Hot Rod Car Show - Road Tour: Leg 2

The Advanced Plating leg was the second in the 2007 STREET RODDER / PPG Road Tour series, beginning with a weekend of rodding fun at the NSRA Mid-America Nationals in Springfield, Missouri. The Springfield event has grown by leaps and bounds in the last few years, and this year's registered participants totaled more than 2,100. The beautiful weather on Saturday brought spectators out in record numbers.

Sunday afternoon, after the awards, it was time for the Advanced Plating Tour to head out on the five-day journey to the NSRA Nationals East in York, Pennsylvania. Our trip was mapped out to take us through Nashville, Knoxville, Charlotte, and Virginia before completing our tour on Thursday in York. Stops would include Lokar Products in Knoxville, Dennis Carpenter's Reproductions and Hendrick's Motorsports in Charlotte, a visit to the home of author Ken Gross, and a stop at the Gettysburg Memorial in Virginia. We were to arrive in York on Thursday in time for the famous Nationals East kick-off party.

Our Sunday afternoon trip was a short one, as planned, and we spent the evening in Poplar Bluff, Missouri. Dinner was at a local steakhouse and the tour participants got a chance to get to know new friends and in some cases renew old friendships. A number of the Road Tourians on the Advanced Plating Tour were veterans of some of the 2006 tours. They already knew the fun involved in a week on the road with fellow rodders. This tour included folks from California, Oregon, Texas, Illinois, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

It was beautiful on the morning of Memorial Day Monday as we made the trip across Missouri, through Kentucky, and then on to Nashville-our destination for the day and evening. Some folks headed to the huge Opryland Hotel while others paid a visit to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. It was sunny and hot, and, after a day of seeing the sights, we got together for dinner and discussed plans for Tuesday.

The tour continued on Tuesday morning bright and early. First on the schedule was a visit to the shop of our tour sponsor Advanced Plating in Nashville, where we were given a full tour of the facility. The first thing you notice at the company's plant is that it is not your normal chrome-plating facility, in that it is incredibly clean and organized. Owner Steve Tracy's philosophy is that you cannot do quality plating in a dirty environment. Those who has seen any of the company's work realizes that Advanced does very high-quality plating, so it makes sense. Also on display in the company showroom is Advanced Plating's line of chrome-plated products, including grilles, manifolds, and valve covers. All items include a full dose of Advanced's high-quality chrome.

We had no time to rest after our tour at Advanced, as we had an invitation for lunch at Lokar Performance Products in Knoxville, about three hours east on I-40. As usual, owners Debbie and Skip Wall and Lokar President Rick Craze really rolled out the Road Tour red carpet for us. A catered barbecue lunch was just what the road-weary Road Tourians needed. On top of great food, Debbie put together goodie bags for all of us, which included a Lokar hat and umbrella. Lokar is the only company whose products have been used on every Road Tour car built since the program began in 1996. After a tour of the company's manufacturing facility, it was again time to keep moving. Our next destination was Charlotte, North Carolina

Our tour guide for the evening in Charlotte was good friend Brent VanDervort, founder and president of Fatman Fabrications. We stopped at the Fatman facility last year on the Road Tour, and this year Brent volunteered to get us a behind-the-scenes look at two of the coolest car-related places in the Charlotte area. The Tuesday evening stop is not generally open to the public, but Brent made the visit possible. Dennis Carpenter Reproductions is a well-known name in the restoration and street rod hobby. Famous for its high-quality Ford reproduction parts, the company has expanded into Cushman scooter parts and also tractor parts. We were able to get a tour of a museum-style collection of cars, trucks, Cushman scooters, motorcycles, and automobilia that has been accumulated by the company over the years. It is an unbelievable collection. Longtime Dennis Carpenter employee and museum curator Roy Howard guided us through the displays.

Wednesday morning Brent was again our guide as we visited the Hendrick Motorsports racing complex just around the corner from Lowe's Motor Speedway. Bob Hice gave us a personal guided tour through the amazing Hendrick facility, and we spent some time in the museum area where Daytona 500 winning cars of past years are on display. We then visited the chassis shop where fabrication begins on all of the race cars. From there it was on to the building where the work is done on Jeff Gordon's and Jimmy Johnson's race cars. It was fantastic to get such an up-close-and-personal tour of the Hendrick facility. Many thanks to Brent VanDervort from Fatman for putting together such a great evening and morning in Charlotte.

Wednesday evening was spent in Charlottesville, Virginia. We enjoyed a group dinner at Cheeseburgers in Paradise, which was great fun for all of us. Thursday morning arrived and we still had two more stops before we got to York and the NSRA Nationals East. Our first one was at the home of author Ken Gross. Ken has written for all the major automotive magazines, including STREET RODDER. His subject matter is wide-ranging, but, by his own admission, his love is with hot rods. His collection of early Flathead manifolds has to be one of the largest anywhere, and his '32 Ford roadster was chosen as one of the 75 honored at the Grand National Roadster Show this past January. Ken is also a former director of the Petersen Automotive Museum, so, needless to say, it was a very enjoyable morning with one of the most interesting people in our hobby.

The Gettysburg Memorial was our final stop on the Advanced Plating leg. It was a fitting end to our week. What began on Memorial Day wrapped up at the site of an event that decided the destiny of our nation. It was a very solemn afternoon at the memorial and cemetery.

We rolled into the headquarters hotel in York at about 3 p.m. on Thursday afternoon. We definitely had a full week on the Road Tour, and the huge NSRA Nationals East was a fitting finale to our fun-filled week. With more than 3,000 street rods registered, there was plenty to see and do all weekend, and the Advanced Plating Road Tourians had plenty of stories to relay to their friends back home.

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