SoCalAMX www.socalamx.net/newsletter Official Publication of SoCalAMX Proudly A Chartered Club of AMCRC Issue 78 Feb 2018 SoCalAMX Calendar 2018 Cactus Classic Hosted by the Cactus Cruisers AMC Friday, Saturday, April 13-14, 2018 Buckeye, AZ cactuscruisersamc.org Spring Fling April 15 2018 Hosted by CPW http://www.cpwclub.com/springfling.php 12th SoCalAMX AMC Show Saturday, May 19, 2018 Cable Airport, Upland, CA socalamx.net/carshow 3rd California Central Coast AMC/Rambler Show Hosted by Pacific Gold Rush Ramblers September 7-8, 2018 Radisson Hotel, Santa Maria, CA Las Vegas AMC Reunion November 2-3, 2018 Hoover Dam Lodge Boulder City, Nevada snamc.amcrc.com Check the online Calendar at socalamx.net Join SoCalAMX so you can automatically receive updates and details of events listed above. Go to socalamx.net/1/join.htm Check out socalcarculture.com for listings of shows in SoCal! SoCalAMX S 2018 AMC Car Show The next SoCalAMX Car Show is just a few months away. The date has been set for Saturday, May 19, at Cable Airport, the same location as last year s event. The entry form is available on the club web site at socalamx.net/carshow and in this newsletter. Click on the download link at the top on the right on the very first page. To get an accurate count of attendees, and for ordering t-shirts, sending in your entry form promptly is appreciated. Once again, we will have 13 trophies, a Dirty Dozen, to go along with a Best of Show winner. The theme of this show is the 50 th Anniversary of the AMX and Javelin. At one of our shows in the past, 29 AMXs showed up. Awesome! I d like to see a repeat of that this year. Mark Melvin 1
2017 Las Vegas Reunion How times flies. The past 12 th Annual Las Vegas AMC Reunion is already behind us. That means the next one is only 9 months away. The Las Vegas Car Show promoters after reading this are probably saying to themselves, Don t Remind Us! As I didn t write down anything like total numbers of cars and such, I really don t have much to report as the details of that weekend have faded. So, what I ll do instead of writing is just post lots of photos. Hopefully they will speak for themselves. Oh, just remembered a little something about Friday, the day of arrivals for the show. I spent the early afternoon on the way to Vegas stopping in Pahrump, NV to visit a long-time friend. By the time I arrived at the host hotel I was too late for the famous Bar- B-Q the club has each year. They had run out of food I heard, and people were returning to the Hoover Dam Lodge Hotel. I was hungry and so was Hobie Kaptan, Allen Tyler and his son Tim, who also missed out on the free grub, so I mentioned a steak joint down on the Las Vegas Strip I had heard about called, The Steak House, and we headed there. The décor inside was appropriate for an upscale steak house. Dark wood paneling, green porcelain light globes, plush leather seats. The kitchen was out front, so you could see and smell the meats being cooked, and next to the check-in hostess podium was an glass walled meat room, both signs of a good steak house. And it wasn t cheap either. My large porter house steak, salad, 2 beers, and dessert cost $99 before the tip. Just think of it as a once in a life time meal and then it won t seem like it s so expensive. Mark Melvin 2
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AMCs At The GNRS The 2018 GNRS, or the Grand National Roadster Show as it is known, is a major commercial car show event held yearly at the Los Angeles County Fairplex. The main theme of the show is to show off, promote, and chose the best Roadster. But in a separate Building #9 there is always a sub theme going on and this year the theme was 100 Muscle Cars. The organizer of this muscle car exhibit had a complicated task to try and include all car manufacturers with a wide variety of models. Included in this display were six AMCs. From south to north in the building on display was Steve Fox with his 1969 SC/Rambler. Next to him was Mark Melvin with the infamous Playmate AMX. In the middle row were two 1970 Rebel Machines, a blue model owned by Norm from Denver, CO, and a bronze model owned by Dan Hallisey and driven by Vince Vanni. On the last row was Kevin Shannon from Northern California with a sparkling 1969 Big Bad Green California 500 Special. Next to the BBG AMX was Dave and Kati Chick s white 1968 AMX. I would have liked to have seen a 1970 AMX included but space was limited overall. There was a little bit of everything in the building. GTOs, Mustangs, Firebirds, Chevelles, Camaros, Corvettes, Superbirds and Daytonas, Hemis, Cudas, Shelby Cobras, and Cobra Jet Fords, Mach 1s, and Boss 429s, Ford 427s, Chevy 454s. And then there was AMC with our six-car display. We received a lot of looks, chatter, and finger pointing from spectators. The event was held over a three-day period. We moved our cars in on Wednesday and Thursday, and removed them shortly after the conclusion of the show Sunday. There was no judging of the cars. Can you imagine trying to pick the winners of out of so many beautiful vehicles? Mark Melvin 5
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CACTUS CLASSIC I just found the information for the 17 th Annual Cactus Cruiser s AMC Car Show in April on the Internet. The show is being held on the weekend of April 13-14. There s a gathering at Dan Curtis AMC Restoration Shop in the early afternoon followed by a BAR-B-Q at Kirk and Terry Fletcher s house at 5pm, both in Peoria, AZ. The car show itself is being held on Saturday, at a new location in the city of Buckeye, a short drive west of Phoenix. Check the flyer in this newsletter for dates, times and addresses, so you can make your room reservations if necessary. Mark Melvin I told my wife I was investing into our 401 investments today so I wasn t really lying, right? 9
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Support Your Newsletter Writers are needed to help support this AMC newsletter. I welcome submissions from each of you who attend the events we go to each month. You don t need to be a super writer or own a wiz bang word processor program. All you have to do is just send me a simple email as your article text and I ll do all the formatting and spell checking for you. Please do attach pictures to your email if you have them! Send your stuff to: mightypilot@gmail.com JOIN AMCRC! SoCalAMX has become a chartered club of the national AMC club known as AMCRC, or AMC Rambler Club. Although membership in AMCRC is not required for membership in SoCalAMX, it is encouraged that everyone join AMCRC to support the national and local clubs, and the AMC hobby in general. To join AMCRC go to amcrc.com and click on the Join link on the side. What do you get for joining AMCRC? You get a Start Up Packet, a quarterly publication, and Services. Read about the details at: http://amcrc.com/info/info.htm FREE! FREE! FREE! I hope that grabbed your attention. The SoCalAMX.net monthly newsletter has a nominal cost of $0.00 per issue due to the availability of Internet delivery. If you have problems downloading the newsletter I will make arrangements with you to send a copy via the United States Post Office, for a small fee to cover postage. The newsletter is published in the Adobe.pdf format because it can be viewed across all computer platforms such as Windows, Mac, and Linux. You can always download the most current version of Adobe Reader X (ver. 10.x currently) at their web site (adobe.com). Sometimes, if you re having a problem viewing a.pdf document, installing a fresh copy of Adobe will cure your problem. Adobe s new Reader seems to load much faster than past versions, but be informed the download is about 52 meggy bites!. The newsletter is available for downloading at www.socalamx.net/1/newsletter. All back issues will be available as they are published monthly. If you have received a notice for this newsletter and wish to be taken off simply email me at mightypilot@gmail.com and I ll get you off the list promptly. Just think how busy I ll be if articles are submitted to me, by you, members of SoCalAMX? Send all submissions, pictures and text, to mightypilot@gmail.com and I ll do my best with them. The deadline for the following month s newsletter is the 15th of the current month. Mark Melvin, SoCalAMX Newsletter Editor 14