Cool Garages and Hot Motors

New York City has its own brand of summer heat, and in July it becomes brutally  hot and sticky. For those in the know, old garages with thick cement walls remain cool in the summer, and become zones of refuge for those who wrench on cars and bikes.  It’s a side benefit of being a gearhead during the summer. Craig Hoffman’s garage is such a refuge – open by invitation only. His sensibility about high performance cars and motorcycles is an accumulation of experience that is very personal and very private.

“I was born in Brooklyn and I lived in Queens as a kid.” Craig said. “I must have been about five, and we lived on Grant Avenue in Brooklyn. I used to sit on the stoop with my father and name all the cars going down the street. He taught me how to identify the cars. When I got older I used to hot rod around. Something happened recently that brought me back to those days. Years ago when I was a kid I had a Camaro. I had worked on it to make it go faster. I hot rodded that car and then I sold it and lost track of it for many years. It was one of those things that I always regretted doing. Then recently the car turned up and I bought it again. I got to look at the car and see what I had done to it years ago. I’d look and say, ‘Wow, I really fucked that up!’  It’s funny, you see how you evolve. I straightened out the whole car and now it’s really nice.”

“When I was straightening that car out I could see all the stuff I had used like blue hose fittings, stuff I would consider gaudy now. This car was a mess when it came back to me. I took the whole thing apart and replaced everything. Made it look brand new under the hood. All of the details down to replacing all the nuts and bolts. When I do a rebuild I don’t like to let anything out of here without new front end suspension, control arm bushings, steering and brakes. Everything is updated. The car is going to stop and steer, get up and run. Right down to the wiper motor; I straighten out the wires. I like to do the details. To make the car look like it’s been here. It’s like my signature to do work like this.”

“I went to Brooklyn High School of Automotive Training.” Craig continued. “I got a little bored with it. I had been working on cars since I was a kid so I knew a lot of the stuff the guys were teaching me. I used to work in gas stations in my teens. I picked up a lot of knowledge just from practical experience. This was probably ‘78-‘79. At a couple stations where I worked, I started to develop a reputation. When a car would come in and nobody knew where to start, I became the go-to guy; they’d say, “Ask Craig”. My wife makes fun of me – she says I must have had my crib up on jack stands. At some point if all this means something to you, then you understand what all the engine noises mean. You take a heavy gauge screwdriver and put it against the manifold and put your ear to it. You listen. It’s your stethoscope.”

“A lot of the oil they use today is not friendly to the flat tappet cams,” Craig said. “Today, most of the cars use roller cams. These hot rods have a flat tappet that rides on the lifter to actuate the cams. The old oil had a high level of zinc that would adhere to the metal to make it easier for the cams. The EPA mandated that the zinc was bad and they took it out of all modern oils. If you use modern oil in one of these high performance motors, you’re going to ruin the cams. If you wipe out the cam all that metal has to go somewhere and it gets into the oil. It will wipe out your crank shaft bearings and that’s the end of that. This stuff is as fine as talcum powder but it’s still going somewhere. If you really want to look for engine wear the only way to really tell is to take the motor apart and mic (micrometer) it up. Measure the OD (outside diameter) of the crank and the ID (inside diameter) of the bearing.

“When I was younger and I got deeper into this, there was a specialized knowledge some people had. Secrets. The motor I am putting into this car now [sitting in his shop at the time of the interview] was built by a guy who is not a throw-together guy. He is known for high horsepower motors. His name is Lee at Lab Precision. Ever since I was young, I understood there were levels of knowledge with some guys.”

“I was always into anything mechanical,” Craig said “I’ll take anything apart. Some guys are afraid to take something apart because they won’t be able to get it back together. I’ll take anything apart. I’m a GM guy- I don’t know, I was always into Chevys. Now I have an Oldsmobile. Everyone dropped Chevy motors in their Oldsmobiles; it’s easier and cheaper. The parts are more plentiful. But I wanted to build an Oldsmobile motor. So I spent the extra time, money and effort to build an Oldsmobile. The bore is different and the stroke is different with an Oldsmobile. The angle of the cylinders is different. If you look at a Chevy motor it’s a narrower angle on the intake manifold. With an Oldsmobile it’s different. The pistons are at a wider angle. Oldsmobile’s have a longer stroke which creates more torque. Think of it as leverage. A longer stroke gives you a longer lever so you are getting more twisting force. Torque is what’s fun about driving around in the street. Torque is what pins you back in your seat and what gets your heart pounding. Torque is what gets the car moving; horsepower is what keeps it moving.”

“The Olds motors are known for low RPM torque, the Chevy motor is known for higher RPM horsepower. The Olds and Buicks make a lot of low RPM torque. The Chevy is better for racing around a track because they have that high horsepower. But beating it from light to light you want that Olds motor. You gotta know what you’re doing to build an Olds motor because they don’t hold together as good as a Chevy. You can wind a Chevy up to seven grand and beat on it and it will hold together. Chevy spent a lot of time and money making four bolt main blocks and steel cranks. Oldsmobile didn’t go for a lot of that. But if you know what you’re doing and put the Oldsmobile parts together right you’ll have a real steamroller. It’ll just get up and run.

“There’s a lot of brand loyalty,” Craig continued. “There are guys who are like purists. If it didn’t come from the factory they wouldn’t have it. We’re more like hot rodders. If it don’t make it go fast we don’t want it. If it’s not GM we don’t deal with it much but if it is GM then we can make it go faster and that’s the idea. I was never an Oldsmobile guy but I found this ‘65 442. I got a good deal; there was no rust and it was a nice car. Now I’m an Olds guy. This Chevelle [car sitting in the garage during the interview] – my friend John (Delaney) didn’t have a dime but the boys in the garage loaned him the money until his tax return came in. We dragged the car here with a rope. He couldn’t get the smile off his face for two hours. Now we are working to make this car fast. It had a six-cylinder with a Power Glide automatic that had sat down on its rims in a plumber’s garage for five years,” Craig said.  “We brought it home, got a battery, fooled around with it for twenty minutes and I got that six cylinder going. We drove it around the street five times and then we took the motor out and threw it in the junkyard and put in a big block motor. We put in new headers, and a new intake cam. We all just do this kind of stuff for shits and giggles.”

“We all pitch in together here. I have a good reputation. I try to do things right. It usually works out that the cars I work on are friend’s cars. If they weren’t friends they wouldn’t be in here. I wouldn’t work on their cars. There are some people out there who have asked me to do work but no; I really don’t know them. People have come in and they say, “I just want you to do this.” I tell them, “No, I do it my way. The car ain’t leaving here unless I say it’s ready to leave.” My garage is almost a clubhouse. I have always thought that some of the best ideas and work gets done in a place like this. John here and the other guys; sometimes we just sit here on a rainy night. Talkin’ and dreamin’.”