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Showing results for tags 'GRANDSONS TOUR'.
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Today being MLK holiday- admission to the Museum was free. The grandsons have been after me to show them "The cars that I built". Of course , I told them, I didn't build the whole car-just an important part of it. As my luck would have it- Try as I might, I couldn't coax these old bones to get moving-too much pain from old gridiron hits and others. So they went with my adult grandson Lance and had a good time-they took a few pics that brought back memories of good times gone by. I was priviledged to work at Avanti both under Newman & Altman owership & Steve Blake. My area of expertise was to completely dress & assemble the complete engine and transmission assembly for placement in the frame. Each assembly took 6 1/2 hours to complete. When Steve Blake took over-we were making one car a day. I also got to build the engine & trans assembly for the first ever Convertible-sold to George Hamilton- the actor & shipped to California-this car was on a TV show too I believe. He wanted to increase production to 2 cars a day- he wanted to establish a network of dealerships. Up til then, you ordered, and picked up your car at the factory. I was given the task of redisigning the engine assembly bay so I could double my production. After a few days and some changes in the way I moved-I did it. I could just barely complete 2 assemblies in 8 hours. I was proud to put my stamp on each assembly of what was nearly a hand built car. The factory was featured in a " ROAD & TRACK " magazine in 1984. The magazine paid me $1 for permission to print something about me building the engines. Here the boys pictures-one of which was ANDY GRANITELLI s car that broke 29 speed records at Bonniville and was labeled "Worlds Fastest Production Car" oh yes their were some wheel horses there too Thanks for looking- wish I could have walked enough to have gone- but I have the smiles on their faces when they talk about "Grandpa's Cars"-Al
