A carburetor is how older engines mix fuel and air. If the controls that operate it are slightly wrong, the engine can start acting up because it’s not getting the right mixture.
Fuel rails are like fuel “pipes” that feed gasoline to the engine’s fuel injectors. If you’re missing or replacing them, the engine may not get the right fuel flow.
Oil leaks are a common maintenance issue where engine oil escapes from seals, gaskets, or oil lines. Chasing oil leaks is important because low oil levels can cause accelerated wear or even engine damage.
The Shelby American Collection is a group focused on Shelby cars and their history. The guest runs it, so it’s likely tied to real Shelby vehicles and stories.
It’s the classic computer storage type where a spinning disk holds data. A tiny arm reads and writes by touching/hovering over the spinning surface. For laptops, it had to survive being jostled and used with low battery power.
A “1.8 inch hard drive” is a tiny data storage device—basically a small computer storage component. They’re bringing it up to show the person’s background wasn’t traditional car stuff.
The starter is the electric motor that cranks the engine to get it running. If the starter is bad, the engine may not start at all, even if everything else is fine. The speaker’s boss uses this as a practical test: fix the starter, then you can drive the car.
CDs are the music discs people used to buy and play in cars and home stereos. The point here is that CDs were physically large compared to what they wanted to build.
A car giveaway is a contest where you can win a car. Instead of selling the car, the organizer runs it like a lottery/sweepstakes, and they have to follow rules so it’s allowed in each location.
“435 miles” means the car has been driven very little. Cars with extremely low mileage are often treated like they’re still basically new, which collectors usually like.
BBS makes aftermarket wheels that are popular on performance cars. People like them because they’re well-made and often look great, and sometimes they’re lighter than stock wheels.
A “long-term loan” means the museum is showing a car that belongs to someone else. The owner keeps ownership, but the museum gets to display it for years.
“Unrestored” means the car hasn’t been fully rebuilt or cleaned up to look brand new. Collectors sometimes like that because it keeps the car’s original condition, even if it’s not perfect.
They were especially into two famous kinds of cars: the GT40 and the Cobras. The GT40 is a legendary race car, and Cobras are iconic performance roadsters associated with Shelby.
A pace car is used to lead the race at a controlled speed when the race needs to slow down. It helps keep everyone safe and organized until racing conditions are ready again.
The front bumper is the front protective piece of the car. It can get damaged in small crashes, and changes to it can sometimes tell you something about the car’s history or modifications.
They’re talking about a specific top speed number and whether they stayed under it. The GPS is being used to argue they didn’t go over that limit.
LIVE
Hey, all you gearheads and car fiends, welcome to Driven Radio Show, your weekly automotive
happy hour.
I am Brett Hatfield, here with my co-host and engineer extraordinaire, Mr. Mark Groves.
That's me.
And former co-host and the force behind YouTube's craving cars, Mr. Corey Pratt.
Hey.
Yay.
We are coming to you from Driven Radio Studios, where this is my 400th show, and so I wanted
to get everybody back together who is responsible for us making it this far.
Corey, it's been a little while since we've had you on.
What's going on with craving cars?
What have you been up to?
What's new with the channel, and what do you have coming up?
Well, let's not get into the personal side of life, because that has kind of hindered
a little bit of craving cars from last year.
Kind of bleeding into this year, but let's see what.
Craving cars isn't gone.
We're still here.
We've got some things that are going to kind of change a little bit and a little bit of
direction that'll change, and possibly even back to simplifying.
We were also doing a little bit of a video podcast for a little while there, and I think
that's going to be on hold.
So we won't have that.
So sorry audience.
It's all right.
I'm trying to get filming down on the weekends, and then get edited down during the week while
I'm trying to also get ready for it.
So we just kind of postpone that for now and see how things are going.
But I've got a different direction.
It's kind of hard to explain the direction since I'm not 100% exactly sure.
What are you going to be craving in the future?
I think I'm going to go something on the line of cars.
Still be craving cars?
Okay.
Okay.
Very good.
Very good.
