32 Ford "tweaks" and a few mods

[fleetus macmullitz]

http://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoram...163041996.html

Here's some excerpts ...

"Eric (Clapton) is a very, very detail oriented guy when it comes to how the car looks," says Brizio. "But he really doesn't care much about the mechanicals so long as the car runs great."
On the detail front, Clapton spared little expense on the creation of his right-hand-drive 1932 Ford Victoria, which boasts a unique rear end that bows out as compared to standard Victorias which curved in toward the rear wheels. The engine is a Ford 402 that's now capable of 400 horsepower, "or about 100 horsepower more than you need for this sort of car," says Brizio.

Normally a two-door, this version features rear doors in a suicide configuration. Clapton also asked that the top be chopped - though only by one inch - and had two requests that speak squarely toward his other automotive passion: Ferraris.
"He wanted hand-made Borrani wire wheel knock-offs, which are about the most expensive wheels I've ever put on a customer's car," says Brizio, shaking his head. The production of those Italian wheels, famous for having shod all manner of '60s Ferrari coupes, are so labor-intensive that only two have arrived from Italy so far. And Clapton's other Maranello-focused demand? That the Ford's interior be swathed in tan Connolly hides typically reserved for new Prancing Horse cars.

"I asked Eric how I should go about getting the leather, and he just said, 'Don't worry, I'll make a call,'" says Brizio. "Next thing I know, they're at my shop."

This Vicky is coated with a familiar brown metallic hue, in fact, the same brown currently trotting around on a few new Porsche Cayennes and Panameras. "I didn't think it would work, but what do you know, it does," says Brizio, who is not afraid to tell customers what he thinks, sometimes to the point of refusing to work on a car that he feels isn't worth the attention and money someone is about to spend.

Clapton himself seems to have a thing about modern paint schemes on old cars. Not far from the Ford sits his 1950 Chevy Pickup, also right-hand drive, painted in a light green that comes from Aston Martin's current paint roster. "Honestly, when Jeff (Beck) first steered Eric to me, I thought he'd want one car and that'd be it, but that was seven cars and 11 years ago," says Brizio.

It's Beck, however, who has Brizio's ultimate admiration because he works on his own cars. "He does almost everything on them, including welding. Of course, if you think of what his hands are worth, he shouldn't do any of it."

"The good news is that so far the current economic downturn hasn't hit us that hard simply because people who can afford to do these sorts of projects still have what it takes to do so," he says, noting that three-quarters of his build orders come from repeat business. He cites longtime customer and slugger Jackson, who first connected with Brizio in 1979. "Reggie's got lots of cars, and he'll typically go sell five or six at auction but come back home with two or three that he'll then send here," he says.

But Brizio he has real concerns about the future of high-end hot rodding as Baby Boomers continue to age and today's thirty-and fortysomethings show little interest in restoring and preserving cars that made America's automotive name. Jackson is 65. Most of Brizio's customers are retirement age or older. "Today's 50-year-olds mostly can't afford these sorts of projects, while guys younger than that aren't interested in hot rods," he says. "Maybe it'll just mean we're working on fewer cars from the '30s and more from the '60s. But yeah, I'm concerned."