Still Worried About the Antique Car Hobby Being Dead or Dying??

Im glad that so many of you are quite optimistic, but frankly, youth interest is only one aspect of the hobby. Prices have not risen in 20 yrs and the the value of the dollar has dropped by more then half. so there is that aspect of how interested the young people really are.


of course its only money.............. but that does hold meaning to many. dont be afraid to share your parts stash with those in need.
 
jb-ob said:
old 31....Sounds like you are attending the wrong shows.
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Or he's taking a realistic look at the local car scene that is playing out all over America. Looking at a big annual event hosted by a big corporation at a world renown venue does not paint the full picture.


This is a website that has all (OK 95%) of the car events in SoCal - http://www.socalcarculture.com/events.html
We have a few A guys that just hop in our cars and drive them. We hit a couple of these events a month. Guess what - we're the ONLY old cars there the rest are all 60s up with a VERY few street rods thrown in.
Tomorrow there is a Centennial Route 66 show nearby. I decided to take the 1926 T Roadster since it's also its centennial. But it will be one of those street rods at the show - with its OHV 4 port Riley B engine .....
 

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ronn said:
Prices have not risen in 20 yrs and the the value of the dollar has dropped by more then half. so there is that aspect of how interested the young people really are.
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Gotta say I’m with Brent on this one. The purchase price reflects the buyer’s estimate of the total cost of ownership. TCO for Model A’s has risen over the last 20 years for two reasons: (1) the cars are in worse shape than they used to be; (2) new owners expect to pay someone else to repair and maintain the car. If the cars’ value as collectors items is not also rising, which it isn’t, then logically the purchase value should decrease.
 
Hitman said:
MAFCA’s Durango tour sold out in a day too. Must be lack of demand.
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Location, location, location. Host an event in one of the most scenic areas of the country and underestimate the draw. What are the numbers as a % of MAFCA members? If you take the total membership and figure the attendance as a % of the total you'll see it's a very small part of the total who are willing to make the trip.
Our 2027 trip will be to the Speedster Reunion in Nebraska. In 2028 we're looking at the MAFCA NOLA trip. It's a part of the country we haven't seen and one where my wife's French ancestors played a big part - from the first landing in Mobile Bay their move to New Orleans in the early 1700s. Then her Chouteau's built a fur trading empire up the Mississippi while her Saucier ancestor was designing French forts all the way to Illinois.
https://www.museumofamericanspeed.org/speedstersreunion.html
 

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Well, you better be ready to explain what a T is and a OHV 4 port Riley B is. Oh what's a roadster?
 
ModelA29 said:
Or he's taking a realistic look at the local car scene that is playing out all over America. Looking at a big annual event hosted by a big corporation at a world renown venue does not paint the full picture.

A few of us went to the Los Angeles Police 'Cops for Tots' show last Sunday. Lotsa cars but we were the only Model A's in attendance. Next oldest cars were some late 40's Slow Riders. Most were Mustangs and Camaros. None were stock/original.
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old31 said:
ModelA29, how many cars do you expect at the 2027 meet? Where is the 2028 meet located?
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2027 - Biannual museum event - 40-50 cars it's a real niche event
2028 - MAFCA New Orleans - No idea how many do they generally get.
 
Back in the so called good old days, your parents were strict and didn't talk to you as you were only a kid. You were expected to dress up and go to church.
Books on anything interesting were hard to find.
Land was cheap and endless, people thin on the ground.
That old car wreck then seemed quite exiting ...
 
Here in CA all you need to do is look at the size of the Model A and Early Ford swap meets swap meets to tell it's dying. I have been going to them since I was born in 1961. My dad was big into restoring Model A's and later Early V8s. It's not nearly what it used to be, I think l it because the parts have just about dried up. The stuff I see at the swap meets today mostly belongs in the trash. If I wanted an old car, I would buy a nice complete running car and forget about piecing one together. Those days are almost gone.

Dad and me water sanding '29 Model A Station Wagon wheels. I was probably 12 back then? He had painted aircraft as a civilian at the local AFB so he did his own paint work at home. Beautiful hand rubbed lacquer. You can get a pretty nice paint job doing outside at home if you spray early in the morning before the fly's wakeup, the wind kicks up and mom doesn't turn the sprinklers on. She did that once right in the middle of him spraying, He had to re-sand and start over. I still remember how mad he was. It helped to have a big clothesline to hang parts on while you sprayed them. Nobody has clothes lines anymore.
 