But I mean, it's kind of like going back to the roots.
Okay.
I think that's what's going to happen.
I think things were starting to get too complicated and all over the place.
So it was just a matter of, hey, let's me just go back, concentrate on me, get some
time for the channel, get a few of the big stuff.
So there's already been a couple of things that we've already done today.
There was an event at the fuel house.
Oh.
And we're friends at the fuel house.
So we had a big turnout.
I happened to be one of the weekends that was like super nice out, you know, because
the weather here in the Midwest is up and down so dang much.
Yeah, it's been a coin toss lately.
The fuel house is a cool place too.
It's a super cool place.
And if anything, it's actually even better now for like groups of people because there's
more hangout area, outdoor stuff, indoor things, food, drinks, all that stuff.
We haven't been on an ice cream place.
We need to go.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We really should.
There's probably all kinds of places you can set up to do a little show there if you
really want to.
Yeah.
But then we just had the World of Wheels.
Yes, we did.
So, you know, we can't go without filming some stuff at the World of Wheels.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
It was a smaller show this year, but you know what, hey, it was still had some pretty amazing
cars.
I think it worked better because things weren't so spread out.
You didn't have to walk miles and miles and miles to see everything.
Right.
No, it's true.
And somebody, you can, it's like, can I not see the other side because of the curvature
of the earth or something?
But the filming was a lot easier, so with half the show, that kind of worked out.
Alrighty.
Mr. Mark.
Sir.
Anything new in Thunderbird World?
A weird victory over the weekend because I got in my parts for the springs and the little
attachments to get it onto the carburetor to get that pull down going so that it wouldn't
idle so fast.
Yeah.
And I'm looking at it trying to figure out, oh, where the heck am I going to put this?
And I moved a couple of things, a little thing, and then my linkage kind of did a little
thing.
So it's kind of a little thing.
So it's idling.
It's idling perfectly.
There you go.
And I'm like, what the hell?
What did I change?
No, no.
What did I touch?
No, no.
Take the victory.
Take the win.
Oh, yeah.
I'm taking the gift from the gods, but I'm like, what the frig?
Take it.
Could I just be allowed to understand for one minute what I did?
Every now and then.
They're self-prepared sometimes.
When I'm working on cars or bikes or whatever, just take the win.
And down the road later, if it starts hacking up, you can take another look at it and try
to figure out, okay, what changed back?
I think I know the little thing that I wiggled and then something moved.
And I'm pretty sure it's in the linkage before it gets to the carburetor.
It's two-foot jokes, man.
And I'm like, okay, I think I know what it was that changed the angle and the trajectory.
And so now do you have a handful of spare parts?
Yeah, yeah.
Now I have a whole new package of unopened spare parts that I'm like, you know what?
I'm just going to hang on to it.
Talk them away.
You'll use them some more.
Exactly.
Exactly.
So I got that for the win.
Well, before you know it, you have enough information on this to do a how-to.
I'll have enough spare parts to build another how-to.
Jesus Christ, the amount of things I have.
So how do we fix this?
Why are you just a little jiggle, jiggle, wiggle, wiggle?
Anybody need a couple of fuel rails?
A couple of fuel rails.
Yeah, two of them.
Mark gets out his voodoo stuff.
Now this is how we're going to make this work.
The Schadenfreude Express is back home finally.
Saw that in the garage.
Did Mark and go?
Mark and I picked that up Saturday morning before we went to World of Wheels.
And it looks pretty fantastic.
It looks so much better.
So huge thank you to John Burdolski and all the good folks at Classic Collision in Kansas
City, Kansas.
If you need quality body or paint work on your car, be sure to contact them at 913-287-9410
or go see them at 4835 Metropolitan Avenue in KCK.
Thanks guys for making the car look great.
It's real to have it packed.
It does look nice.
And you know, considering the way that I look at cars, the little dent thing didn't really,
you know, I didn't really notice it that much.
But I know with the way that you are, it was top of mind every time.
It still rode like a dream.
But it was like having shards of glass crammed into my brain.
