduction commemorates the car's best time: 141.95 mph in July 1949.
Said Khougaz: "In those days, Ayulo, and Jack McGrath (who also became a famous racer), were working for Lou Baney (who at one time ran the Russetta Timing Association). Lou had a hot rod shop on Vermont Ave., and right down the street there was a Ford dealership. After the war, I had heard about all these guys, and I found out that Manuel was a good man to port the engine block. I went into the dealership and said, 'I want two 59A Ford blocks.' The parts guy said, 'OK, I'll give you a call when we get them in.' When I went to get them, in my other highboy, I opened the decklid, loaded the blocks in back, took them to Manuel's and said, 'Start porting.' The brand new blocks were $36 apiece."At first we simply used stock valves, but when we increased the size of the intakes, more (fly-cutting) work was needed. We always used Lincoln Zephyr valve springs, and then we increased the size of the intakes. In those days, you'd build an engine, and two or three runs later, you'd change cams, change compression, and change carbs. You might start out with two carbs, then build up to three or four. As Flathead engine technology progressed, you'd try to keep up with it. Nothing was ever the same twice running."
Why the column shift in a race car? "That column shift worked good," he said. "Remember, we weren't drag racing, so you didn't have to speed shift.""They'd pick a new course (at the lakes) every month," said Jim. "By the end of the day, the course would be torn up. Sometimes we'd have to change the course in midday and run adjacent to it because the surface would only last for 200 to 300 cars running. We had a lot of roadsters, but we ran 'em pretty quick, about 30 seconds apart. Over the course of a day, 4 to 5 runs were pretty adequate. The wind would come up, and by 1 to 2 p.m., it could be blowin' hard. It was hot when the sun came out. And there was always a tailwind. We'd run west to east, you'd get 2-3 extra miles per hour with the wind. When it was too strong, they'd stop running. If there were 10-15-mph tailwinds, there'd be too much dust. Before the war, they ran several cars at once, and it would get very dusty. But there was always a slight cross wind, so in 30 seconds, the dust would clear, and you could run the next car," he remembered.
A roadster body on the Khougaz lakes car is channeled deeply over the '32 Ford frame and welded to the frame in front. Khougaz fabricated a neat fairing to mold the body into the framerails. That was a challenge for the painters who had to do some repainting after the body and frame were fused. The low silhouette still looks great today. Is channeling worth the effort? Jim Khougaz's lake times indicate yes. Luckily, the new owner, Mark Van Buskirk, isn't too tall. He fits comfortably in the car, with his line of sight below the windscreen.
Once the car was painted, plated, and very smart looking, Jim Khougaz took it to driving events and car shows. He entered one of the early Pasadena Roadster Club Reliability Runs. That's pictured in Don Montgomery's Hot Rods as They Were, where he finished fifth overall. In the Feb. '49 issue of Hot Rod, Jim Khougaz, in his channeled '32, and Ted Miller, in a '29 highboy, took on seven sports cars in a "challenge sprint race" held on an impromptu course at the Davis Motorcar factory in Van Nuys. The event was called, "Sports Car vs. Hot Rod." Phillip Payne, in a Mercury-powered Special designed by Willis Baldwin, had the fastest time of 1 minute, 11 seconds.
Payne had timed his car at a Russetta Timing Association meet at the lakes, so its appearance begged the question, was this a hot rod with sports car attributes or a hot rodded sports car? Second place of 1 minute, 13 seconds, was taken by a young Phil Hill in a supercharged MG. Khougaz's '32 had the third fastest time of 1 minute, 16 seconds. In August 2003, at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, hot rods returned for the fourth time to participate in a class called "Road Racing Rods." Both the Khougaz '32 and the Phillip Payne roadster were reunited when Stephen Payne brought his late father's Special over from the UK.
Although the Khougaz roadster was never a feature car in Hot Rod, it was pictured in a July '49 article by Walt Woron as a fine example of channeling in his How to Build a Hot Rod series.
