1990-1993 (FORMERLY 4 YEARS- NOW CONDENSED TO 3)
Bill Schwimmer:
Hey I know those dudes, I saw most of them this past weekend.
baz:
Great stories and great pics too. I got into vws around 1990 but it was through volksworld rather than attending shows in california. The cars pictured above are the very same cars that drew me in to the hobby. 25 years later I'm still hooked, and the look and vibes of proper cal look has never and will never get old. 8)
Jim Ratto:
VW Jamboree, Costa Mesa CA, Summer 1990
The following morning I made full use of that in room coffee. Up the freeway and found my way into Costa Mesa area, and the OC Fairgrounds. It wasn't hard, as there were throngs of VW's of all sorts descending upon the area. Brightly colored Type 2's with polished 911 alloys tend to stand out in traffic. And there was no shortage of them.
The line wasn't long to park or get into the event. I made sure I had my pocket Nikon 35mm and my swap meet cash (which had been eaten up by fast food and the plush room in Laguna). I think I had about $100 left on me. All I wanted to leave with was a sedan merged header. Mufflers would be nice, but I didn't want to get greedy.
As I walked from parking area, I took a picture of the early arriving crowds. Now that I look at this, the picture doesn't really show much going on, does it? Maybe I was there late, but I seem to remember arriving maybe around 8:30am? The sky was still pretty overcast.
Jim Ratto:
VW Jamboree, Costa Mesa CA, Summer 1990
First stop I made once I got in was at the WCM booth, as I had recently been given the responsibility of maintaining the WCM line at Buggy House. I think the guy that went back to boot camp was supposed to maintain it, prior to me starting. In any case, I had made new bin boxes and labels for everything from the 111 to the 311 section, we seriously stocked probably 90% of everything in their catalog. Every two weeks, I'd manually count onhand and compare it to what computer thought we had and fax them an order. Sometimes I'd talk to some guy named Steve, so I thought I'd ask if he was working and introduce myself. Sure enough, the guy was there and we talked shop for 5 minutes, probably less, since I had no idea what I was talking about, and was scared to death to be found out. The "I'm from out of town and need to get back on the road" would get me out of a conversation quickly, before I looked like a moron. Next stop was Fred Simpson's booth, where he had all kinds of neat cylinder heads on display. I really liked the heads that only had one half that was done up, the other half was still stock, to emphasize the amount of work that went into making these heads. I think they were called V5, V6 etc. There were also HO and Super Flow heads, with huge valves, ports and all kinds of softly shaped shiny ports and chambers. I couldn't resist sticking my finger in some holes. I remember thinking the heads I had slated for my 94 x 74 looked like junk at the bottom of the ocean compared to this high caliber stuff. I was careful not to say much, as I could really expose how stupid I was and this guy Fred was being super cool. He even said he knew my boss Jerry from sandrailing. Wow small world.
Jim Ratto:
VW Jamboree, Costa Mesa CA, Summer 1990
After thanking Fred and grabbing a card, I came upon the Neuspeed booth they had a brand new Corrado G60 done up with all the hip water cooled stuff. I never got into this stuff, but we sold all the Neuspeed springs and short shifters and 5th gear conversions for the early GTI's so I thought I better act interested.
I also saw lots of turbo cars, which we only had one of in Northern CA. Here's a few
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page