My LCD won't tolerate it.
But more than that, that keeps water out of the trunk.
That does help.
Which is a whole lot better.
I'm real familiar with that.
And now I can go on to having the wheels refinished and fixing the seat.
And I think that car is going to be, I'm about good to go.
Well, and then I got a bunch of mechanical crap to do, but I'm not going to gripe about
that right now.
I don't think about.
So what you're saying is now you're going to have to start carrying a water bottle with
you because you can't keep it in the trunk.
No, no.
I've always taken really good care of that car, mostly because I know how stinking expensive
is to not take really good care of that car.
Oh yeah, I understand that.
You know how complicated that sucker is and how maddening it's been.
And it fully earned the name Schadenfreude Express.
So, oh, did you hear the other name I found for that car?
Oh, so P.O.
Somebody else thought it up.
I didn't think of it, but I saw it in print online.
Hitler's Revenge, which is 100% spot on.
Oh boy.
Yeah, he was big.
I think he, he cruise around in Mercedes, didn't he?
Yeah, he did.
Like his big boat.
So let's, let's try to get away from that.
But hey, no, that's just, it was just a, it was one of their car makers.
That's the only reason.
It was it.
Car of the people.
All us German car weenies.
So, yeah, I'm glad to have it back.
It looks really fantastic.
I'm starting the full detail on that car now because I can do it the way I want to do it.
And some mechanical stuff.
I'm going to chase on a couple of oil leaks, but the car's getting there.
It's really getting there and it's been so long since I've had it perfect that I'm,
I'm starting to be excited about it again.
So happy to have that back.
Thanks all the folks over at Classic Collision.
Our special guest this week is Steve Volk, executive director of the Shelby American
Collection, founder and CEO of Tapcat Solutions.
Steve has had an extensive career in optical and rotating magnetic data storage.
I didn't even bother to look it up.
I don't know what this means.
We'll ask him in a minute, including having launched the first tape and disc
subsystem for the IBM PC.
He is the founding member of Prairie Tech, inventor of the two and a half inch hard
drive, founder of integral peripherals, developer of the 1.8 inch hard drive and
founder of data play, which developed digital media and micro optical storage
engines for the music industry.
That was easy for me to say.
In 2017, Steve founded Tapcat Solutions, an online sweepstakes platform for nonprofits.
He was the winner of the Rocky Mountain Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2001.
Steve earned a bachelor of science degree from Duke University in 1976 and a doctor
of dental surgery degree from the University of Missouri in 1982.
Of course, then he went into making computer stuff.
He, in 1996, Steve co-founded the Shelby American Collection in Boulder, Colorado,
boasting the world's most significant collection of Shelby race cars, including
Cobras, GT40s, Shelby Mustangs and memorabilia.
Steve's been the executive director ever since.
Steve, welcome to Driven Radio.
Oh, thanks, guys.
Thanks for having me.
That was a heck of an intro dude.
Yeah, no kidding.
What a bio.
You earned your dental doctorate in 1982, yet you went on to do so much in the world
of data storage.
Did you ever work as a dentist?
No, I did not.
And, you know, the dental thing was kind of a vision of my family, you know, that my
parents wanted me to do that.
And so I went ahead and did it.
And, you know, it's a four year thing.
So, and in the first year, they throw you down in clinic and you actually have patients,
believe it or not, you know, folks that want to come in for free dental work.
And the problem I had was I didn't really know that much about dentistry.
You think?
Yeah.
But the problem I had in clinics, I couldn't, I couldn't see what I was doing, you know,
with the light, you know, you adjust the light and then you dive in with your hands and
everything gets blocked.
So while I was in dental school, I formed a company that built fiber OPTIQ illumination
gear for the dentistry.
Yeah, that was my first venture backed company.
And one of the engineers that, so, you know, I went to dental school during the day and
then at night, we would design and build fiber OPTIQ illumination systems.
And one of the engineers that worked for me had a design for a disc tape controller and
that, you know, the personal computer space was just coming into play.
And I got really interested in that.
