The Ratmaster, 1991 Roadmaster estate. Febuary 2009 long roof of the month

Yes it has a history, it was a two owner car when it was involed in a fender bender that took it to the impact auction where I found it and bought it for 2400,00 bucks.
got it home and took these first pictures, it was november 2002...


She was branded and had a salvage tittle.
I did a quick repair of the front fender, pulled it off and hammered it straight, put it back on got some used trim from the salvage yards along with a corner light and the accident damge was fixed for under 200 bucks

for the next three years it was my daily driver and work vehicle.
took it to shows, gave it a few mods, the bigest mod was the bucket and consol that are not in my 93 sedan nose wagon. it got flames in the woodwork

Sam did these flames for me at one of our local cruise nights
this is his website http://www.yosemitesams.com/

it wasn't a bad looking ride, though it was a high millage wagon nearing 400,000kms
it got a different set of flames, these ones ended up being cut out and left on the sides after the roof got removed

in june of 2006 The old 400,000kms 91 was facing an emissions test, it needed a new exhaust system, brakes, and rust was begining to show....
completely by hazzard I found the 93 sitting on a dealer's lot with only 124000kms, ready to go for only $3600.00, so I picked it up since it was the same colour in and out with a clean tittle and in better shape{so I thought at the time}
The 91 got taken out off the road and I started to part it out.
during the August first week end, Paul and I were talking about what cars we would take to Woodward later that month and the concept of the ratmaster came to be that week end. we had 12 days to get it ready so with a group of car guys paul and I started to trans form the car.



the initial intent was to put a ten day trip permit on the chopped wagon take and cruise woodward with it come back and scrap it. we worked day and night when we could to get er done, cut he springs, clean up the rough cuts and just bash our way through it.

we rushed the last few days, I'm sure the flat black paint was still wet as we crossed customs in port huron heading for detroit....



it was crude and unfinished the old single exhaust did not survive the highway from port huron to detroit, it was dragging and sending sparks behind us and required a road side repair.
we never did fix the brakes so it only had front brakes making it a breeze to do smoke shows! It was a fun day! took on pasengers from the crowd at one point I think we had like 25 passengers! it was a riot! the Detroit Free press and Channel & news got pictures and videos of us having fun.



of course we could not pass the MISSL guys with out being noticed


notice the coat hanger wire holding up the tail pipe!

After doing woodward and getting comments about the chopped wagon from people locally we continued to do a few mods to it, it needed an exhaust system so that is when we fab up the true dual lake pipe set up.







YES THE DO WORK AND ARE HOT!

many victims have left chunks of burnt flesh such as this on them....

Paul and I entered the car in it's first local show, who was MC'd by Spike Tv's own Courtney Hansen, who could not help herself and fondled the horns on the chopped buick wagon, that people had begun to call the ratmaster....



Ok so how can anyone scrap a car that was touched by her?

It sorta of just evolved from that point on, we got it to pass E tests, and I put the plates back on it and the rest is history...















I'm not sure what the future holds for this chopped wagon....

if you check on youtube you will find videos of it, and even some childeren have posted videos of the their tribute ratmaster model cars they've made!....

I'm sure that Paul can pipe up and tell us about it to since he has put in as much labour into the Ratmaster as I have....

Thanks for making it the wagon of the month for Febuary 2009

Great write up Pat.
What about the polished trim that was also migrated to the sedan wagon?

UberWagon wrote:

Great write up Pat.
What about the polished trim that was also migrated to the sedan wagon?

no, this wagon never had the polished trim, I had recovered the trim with the same field DiNoc vinyl that the panels were done in fromt eh factory, it looked nice and clean, the polished trim came to be when I got the 93, so it's a 93 only thing.

Too many MAB wagons to keep track of, my bad.

Great pictures and a cool history. Thanks for sharing!

Now we've heard the rest of the story! I can see where the Ratmaster has been a lot of fun and laughs and that's what its all about. Several years ago when Pat first crafted the Ratmaster, I thought it was kind of a crude joke type thing. It didn't take me long to realize quite a bit of thought and planning went into the Ratmaster. Everything is finished on it also.

Pat, is that a chain on the tailgate and does it have a purpose?

Is the Ratmaster going to make an appearance at Wagonfest or is it going to be one of the Southern Belles you got from Sprocket?

Nice Job

Tom C.

Thats a great writeup Pat. I still remember a van when I was a kid that had been chopped. It broke my heart when I came across it in a salvage yard. to kids that thing is what inspires their ideas,and thats cool in my opinion.

I was hoping you would show what you once told me pulls the car together in the middle. Lorne.

Great write up!

I love this LROM idea. Its cool to read about the detailed history of these cars!

Keep 'em coming:)

Great to hear the background on the Ratmaster. Must have been fun.

Back in the late 60s we did the same thing to a 63 Pontiac 4dr that was given to us by a farmer. Took us 2 hours with an axe and a sledge hammer (sawsalls hadn't been invented yet). Needed a pickup more then a sedan. Then again one doesn't think right under the influence of cheap drugs and booze. Couldn't believe we did that the next morning (afternoon?) when we woke up Yours is considerably nicer and is a far sight safer then ours.

Did last the summer though and actually made it out to Nova Scotia and back to Quebec City, on a friends honeymoon no less, before it was hauled off the road. Wonder why? Different times back then.

Bill

Nice write up and it filled in a few gaps in the story for me.

Yeah, Pat seems to like the MAB's bought out my entire stock of 'em, lol.

This is a superb write up, very impressive.
This car is freekin' awesome!

Very nice writeup Pat... Cool car

Not to get too technical, but... shouldn't the Ratmaster be NOroof of the Month?

I love the Ratmaster, but I would still love to see someone build one and try to make it look factory. Maybe even make some sort of convertible top to replace the "Emergency Poncho" in the armrest.

I was going to chop up my blue '92 Caprice to do that, but the body was too rough to waste the time. Not sure I would have the heart to chop a rust free car up.

Oh well, I guess I will just have to be content with riding in the Ratmaster from time to time. Which is a blast by the way.

thanks for the feed back....my ego got a boost

Great story for a cool wagon.

That car, and that story, have gotta leave a smile on your face!

I would be willing to bet that the Ratmaster has had more fun than most cars on the road today ever will have...

and still going strong!

Stretch

Most of the pictures no longer show up as of 03/19/2011.

Pat, can you restore the links?