I sincerely hope that that pretty ’74 Caprice convertible is not going to be subjected to, ahem, the modifications of the sedan it’s sharing a driveway with. It’s such a nice original car.
Didn’t Mike Brady drive one of these? The convertible, I mean!
You’re right, Mike Brady had a Blue 72 and a Red 73 Caprice convertible.
I hope it doesn’t get those “modifications” either. The way most of those cars get built render them useless within a year or so..
Bradys had a ’74 Caprice droptop in last 1/2 of final season. Was featured in episode where Marcia gets her licence and Greg challenges here to a driving contest. Alice provides an egg for a parking test.
The ’73 was in first half of season, featured in a Drive In theater themed show.
The, ahem, “customized” car hurts the eyes. The second: Sweet!
I much prefer low riders to those monstrosities.
What are these called as opposed to being low riders? I never really thought The Wheels Made it a different category…but I guess It Does. Are The Bouncing Low Riders a 3rd category all together?
it’s called a donk.
The common term today is Donk, however the convertible is actually a Donk shortened from Donkey a term referring to the Implala logo. That evolved into meaning the full size Chevys only for the 71-76 model years when people started calling the later ones Boxes and Bubbles (or whales) before being used to refer to lifted cars fitted with “dubs”. Before that they were often called high riders, and before there were 20″+ a slight lift (via air shocks all around or spacers for a 1-2″ lift) just meant you were “riding right”.
Ones that “bounce” are called hoppers, juiced, or just low-riders and I’m sure a few more terms I’m not hip enough to know.
well said. this is indeed more accurately a “box chev’.”
never heard of a whale.
For many years during my teens I wanted a “bagged” 60s or 70s Detroit sled almost badly enough to commit larceny. I thought it was the perfect combo of “low for show, high for go.”
I thought you were a little older than that since “bagged” cars didn’t make an appearance until the late 90’s. Low riders were originally “juiced” if you wanted to be able to change the ride height so you could lay frame but still be able to get in and out of driveways.
My father was a Hot Rod magazine subscriber I think they did their first article on “bags” in about 92 – 93 when I got my licence so I guess I litterally meant from about 16 to 19 (which is late teens.)
Those that aren’t B fans particular the last gen affectionately call them whales instead of the fan-boi term of bubble.
You gotta wonder about a guy who is encyclopedic on International trucks and hiphop car culture but who hates the sound of the old Mopar starters. 🙂
First and foremost I’m a Ford guy with my soft spot for IH’s secondary and Buicks following up 3rd. Being a Ford guy my favorites are the Panthers. With the supply of Bs drying up many Panthers are becoming Donks so seeing the term so heavily used I had to do some investigation as to what the term meant and where it came from.
If the donk trend starts to involve cornbinders, I see a cable tv show in your future! 🙂
Weird about the donkey origin, but it now seems to be what the web is saying. I had always heard before that “donk” was short for “badonkadonk”, meaning a big butt on a woman, which totally made sense on that generation of cars…
For more insanity watch “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” by Trace Atkins, he says he meant it to be a send up of Hip Hop culture. http://youtu.be/vNVguvNE7qc
Perhaps it’s because I’m getting older (though I doubt that’s the reason), but I don’t see anything classy about the sedan.
I’ve said it before in another forum, but all I see when I see these cars are people who look like idiots. Please note that I did not say the people were idiots. It all just seems so…immature to me.
Moving on…that convertible is beautiful!
The whole “Scraper” school of using lift kits on older Body on Frame cars to clear comically large rims with no profile tires is just retarded. It represents an unholy fusion of ghetto and redneck car culture using lift kit to clear giant rims.
About the only thing I’ve seen that dumber that this is “Spinnas” on a Freightliner Columbia (the Corolla of the Class 8 world).
Fine choice of language. I’m sure the ghetto rednecks will take into consideration that you think they’re retarded.
Tofu,
I doubt Ian is too concerned about what those morons might think. Perhaps you should re-introduce a bit of red meat into your diet and chill out a bit.
I never knew that the Columbia was thought of that way.
C’mon down to Tallahassee for a serious fix of this stupid trend…. the whole large rim w/ low profile tire is totally lost on me. In NJ, where I was up until mid Feb. I NEVER saw one example of this look. Down here I see 15 a day.
Awful… and quite honestly these vehicles look out of control at anything over 45 mph .
The Hard Core off road crowd that lifts and goes with 35″+ tires that weigh 120lbs ea talks about encountering “death wobble” at highway speeds. If you add extra shocks and tune the suspension right its manageable.
My concern for these would be did they upgrade the brakes for the bigger wheels? Given the weak OEM brakes by modern standards on many cars of this vintage you’re just asking for trouble if you triple the stress on them with giant wheel & tire combos.
Although I don’t care for Donks, Hydraulic low riders, pickups, hotrods, etc I never begrudge the person who does. If any of you would bother to talk to anyone driving or showing their cars you’d find a car nut who may or maynot be a very astute automotive historian. I have always owned several cars at once even while young and have always perfered the factory look. If it can be done at the dealership I’m ok with that too. I even cringe when Chip Foose gets rid of the side markers (although his bumpers are brilliant). The most I’ve ever done was pinstriping chrome exhaust and upgraded sound systems,but it had to look factory and I have never bought aftermarket wheels. I always by new or used factory wheels for the given make or model. Just pointing how consevative I am and am willing to appreciate anyone with a love of cars. And thats what I thought this site was all about, I’m once agin disappionted.
Yup I consider pretty much all car guys brothers even if they are from a different mother, they are all auto enthusiasts and many put incredible amounts of blood sweat and tears into their cars even if it isn’t something I would do myself.
Personally I don’t like keeping my cars too stock but I usually don’t deviate that far either. In regards to wheels all my rides have OE wheels even if they aren’t always correct for the particular model they are on. The factory wheels are of much higher quality than the majority of aftermarket wheels you can get today.
The Donks haven’t made it over to Klamath County, though we get a few of the 4WD trucks with lifts and oversized tires. A few of those drivers seem like candidates for “Think of it as evolution in action”.
I guess I’ll find out on aftermarket wheels. Got steel rims for the studded snows on our Forester. Couldn’t talk myself into OE alloys wheels for winter. (Doing OK with used steel wheels for the snows on our 2WD Ranger, but it doesn’t get driven much during the winter. Siped tires and our local conditions don’t go well together.
Great stuff E.Z. I agree with you wholeheartedly. In a generation allegedly obsessed with being indoors and attending to hypePads, it helps to see a fellow auto-enthusiast, even if his/her tastes don’t exactly align with mine. Would you rather see a two year old Camry driven by a person who hates cars? I wouldn’t.
old school is cool!
is that donk wheels? i need donk wheels now….
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