And we formed a company actually in Kansas City was Tallgrass Technologies and we built
disc and tape subsystems.
And so by the time I graduated dental school, Tallgrass was really taking off.
And so I took my boards.
I didn't want to be a dental school dropout.
I took my boards, you know, graduate took my boards, became board certified.
And then the next day sold all of my instruments and was out of there and was knee deep in the
computer industry.
And then one thing led to another and I came to Colorado, Boulder, Colorado in 87 and
started as one of the founders of Prairie Tech, where we built the world's first two
and a half inch hard drive.
And that was for notebook computers.
So that's rotating magnetic disc drive.
Everybody knows about that.
And except the three guys sitting in the studio.
I speak for yourself.
Wait a second.
I'm kind of a nerd.
Was the technology already going, you just figured out how to make it smaller?
Yeah, but there's a tremendous amount of innovation in doing that.
As you can imagine, because it to work in a notebook computer, you had to be very durable
because people threw them around back then.
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, and had to be very low power because battery technology wasn't very good and so
on.
And then it went on to do the 1.8 inch hard drive.
And that was the drive that was in the Apple iPod, you know, and, you know, so.
Wow.
Got smaller and smaller.
But all along, you know, my real interest was in cars.
And, you know, at tall grass technology, I had the wherewithal to start going to racing
school, you know, bond around school racing, you know, out in Sonoma when Bob was out there.
And then obviously in Phoenix when he moved and I started collecting cars and acquiring
Cobras back then factory team.
I was really interested in the history.
So I always wanted to go racing.
Always wanted to collect cars.
Do you have a loss?
Yes.
Holy shit.
That did me so hard sideways.
I was out of words.
I'm like, wait, what?
He did.
I was trained to do that.
I was curious if it stuck.
Just check it.
So that was prairie tech.
What is integral peripherals?
That was the 1.8 inch hard drive.
Okay.
All right.
I thought that was prairie tech also.
Where did you get these ideas?
Where did these ideas come from?
Yeah.
How do you go from dentistry to hard drives?
Well, I'd always been fooling around with electronics.
You know, when I was in high school, I worked for a guy and this is part of my how I got
indoctrinated and Shelby stuff.
When I was in high school, I had a job.
I worked for a guy.
I had a long goose day.
Tommaso and a 427 cobra.
Wow.
And a GT 40.
It was P 1068.
You know, it was a street car, but it was still a GT 40.
Wow.
Went around the streets of Kansas City in a GT 40.
And so I kind of got the bug early.
And then the 427 cobra was not operable.
It had a bad starter in it.
And my boss said, Hey, if you can fix the starter, you can drive the car.
And so there's a hell of a motivation.
Give that over to Mark.
He can fix it.
Maybe.
Mark says he'll have parts left over.
I can break it with style.
So I got into the, you know, the Shelby stuff really early on.
Um, and, but was also interested in electronics and, uh,
and the computer industry.
Remember, you know, the IBM PC came out in 81.
And, you know, it just, that industry just exploded.
And so you say you graduated from University of Missouri in 82.
When did you move to Colorado?
In 87.
I because were you in Kansas city until then?
Yeah.
I think that Steve and Dave Kenny may have been here the same time.
You know, Dave Kenny went to school in Parkville.
That's a while.
Dave Kennedy.
Dave Kenny, who is the publisher of the Haggerty price guide,
went to school in Kansas city also.
I think you guys were here about the same time.
Kind of interesting.
Um, so I'm curious what is, what is data play is data play also one of those,
uh, data storage or no, no, no data play.
Wasn't that the music digital storage?
We teamed up with a universal music and BMG and EMI, uh,
with the, the, uh, intent of building a new mobile media.
You know, CDs were too big.
Um, and so we built a tiny, uh, it was a blue laser based, uh,
optical media and we got all the, uh, you know,
we built the hardware.
So we built the drive.
We had teamed up with Panasonic, but it was all our technology.
And the idea was that this was going to be, it was a tiny, uh, disc.
You know, it had to be big enough.
So a child can't swallow it.