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AACA has been suffering from this for a while! Most people are moving to Retro mod old cars because it’s cheaper to do, and has modern creature comforts and improved safety! But I believe in a few more years there will be a revival of the old original “Restored” cars.
They are getting rare enough, that a lot of people don’t know what the original actually was! For me there are only a few improvements worth forsaking the old original restoration cars. Depending on your needs, you driving situation will drive to level of originality! But slowly, truly original cars will start becoming more rare and the value will go back up accordingly! Maybe right now is the time to invest in just what you want and enjoy it in the meantime!
 
I remember: pancake breakfasts at club members place, Members garage tours showcasing their projects and skills, Clue Rallys, Poker Runs, fall photo tours, manifold cooking tours, local parades with the kids piled in, picnics with car games and fun games for the kids.
 
I'll be a bit of a contrarian in the thread. While there are well-attended events, and while some clubs are growing, there's a much, much larger majority of people out there who are no longer participating.

For example, if you look through a MARC or MAFCA membership roster, you'll see a 10-to-1 (or more) ratio of people who are members of the national club, but who do not participate in club events.

It's this "silent majority" that keeps places like Snyder's, Mike's, Bert's, etc., in business.

We can have all of the crowds at major events we want, but they're the "tip of the iceberg" and are only a fraction of the people who keep the economics of the hobby functional.

When the "silent majority" starts getting out of the hobby, that's when major shifts happen because the economics are no longer there to support it.

This is the danger of making generalizations based on singular experiences, or the opinions of online groups...we only see a fraction of what's actually happening and quite often have little to no ability to control often-invisible, but seismic, shifts.

Dave
 
I have said this over and over, but 60 years ago when I was 6 years old, My father and several Model-A friends started the Model-A club in Houston. When I was about 8 y.o. (-circa 1968) I remember an old man stood up and made a comment that devastated me. He said 'Boys we better enjoy these cars now because in a few years there ain't nobody going to want a Model-A. They will want the Early V8. I still remember vividly how crushed I was and my Dad said 'Well let's just hold one and lets just see what happens.. Maybe 10 years later in the latter 1970s, the same topic came up again at the club meeting however this time it was Muscle Cars and late Ford V8s that people would be ditching their Model-As for. I have heard that same comment decade after decade for 60 years now. Prices have always been like a yo-yo where they went up & down, however prices for a Model-A have always increased when comparing the same car between decade to the following decade. There is always someone willing to buy a Model-A.
 
I always liked the '35-'36 Ford Pickups. I thought the styling (copied off of the '34 Ford car) was really sharp.
Move into the 90's and beyond and everybody was taking those beautiful pickups and chopping and hacking the hell out of them. They look like doo-doo those trucks.
NOW look at today, 2026. IF you have an ORIGINAL '35-'36 Ford PU people go ga-ga over them... unrestored pickups, all there not running, can bring mid -30's all day long.

So yes, ORIGINAL does and will still hold a lot of interest!! Same thing with Model A's

I personally wouldn't walk across the street to look at a 'Street Rod' I always thought they looked ignorant, ruining a good antique car...I never had any desire whatsoever to own one or even bother looking at them.
 
A few years ago, a guy told me that he was stripping out his A so he could turn it into a hot rod. Wanted to know what I thought the parts were worth. I just told him that he should be shot.
 
Like any antique, there should always be a market for good quality Model A Fords.

I think the secret is “Good Quality Cars”.
 
I would like to get rid of all my A's and parts,but right at the moment prices are down locally.I'm seeing some really good prices,but I am going to get away from them completely,so I'm not buying.It'll come back,it has never not come back.About 15 years ago a rod guy here bought a real nice A coupe for the body.Nice old restoration,solid,and I did get the L-B interior out of it.He advertised the running gear on craigslist,where I told him he could get a little better money out of it than on the side of the highway.That pulled some real clowns out of the woodwork,some offering 10 cents on the dollar for something that was already cheap.He got pretty disgusted with the whole thing,and one day it was gone.Some A guy had told him he should be shot or hung for what he did,and his wife said enough,not for sale.They hacked it up and ran it over the scales for scrap.I didn't care what he did with it,the guy stepped up and paid the price.The guy I had sold the car for just laughed,we'll never get a comeback with that one.
 
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