Khougaz was involved with SCTA for years. "I was elected president in 1954-55, shortly after I came home from Korea. I also became secretary-treasurer of the Bonneville racing association." He'd moved up from running at the lakes to the salt flats of Utah, and the new car was ready to double the speeds of his old '32. Pick up an old Jan. '59 copy of Hot Rod and the Khougaz D modified roadster commands a four-page spread with a cutaway drawing under the heading, "T Masterpiece." The chrome-moly, tube-framed T-modified packed a massive '57 Chrysler Hemi bored and stroked to a whopping 467-cid. Atop the engine, a Crower U-Fab manifold ran eight (!) Stromberg 97s. Forgedtrue pistons, a Vertex magneto, and an Isky cam were also on board. This time Khougaz could afford a Halibrand quick-change. The swing axle rear used Jaguar torsion bars; the front was a '37 Ford tube axle. Firestone Indy tires were mounted on each corner.By then, Jim was working for the famed C-T (for Clark and Tebow) Automotive in North Hollywood, California. Their dyno read 514-bhp at 5,700 rpm for the big Hemi on alky; on nitro, the mid-mounted motor developed 600-bhp. Khougaz first ran the new roadster at Bonneville in 1957 where it turned a heady 212.76 mph. Unfortunately, after running 207.85 mph in 1958, he had an axle break. Later, at the same meet, Khougaz was doing well over 200 mph on another run when the car flipped. The eight carbs were virtually demolished and a few panels were bent. Courageously, cool Mr. Khougaz put out the fire himself and, in doing so, received burns on his arm. He vowed to return to set a record in the '56 Dodge Metallic blue speedster. It never happened. The fully disassembled nearly complete Bonneville T rests in a loft in Jim's garage, surrounded by spare parts.
Although most cars in his class were T roadsters, chosen for their svelte silhouettes, Jim Khougaz wanted to see how low he could get his roadster and be competitive. Today, its sleek silhouette marks it as one of the best-looking vintage lowboys ever built.
"Herbie ran the channeled '32 'till about 1956-57, then I parked it," said Jim. "I was busy working on the T. I had a family, but I didn't want to sell it. Later, my kids were too busy. But they took the car apart, and were going to make it into a street machine. That project was sidelined. The '32 never ran on the street or lakes again. It sat in Jim's shop for nearly 40 years."In April 1995, Jim Khougaz ran an advertisement in Hemmings Motor News offering both of his roadsters for sale. Dr. Mark Van Buskirk, a dentist (and hot rod enthusiast) from Crown Point, Indiana, happened to be in Las Vegas when he read Khougaz's ad. "I jumped on a plane to Los Angeles with a $49 round-trip ticket," Van Buskirk said. "I was the first guy who got there. The ad mentioned this was a hot rod with real provenance and I liked that. Earlier I had planned to build a '32 Ford roadster, and here was a real one for sale."
When asked if he was sad to sell his car, Jim replied, "It broke my heart. Even my son asked, 'Are you sure?' But I said if he offers me $25,000 I'll sell it." Mark paid the price and the Khougaz roadster was on its way to Indiana.Soon thereafter, Mark and his father brought the Khougaz roadster, then really just a pile of pieces, to Dave Simard's Leominster, Massachusetts, shop, East Coast Custom, in May 1997. After a five-year, ground-up restoration, the completed Khougaz/Van Buskirk '32 debuted in January 2003 at the Grand National Roadster Show in San Mateo, where it won the Bruce Meyer Preservation Award. A few weeks later at the Oakland Rod and Custom Show, the '32 won several more trophies, including Best Engine, Best Rod, The Nostalgia Award, and second place in the Altered Street Roadster class--a class comprised of modern street rods. And at the Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance in March, the born-again ex-Khougaz roadster won the Street Rod Builder Most Significant Hot Rod trophy. "It took five years," Van Buskirk said, "but I enjoyed seeing progress on visits to Dave's shop. My dad was a patternmaker. When we visited Dave's clean but hardly sterile garage, he looked around and said, 'This is a craftsman; he's a good guy. That made me feel good. I had a picture in my mind's eye," Van Buskirk said, "and the finished roadster came out exactly the way I'd pictured it."
Jim Khougaz campaigned his '32 roadster successfully at El Mirage from 1946-1950. At first, it was a dual-purpose street and lakes car, but by 1949, with a tank full of methanol and a full bellypan, it could top 140 mph. Here, Khougaz streaks across the lakebed at El Mirage in a period photo that captures the excitement of lakes racing and preserves it for all time.
Dave Simard has built and restored a lot of cars. Was this one a challenge, we asked? "Not really," he replied, "but we did do a few things differently. First of all, when the pile of parts arrived, I thought to myself, 'I should really put this car together with all the original pieces to better evaluate what we'd have to do. So we did, and then we took plenty of pictures.'"
