2015 Custom Car Line-Up

2015 THE LINE-UP part one

Late July, early August is the time of the year that the A-Bombers Hot Rod Club in Sweden organizes the Old Style Weekend. During this weekend Ulf Christiansson puts together his annual Custom Car Line-Up event. The 2015 edition of the Line-Up was  held at a new, really fantastic location.

Several weeks before the Old Style Weekend takes place Ulf “Wolf” Christiansson is starting to look around at the “local” Custom Cars that are planning to visit the Annual A-Bombers show. In his mind Wolf is already starting to build this years Line-Up, but of course some of the cars might not make it to the show, or others will show up. The idea behind the line up is to collect a series of Custom Cars that have the look of a late 1940’s early 1950’s Custom Car. Mandatory features are chopped top, Spotlights, lowered all around, or with speed-boat stance, and an overall period look. Some exceptions to this “rule” can be made by the organizer of the event as long as the overall look of the car will fit in with the other selected cars.
 
 

Why the Custom Car Line-Up?

Wolf has been fascinated by the famous 1951 Custom Car line-up photo taken by Marcia Campbell from the first time he laid eyes on it. This 1951 series of photo by custom car photographer Marcia Campbell was taken of  a selection of 5 Barris custom cars. The owners was asked to drive to a photo location in South Gate, California. At this location Marcia took individual photos of all these 5 Barris Customs, but also took a few photos of all 5 cars parked next to each other. One of them with the owners standing proud next to their cars. Decades later every Custom Car enthusiasts reveres to this photo as: “the Line-Up Photo”. In 1951 Marcia could not have foreseen the impact this photo-shoot would have more than 60 years later. Nor could she have thought this photo would see an Annual remake on the other side of the ocean.

You can read more about Marcia’s original 1951 Line-Up photo-shoot in this CCC article.

The Line-Up is always held on Saturday morning before the Hill Climb that is organized by the A-Bombers. And it is organized in such way that the cars and people involved in the Line-Up will be able to attend the Hill Climb. This years Line-Up was forced to find a new location compared to the first two years. The original location could not be prepared enough due to the bead weather that summer. But fortunately one of the people who would be invited to the Line-Up, Andreas Åberg, found a new location close to the water and with a nice grass field to park on. The only problem with this location was, that we needed a key to get in, and due to a broken cell phone the whole deal of making an appointment to get the key seamed to fall apart leaving us with no location to park at all.
 
Lars Kjær and Tomas shortly after they were given the Line-Up handout knowing their car was invited for the Line-Up.
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But fortunately Wolf and Andreas managed to make it work after all. Friday, the first official day of the Old Style Weekend event Wolf made his round around the event place and hand picked a number of cars. Some needed a bit of discussion, but most of them were easy to pick. We were fortunate to have several great looking new cars that fitted the “theme” for this years Line up. In the end eleven cars were selected and all owners were given an handout to let them know they were invited to the Line Up event. It was great to hear that some of the owners with the new customs had already hoped they would be picked for this years line up. So it looks like Wolf has created a real prestigious event with the Line-Up.

Saturday morning ten-o-clock sharp all the invited car owners gathered at the A-Bombers event gate, and soon were were off to the new location in an industrial section of the nearby town of Uddevalla. We drove off in a convoy of the 11 selected Customs, plus two more with some friends. We always try to keep the number of people visiting the Line-Up as low as possible so that is is easier for the photographers to make the photos without having to wait for the visitors to leave the scene.

