Greg Leavit

Robin’s yellow pickup circa 1985

Tuesday, May 29, 2012 

An high school friend of mine asked if I had any pictures of our old Turbo Pinto, and alas, I do not think I do. But I did remember some pictures of the even more entertaining conversion of Raab’s (he was into Saabs at the time) pickup truck into the super sport truck pictured here. The black and red details I remember painting, but I think it came yellow, Rob’s favorite color for cars due, I believe, to some line in a song that went “inside the walls of the citadel, yellow chariots race.”

Ah yes, classic brain sludge.

I fabricated that roll bar at Greg Leavit’s place and welded it into Rob’s truck for him after his mom worried that these particular vehicles were prone to roll-over accidents and tended to smoosh the occupants as the cab wasn’t particularly well reinforced. Back then, light trucks were considered work vehicles and didn’t have to meet car safety standards.

Rob’s mom’s fears turned out to be well-founded when Rob rolled the truck into a ditch in a late-night end-of-school-year drive home from college. He was fine, but the truck was totaled and lives now, only in our memories (to quote another movie favorite of ours from the era).

IMG0048.jpg

IMG0049.jpg

IMG0047.jpg
Posted at 07:22:39 GMT-0700

Category: FabricationGeopostphoto

Blacksmith

Friday, January 4, 2008 

Over the holidays I visited the blacksmith I was apprenticed to as a child (roughly 1978-1986, though we couldn’t quite figure out the exact years). This is the welder I learned to TIG weld on and the smaller anvil was what I learned to forge steel against.

Greg Leavitt was a great inspiration to me and set me on the path of making things from an early age. It was also a great lesson in the value of hard work swinging a hammer all day in front of a coal forge. In August. In Philadelphia. 100% humidity, 95 degrees outside, 120-140 in front of the forge. Black boogers.

I have my own anvil and TIG now. Just because you can’t ever really get the coal dust out of your nose.

blacksmith_01.jpg

blacksmith_02.jpg
Posted at 02:52:19 GMT-0700

Category: photoUncategorized