Um, and we teamed up with EMI and BMG and, uh, universal music, uh,
on the content side, cause they wanted, you know, a next gen, uh,
uh, removal media for music.
And then we had a Samsung and Toshiba and Panasonic and others
that were going to build the players and, and everything was cruising along
just fine.
Uh, and then Napster came out.
Oh, okay.
And killed all that.
Because you could get free music, uh, downloaded and, you know,
just burn it on CDs and there's nothing better than free.
Right.
Free stuff.
Free is really difficult.
Uh, one more question about your, uh, your, uh, technology background
and then we'll jump back into the Shelby stuff.
Um, how did you develop tap cat?
Uh, and for, for our audience, please describe what it is and what it does.
Oh, uh, tap cat, uh, was formed in, in 2017.
And then that really ties into the, uh, museum cause the Shelby American
collection, how you got interested in cars at a very young age.
Uh, I, I remember, you know, seeing my first MG, uh, TD.
And I thought that was like the coolest card I had ever seen.
And it just, uh, I was building models and I had dreams of one day, you know,
owning, uh, some significant cars.
And the, the tech stuff allowed me to do that.
And I actually, you know, I told you, I went to Bondurant and
Skip Barber and all that and learned how to race.
And my first race car that I raced in historic, uh, was a Ferrari, uh,
Tucson, LA body, 275 GTB.
Wow. Wow.
What a way to start.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's not the top of the hill.
Yeah.
I go to, you know, road America and Watkins Glen and I was just
getting creamed by the Cobras and I always loved Cobras, especially, you know,
the one of the 427 I got to drive and I changed, successfully changed the starter.
And so I sold the, all the Ferraris and started collecting Cobras early on.
And I was at a race, uh, Rhode Atlanta in, uh, early 80s.
And this guy comes, you know, Carl Shelby comes, Walsson into the pits.
And he said, uh, you know, I was driving an ex factory team car.
It was a Tom Payne Bob Johnson car that I had acquired that I was racing at
road America or Rhode Atlanta.
And, uh, Shelby came in and we started talking and just became good friends.
And, you know, we would, he wasn't doing much in the 80s, you know, in the early 80s.
Um, and we just, uh, became friends and, uh, stayed in touch and, and as things grew
and more cars and other people got involved that were also, uh, Cobra and GT 40
enthusiasts that we here in Boulder, Colorado, we had so much stuff, uh,
because I was always really focused on the history.
And so I was collecting anything, any memorabilia, whether it was race records
or, uh, molds from the GT 40s, you know, that had been discarded, you know,
by home in the moody or, or, uh, Shelby American.
And I had a lot of stuff.
And one day we're all sitting around, uh, because we had some significant cars.
And we said, boy, what, what if we, you know, nobody has done a museum that is
entirely focused on Shelby American and all the things that they had done.
And so, uh, I sat down with Carol and I said, Carol, you know, I know this is
crazy idea. This is like 1995 now.
Uh, but we're thinking about doing a museum that is focused entirely on
everything that you've done because you did it all.
I mean, aside from, you know, winning Le Mans as a driver, you know,
for Aston Martin, um, you know, you won the USR RC championships.
You won the SCCA and you won the big enchilada, the FIA World Manufacturers
championship and you built some of the best car.
I mean, basically ushered in the muscle car era in my mind, you know,
with Shelby, uh, Mustang GT 350 and the ours and so on.
And, uh, and I said, but we're not going to do this unless, you know,
it's okay with you and that you'll, you know, uh, I know he didn't have any money
back then because he hadn't reunited with Ford, but, um, you know,
you don't have to support us financially, but we want your endorsement.
And he said, Steve, I will support you for as long as I'm vertical.
Oh, yeah.
And he did just that.
I mean, that was 1996 when we opened the museum and we would have these
big galas and, you know, Carol would come and Bondurant and Gurney
and Tom Paine and Bob Johnson and Phil Remington and Phil Hill.
All the guys would come.
Um, and, you know, that was how we made it.
We set it up as a nonprofit and that's how we made enough money to keep it going.
