Took these at "Scrape By The Lake" in St. Catherines, Ontario.

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape14.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape13.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape05.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape04.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape03.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape18.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape23.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape25.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape26.jpg

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape24.jpg

Martin.

Ok, how do those cars jump with the hoods open and nobody in them? And I really wish they wouldn't remove the trim and pinstripes from the Broughams; their sides look a little bear.

No they were just "posed". I'm not sure exactly why Lowriders feel the need to park their cars in these exaggerated positions, especially as these guys we not displaying chromed and painted undersides. Just slam it to the pavement and it looks cool IMO. Junk those mini wheels though. The last car pictured looks cool IMO because the wheels are a decent size.

I'm sure a lot of these cars are bought cheap with bits of trim missing. Maybe they remove the other matching parts for symmetry? Most of them are owned by young guys. It could be the "Less is more" concept from street-rodders which certainly works visually on certain cars, but not Cadillacs of 80's vintage. More is more seems to work nicely thank you :cool:

Martin.

AGGH! I saw it! Now I can't UN-SEE it!!!

Haha, that aside, these are actually pretty cool. I've always had some respect for the work that goes into that, and it is pretty cool when you actually see the cars jumping up and down like excited puppies.

They're all pretty tasteful, really, except for maybe that first blue sparkly fleetwood. I'll pass on that one.

I kind of like the third one.

The color combo on that third one is nice.

Not my thing... but I respect. Not like the cars are that rare. If a couple get butchered it's no biggie.

I think it interesting that these guys (or girls) put a lot of time and money into these cars. Not my thing but they are a testament to a lot of hard work that went into the customizing of these Cadillacs. Everyone has different tastes. I would never condem someone for working hard on their cars. Very interesting paint and wheels though. I like most of them

No they were just "posed". I'm not sure exactly why Lowriders feel the need to park their cars in these exaggerated positions, especially as these guys we not displaying chromed and painted undersides. Just slam it to the pavement and it looks cool IMO. Junk those mini wheels though. The last car pictured looks cool IMO because the wheels are a decent size.

You're saying that those cars are balanced that way??! How can that be? The engine compartment is lifted up and I know for a fact that those cars were severely front-heavy. And they don't seem to be tilted enough to balance either. The white '90 with '84 Deville leather seems to be held up by the rear wheel yet the engine bay is completely suspended! What keeps the nose from diving into the ground and lifting the rear? It's basically a see-saw that defies the laws of physics!:confused: I guess it's like balancing a nickel, but the nickel weighs 5000 pounds and can kill you. What if someone merely leaned back on the car? What would happen?

In any case, the pose looks VERY dangerous. One wrong move and you could have 3000 pounds of iron and steel on your head. Getting back in would be a feat of its own. I would not want to have kids at that show.

hydraulics is how the car gets in those positions.

http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u88/Martin_Thoene/Scrape24.jpg


needs to be a little lower, chopped a little more, and bigger rims...imo

love the car though ... had a 67 phaeton done up like that that i was looking at a friend was selling but couldnt scrape the money together quick enough

In answer to your balance question My favourite Brougham, have you seen just how many batteries these guys have in the trunks? (Look at the black one) Running all the hydraulic pumps (and usual big stereos) requires a tremendous amperage capacity so they have as many as 10 big deep-cycle batteries in the trunk. Plus there's the weight of the pumps and associated stuff in there too.

It is a question of balance though. I saw one guy with 8 batteries pump set the hydraulics to get this stance but he had to get out and sit on the left rear bumper to counter-balance the car into that position. Once the left rear was dropped it stayed like that.

I'm assuming that they use oversized alternators and some kind of split-charge system like on RVs.

Each corner is independantly plumbed so to get the front right off the ground they dump pressure in the right front, raise the left front, dump the left rear and pump up the right rear. This twists the whole car. Most hard-core lowriders have severely reinforced chassis because even a hunky Cad can't take this kind of treatment repetetively without some extra metal in there.

To each their own.

Martin.

Not bad, guys. The old DeVille is my favorite, though.. Like others have mentioned, it may not be what I'd do to mine - but the work put into these cars looks good.. Much better than rice, right?

If you've seen one Low Rider, you've seen them all. :hide:

It seems that there is nothing really original happening by the lake. There are much, MUCH better Low Riders here in LA.

Even if the '66 had Superiors (which is should) instead of spokes, it'd still be a "seen that, done that" kinda ride.

Oh there were some show quality Impalas there but yeah, like you say they're nothing cutting edge. I was just showing the Cadillacs. The problem is, most hard-core Lowriders are staunch traditionalists. The club that hosts this event won't even let you in the club unless you've got them stupid little undersized wires.
I'm guessing from your name HotRodSaint that you're into rods and suchlike. Therefore you're probably aware that there's a lot of cool rides out there being made from 60's, 70's and 80's cars that are often well into the "Dare to be different" genre.
Despite the purists here loving chrome (which I do myself...picking up my '91 Bro' today :D) I totally appreciate smoothed out cars with air-bags and modern wheels. Low is the way to go, but hydraulics are just a PITA for any sort of daily driver car IMO.
If it's a hobby vehicle you can go nuts, but many of us can't afford that luxury or don't have the space. Looking around it seems that a lot of the 80's Cadillac lowriders are being sold a lot of the time. Since they mainly seem to be owned by younger guys I'm thinking that budgetry constraints and the day to day living with one of these beasts ends up making them move them on. Either that or they twist the heck out of the frame and cracks start to appear.

Martin.