"Our biggest challenge," Simard reflected, "restoring this car, was assembling the body and chassis. The body is actually welded to the chassis in front, so we had to paint it and then weld it back together perfectly--there could be no adjustments. We then repainted the areas that were blistered by the welding. We painted the complete interior and carefully welded it together with the chassis. Everything had to be perfect, so the doors, hood, radiator, and grille would fit just right. There was no second chance to adjust anything." The fit is razor sharp and probably better than when the car was built. Out of respect for Jim Khougaz's vision, this roadster has been remade as good as they get today. "The hood is a good example of Khougaz's work," said Dave. "In an era where most guys used lunchbox latches, he developed a unique three-piece hood system to secure the panels using a support rod on each side that fits neatly into a small hole in the frame. It's secured by a knurled nut."
"And that bellypan," he said, "we must have 400-500 hours in fabricating it. Mark Szmyt in my shop did half of it. Stan DeCoste, another one of my guys, did great detail work on the car. Kevin Olson and Phil Austin, from Viking Auto in Vernon, Vermont, carefully matched the blue paint from samples we took off original panels where it hadn't faded. Steve Pierce from OneOff Technologies in Gilford, New Hampshire, did a superb job on the brown leather and the tonneau cover. And credit Joe MacNeil and Bob Hilton of J&B Metal Finishing for their perfect plating. Skip Readio did the wiring."
Like many lakes racers, Khougaz flat-towed his roadster to El Mirage. Safety chain (on ground) ensured the '32 roadster and tow car wouldn't part company. Although a channeled '32 wasn't as aerodynamic as a '27 T or a purpose-built lakester, with its smooth bellypan and other mods, this car came close. Its 141-plus-mph top speed was an impressive feat. (Photos courtesy of Mark Van Buskirk.)
Simard punched extra louvers in the bellypan so the car could "breathe" on the street, and he wrapped the exhaust pipes under the car so it wouldn't slow cook one very happy Indiana dentist as he drives his completed roadster. "I'm living my dream," said Mark Van Buskirk, DDS. He arranged his entire year's patient schedule so he could bring the roadster to the L.A. Roadster Show, Pebble Beach, Goodguys in P'ton, the 31st Ty-Rods Old Timers' Reunion in Massachusetts, and Mark Morton's 2003 River City Rod Run. "After that," he insisted, "it's just gonna be a driver."
Jim Khougaz first saw his completed old car at the Beverly Hills Concours on Rodeo Drive in June 2003. It won the hot rod class against stiff competition. Khougaz was very pleased, and he brought his entire family to see it. "You'd be surprised," he said, "how attached you get to something like this. This car was just a thought when I was a kid. I didn't like '29 roadsters. I wanted a '32. It's something you grow up with," he paused. "I get shivers thinking about all the good times we had in that car."
I had a chance to drive the Khougaz/Van Buskirk '32 at Pleasanton last August. It's tight, stiff, and rock-solid. Exiting through chromed, unmuffled, side pipes (not fitted in these photos), it barks authoritatively and accelerates briskly. The shift from second to third results in a satisfying chirp, and the low center of gravity helps you corner this car with confidence, even on vintage-style bias-plies. With all the bellypans fitted, the engine temperature rises rapidly, so for street use, the bellypan section under the engine and/or the hood side panels are best removed. When you think that Jim Khougaz topped 140 mph in this stunning low flyer, you have to respect his inventiveness and his Army Air Corps-hewn courage.
The sleek bellypan on the Khougaz '32 runs from the front frame horns all the way to the rear. Designed strictly for racing, and despite the louvers, the pan retains heat and the car tends to overheat quickly. At the lakes, it was another story. Runs were short and the pan maximized the car's aerodynamic efficiency. Dave Simard reproduced the bellypan from pieces of the original and period photos. | 
A 286-cid Flathead in the Khougaz roadster runs a Lincoln-Zephyr distributor conversion, Edelbrock heads, 4-carb manifold (with four Stromberg 81s), and homemade headers. Inside, pop-up pistons, big valves, Johnson adjustable tappets, Lincoln valve springs, and a Winfield cam do the serious work. Mark Kirby and his talented crew at Motor City Flathead, Dundee, MI, built the engine. | 
A happy Jim Khougaz relaxes after a quick lakes run. At the July 16-17, 1949 SCTA Speed Trials at El Mirage, entered in the C Lakester class, with this channeled '32, Khougaz achieved a best-ever speed of 141.95 mph. Power was a 286-cid Flathead with a Winfield SU1A cam, Edelbrock heads, and four-carb manifold, backed by a three-speed, '40 Ford box with Zephyr gears. (Photo courtesy of Mark Van Buskirk.) |