Steve-

You probably don't remember me, but my name is Bob Kovacs- I worked at Dick Cepek in LV back in the mid 90's. We used to do some work on some of your trucks, and sold you some parts for the monster trucks you were sending up north for hunting expeditions.

I've been seeing your name more and more in various magazine articles featuring some of the awesome cars in your collection, and when I saw that you were replying to messages here at Lateral-G, I thought I'd say hello.

I'm living in NJ now, but I'll be visiting my out-laws in Vegas in April. If possible, I'd love to get the chance to check out your collection.

Regards,

Bob

Hi Bob...those 2 monster trucks are still in Nome, AK. We used them to traverse the tundra muskeg during September moose hunts. I still have a Dana 60 axle around here somewhere that snapped like a pretzel stik and left us afoot 75 miles from civilization for 3 days and 2 nights with the grizzly bears. I was surprised Cepek shut down here, after all the $$$ I was spending in your store...lol.

SS

Me too- I moved back to NJ in 1999, and when I went back for a visit in 2000, they were shut down. I guess you must have had a slow period at that time, and it put them under....lol.

Seems the only thing left of the company is the Radial FC tire design that M/T bought. Those were the most out-of-round tires ever made, so God only knows why M/T wanted them....lol. Of course, Tom Cepek (who inherited the company from Daddy) spent more time flying around and playing with his planes than he did on the business, so that probably didn't help either.

I remember one time he flew into LV and saw that we had a box of sidebars that we were shipping to the store in Garden Grove, CA. To try to save the $15 in UPS charges, he and his son (we used to call him "Spaulding" after the kid in Caddyshack) spent 30 minutes trying to tie them to the roof of the Saturn that Signature Air had lent him, then spent another hour trying to stuff them into the cargo hold of his plane. They came back later that afternoon with the box all mangled, and after having wasted around 4 manhours, ended up sending them to CA via UPS anyway. How's that for "effective use of time"??? lol

Bob

Hey Steve, I'll be asleep by 11pm, LOL. Have a good new year.

Hey Steve...I've been traveling most of this week, so I haven't seen or talked to Rick Tucker in a few days. Were you guys able to get together last weekend here in LV and shoot his 61 Corvette convertible?

SS

Yep, Shot the car last weekend.. beautiful car and a nice change of pace for the magazine. Johnny loved the lines of the car and how good it looked "on film"

Rich and Al are good guys, thanks for the heads up!