Uh, but as you guys know, you know, Carol got sick in 2011 and he passed away in 2012.
And, and we couldn't, you know, we still had the big galas,
but they had lost their spark because, you know, he would sign stuff
and people would donate and that kind of stuff.
So I'd always wanted to do a car giveaway.
And I asked the guys, I said, Hey, go find some software that we can,
that can facilitate a car giveaway, you know, a sweepstakes.
And it wasn't out there.
And so we built it, uh, from the ground up, we built a platform,
uh, a sweepstakes platform that would do the payment processing
and the donor receipts and the donor database management and all the things
that you need to do and have, you know, and, uh, be legal in all 50 states
and the district of Columbia, you know, there's a lot of legal aspect to this
because every state's a little different.
So we built the platform and we did a car giveaway
and gave away Shelby Mustang, of course.
And, you know, uh, it raised, uh, you know, a quarter million dollars
and we were thrilled.
Nice.
And then next year it raised $500,000.
And then, you know, it just kept climbing.
Um, and other nonprofits around the country started calling saying,
can we use the platform?
So we, uh, dramatically beefed up the platform so it can handle this.
And we, you know, form TAPCAT in 2017 and we, you know,
it can process 2000 donations a second.
Wow.
And now, uh, you know, TAPCAT is big, you know, we, uh, raise,
uh, nonprofits raise millions of dollars every month on the TAPCAT platform.
Every car museum that you know uses it, whether it's the Peterson
or Auburn, Cord, Duesenberg or Owlshead or Saratoga or, uh,
national sprint car, Hall of Fame or SCCA or, you know, they all use it.
And, and more importantly, we do a lot of, uh, childhood, uh,
you know, pediatric brain cancer, a lot of those, amyloidosis, Parkinson's,
uh, you know.
Do you have any idea about how many nonprofits TAPCAT serves?
Yeah.
Uh, we have almost 600.
When at any given time, you know, we've got, uh, TAPCAT has a hundred
or more sweepstakes rolling and there, you know, a lot of them are cars,
but they're not all cars.
Um, you know, some of them are experiences like for the mining organizations
or do gold nuggets and do experiences, get to go to, you know,
African safaris and that kind of stuff.
But for the museum to get back to the Shelby American collection,
we're actually, uh, giving away a 2006 Ford GT with, uh, it's beautiful
tungsten, uh, gray, uh, metallic.
And it's only got 435 miles on it.
It's basically a brand new car.
Oh, wow.
It is brand new.
All four options.
Yeah.
All four options.
Okay.
Yeah.
Corey, do you remember what the four options are on an 0506 Ford GT?
Okay.
Uh, it is a right front tire, right left rear left.
That would be no.
No.
I'm going to see if I can remember.
Stripes.
Yes.
BBS wheels.
Yes.
Macintosh radio.
Yes.
And I'm drawing a blank on the fourth one.
Bumpers.
Calipers.
That's right.
Painted Calipers.
Painted Calipers.
That one slipped my mind.
Alrighty.
And you're, you're giving one away and it has 400 miles on it.
Yeah.
I was kind of hoping for an 86 Dodge Omni.
GLHS.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hell yeah.
No.
I would rock that so hard.
I know you've been over there tapping away, looking stuff up.
Flipping my bifolder.
What does GLHS stands for?
Stand for.
Oh God.
Hang on.
It was a.
It's GLH and then GLHS.
Goes low hate speed.
No.
No.
I don't know.
I have no clue.
Goes like hell.
Goes like hell some more.
Seriously?
Yep.
Steve, correct me if I'm wrong.
I don't know.
I don't know about those things.
That's fantastic.
No, I gotta Google it.
Hey, look it up and tell me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure it's goes like hell and
goes like hell some more.
It didn't matter if that's what it really was or not.
If he would answer his stinking phone.
He could correct me and tell me where I've gone wrong.
You are in fact correct.
That's one thing I meant to ask you, Steve.
Are you familiar with our friend, Vern Estes?
Oh yeah, of course.