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The cars selected for the 2015 Custom Car Line Up photo are:

• Wolf Christiansson, 1951 Mercury
• Bert Gustafsson, 1951 Dodge
• Anki & Roger Carlsson, 1951 Mercury
• Andreas Åberg, 1950 Ford
• Petri Lahti’s, 1950 Lincoln
• Palle Johansen, 1947 Cadillac
• Fredde Östman, 1947 Ford
• Dan Lindberg, 1946 Ford
• Tim Kirkegaard, 1939 Mercury
• Tomas, 1939 Mercury
• Lars Kjær, 1936 Ford

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In convoy to the the Line-Up Location in Uddevalla. The unchopped 1956 Mercury and 1948 Buick were not invited, but joined the party to take photos. 
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The location was actually rather big, and after some discussion the perfect location was pointed and the invited cars drove slowly to the other side. The short grass an young trees reminded me at some park locations George Barris used to take some photos in the early 1950’s.
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Lars with his freshly “finished” 1936 Ford is having a great time. He also visited the event the two previous years, but this was the first time with an invited Custom Car.
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Organizer Wolf (on the right with hat on) is having the time of his life and all the cars are now as good as lined up. Some of the owners take their time to do some final polishing at this time.
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Andreas is just finished polishing his New Panoramic Ford as a period steam-boat passes in the background.
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One of the photographers present at the event is Gasoline Magazine photographer Per Webb who will be using the photos in an feature in an upcoming issue of the Swedish magazine Gasoline.
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The cars are all lined up at the front in a very slight oval shape. The location with the water and the Uddevalla bridge in the background is absolutely perfect.
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Several sea-gull’s came by to take a look what was going on in their backyard.
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Palle Johansen took this photo of some of the car owners enjoying the view and some of the photographers working hard to get every photo they wanted to make.
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The owners of the car took place on a small hill on the side of the location and had a wonderful overview on this wonderful selection of fine Custom Cars.
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Time for the Sam Barris pose of the owners with their Custom Cars. This photo shows that 11 cars for this set-up is perhaps a bit to much. The cars get rather small. So at this point it was agreed that for the next years the max number of cars to attend will be 10.
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Ulf “Wolf” Christiansson with his home build 1951 Mercury, a work in progress.
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Bert Gustafsson with his home build heavily restyled 1951 Dodge. Also a work in progress, but with at least a wonderful paint job and nice chrome for a perfect look. 
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Last year it was Lars Friborg who drove Palle Johansen’s Dick Dean build 1951 Mercury. Anki Carlsson is the new owner of the Mercury together with here husband roger. She was thrilled to be part of this event.
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Andreas Åberg with his 1950 Ford the New Panoramic Ford restyled after the famous Barris/Cerny Panoramic Ford for Buster Litton.
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Petri Lahti’s 1950 Lincoln is based on a four door sedan and converted to a two door hard-top model. Most of the rear portion of the roof is home made by Petri. 
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Palle Johansen made some changes to his 1947 Cadillac this winter, including stainless trim around the windshield, and an all new dash-board with a center positioned 1948 Cadillac gauge cluster.
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Fredde Östman had finished his 1947 Ford just weekend before the show and was very thrilled to be part of the line-Up.
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Dan Lindberg with his 1946 Ford long door coupe in an mid 1940’s style. Dan has plans to re-chop the top and change the grille… perhaps next year?
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Tim Kirkegaard with his Kevan Sledge Customs created 1939 Mercury.
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Tomas was also invited to last years event, but could not make it at the gat at ten in the morning then. Now he made sure he was plenty on time to be part of this event. Tomas recently added a set of bubble skirts… which will need some work to looks right. But it was already really great to see the skirts on the car.
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And the last in the line was Lars Kjær with his 1936 Ford chopped by Kenneth Kristiansson. Lars also finished his car only weeks/days before the vent. Last year his car broke own in Denmark, before he had made it to the ferry to Sweden. This year was a perfect revenge making it with a “finished” Customs on the Line-Up photoshoot.
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The Line-Up with the owners in the Sam Barris position as seen the the camera of Palle Johansen.
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The perfect photo location for this years Line-Up event was so good that we still have plenty of photos we would like to share with you. Click HERE to go to part TWO of the 2015 Custom Car Line-Up photo-shoot.
 
 
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(this article is sponsored by)

 
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