Vern's an amazing guy.
Tell us a little bit about the museum.
How many cars are there?
What are some of your more valuable or rare exhibits?
And does the museum own all the cars or are some of them on loan?
Some are on long-term loan and the museum owns some.
Some have been donated.
The museum has bought some, you know, because they're doing sweepstakes.
You know, we've been able to expand.
We now have two buildings and the main building has all the cobras and the
Shelby Mustangs and, you know, things real.
We have the very first Cobra CSX 2000 and we have a Daytona Coupe.
We have an FIA Cobra Roadster.
We have the Ken Miles, USR RC car.
We have the Riverside car.
We got a couple, three Cobra Le Mans, you know, with the short trunks.
I don't know how much you guys know about Cobras.
Know a little bit.
Yeah.
So we got a lot and some are on loan.
Some are from the Larry H. Miller Automobile Foundation.
Some are from other private collectors.
We've got the very first Shelby Mustang, the R model, which is the GT350 Ken Miles car.
Nice.
I have been in that car.
Oh, you have?
I have.
Saw it.
Some place that shall remain unnamed also covered that car sale when it was part of
the John Ottzbach collection and it went through Mica Mindy.
Yeah.
So that was, I own that car for about 25 years after was found in Mexico.
And it was in our museum, unrestored.
And John Arzbach, who's a terrific guy, kept bugging me and bugging me and bugging me.
They had to have that car and more focused on GT40s and Cobras.
And so one day I said, okay, and he got it and he restored it.
And then, you know, for health reasons had to sell it.
He took it to Mica and a Kansas City guy.
I don't know that I should mention his name.
No, it was Vern.
Oh, Kansas City guy bought it.
No, I know that Vern was helping rep that collection.
Oh, yeah, he did.
And Vern did a spectacular job cataloging.
You know, John had so much stuff, so much memorabilia.
If memory serves, I think Vern said there were over 5,000 pieces of memorabilia in his collection.
Yeah, it was amazing collection.
But anyway, so our 002 went to auction, went to Mica and the guy that bought it had it, you know,
took it home and sat in his garage for a while and then he said, hey, you know,
nobody really gets to see this.
Anyway, is there any way it can come back to your museum?
And I said, hell, yes.
You think?
Oh, it's back.
I mean, it is the most significant Shelby Mustang in the world.
Sure.
Yeah, it's just an amazing car.
Now, Steve, how do you feel about it being restored?
Would you have left it alone?
Well, the problem was it went to Mexico.
You know, a lot of cars went to Mexico that were retired race cars and it went in on a temporary visa.
You know, and it might have been raised in Mexico.
I'm not sure about that, but when I got it, it was just in primer.
I mean, if it had been a survivor, you know, because somebody started on it and somebody painted it.
So, no, I think it was a good idea to restore it.
Okay, cool.
And so now it's back in the museum.
So the big building, you know, the first building has all the cobras and the Shelby Mustangs.
And then because of the sweepstakes, we were able to expand in the adjacent building.
Another 10,000 square feet.
And that's where all the Ford GTs and GT40s are.
And, you know, right now it's the largest collection of Ford GTs and GT40s in the world.
So, about 14.
Oh, nice.
And every variation.
So, two oldest surviving Mark 1s.
And the first, one of them was driven by Ken Miles, the other was driven by Bondurant.
The first, they won Daytona in 65.
So they're Mark 1s.
We have two Mark 2s.
They're both 66 Le Mans winners.
We have a Mark 4 that Andretti drove at 67 Le Mans.
Oh, cool.
A Roadster, one of the Roadsters.
You know, there's only two surviving.
Well, GT108 and we have a Mark 3 street car.
So we have every variation.
How do the cars get exercised?
Are they driven at all, started?
Are they used ever as they were intended?
Yeah, we raced them for years here in the U.S. and in Europe.
And we start them on a regular basis.
Our two Le Mans winning Mark 2s, you know, the Ken Miles car, are actually, that's owned by the Miller Automobile Foundation.
Those are going to Goodwood to hook up with, you know, the Black, P1046.
You know, the Chris Amon Bruce McLaren winner of the 66 Le Mans.
So they'll all be together in Europe at Goodwood.
So yeah, they go into things.
You know, the Shelby American Automobile Club just had their big thing out at Sonoma Raceway.
And we took two cars out there.
We took our Daytona Coupe, which of the six is the most significant.
It's the Le Mans Daytona and Sebring winner.
And we had Peter Brock out there and we put Peter, you guys know who Peter Brock is.
Yes, we've had him on the show a few times.
Yeah.
Okay.
So we took that Daytona Coupe and then we took our FIA Cobra Roadster.
You know, it's under restored Pebble Beach winner.
It, you know, has five first place FIA wins driven by Phil Hill and Bob Bonnerant and Roy Salvadori and Sir John Whitmore.
But anyway, so we took those two cars out and we put Pete in the Daytona Coupe and he was, you know, running on the track.
He was, you know, the pace car.
And he was beside himself.
He was beside himself when we loaded him in and he, you've probably seen the articles.
There's been a lot of articles on this.
He said to us, he said, this is the, this will be the first time I have ever driven a real Daytona Coupe on the track, on a track.
Wow.
Wow.
Really?
It's, you know, we said, you got to be kidding me.
You know, you developed this.
You went back and forth to Riverside and Willow Springs, you know, back in the day in 64.
Are you telling me you never, you know, hopped in and experienced it?
Give her a spin.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And the answer was no.
How could you not?
I know, right?
If it's right there and you're like, is anybody looking?
Guys, that would take an early lunch break.
Just be smoking laughter all the way around.
Yeah.
Nice.
Nice.
Yeah, because he's an accomplished race car driver.
Pete was.
So it wasn't like you were putting, you know, L doubt or somebody like that in the car.
Anybody want anything from good sense?
Cause I'm just going to go down the street.
It won't take long.
I promise.
And then you find yourself a good sense saying, Hey, do you have one of those drink caddies?
There's no couple.
So what are some of the larger events you have at the museum?
Is there anything coming up that we should, we should attend?
Yeah, absolutely.
We've got over Labor Day weekend.
It's on Saturday.
What is that the fourth?
I think September, September 5th.
Is that the Saturday?
We have our annual car show and party and we'll have Ellen Grant will be there.
And Peter Miles.
We'll be there.
And Aaron Shelby.
And probably Gary Patterson, you know,
the gang will be there.
And, you know, we have a commemorative poster and we usually have about 200 cars.
We don't limit them to just Shelby's.
They're all collector cars.
So you'll see your run of a lot of four GTs and Shelby Mustangs and
Ferraris and pretty much everything.
What are the future plans for the museum?
We have a have executed a contract on a third building.
Wow.
They're all together, you know, in our little cul-de-sac, but this one's bigger.
It's about 16,000 square feet and it's very tall.
And we want, we have an event center in our, you know, where the GT 40s and
four GTs are, it can seat about 90 people for dinner.
And this new building, we want to move the Shelby Mustangs into that.
And we want to put in a big video screen so we can have Friday night,
you know, movie night and seat, you know, 300, 350.
Or you can line up the cars in front of the screen and act like you're at the
drive-in.
Yeah, I hadn't thought about that.
That would be cool.
So we're just continuing to expand.
We just, just got a GTD, you know, got chassis 21, not necessarily a Shelby
product, but pretty cool to have one in the museum.
Oh, that's going to ask if you had any newer stuff, like maybe some of the
new Shelby super snakes, some creation from Vince Violetta or anything like that.
Yeah, no, we don't.
I mean, we have a number of the newer, we have three of the new Ford GTs.
One of them is a GTLM.
Have you guys heard of those?
Yes.
Ford made 20 of those.
And we got allocation on one of those.
It's a really beautiful car.
But, you know, we don't have any newer Mustangs.
Okay, okay.
And the final question that we ask everybody, and I'm kind of springing
this one on you, so feel free to take your time to think about it.
Steve, what's the dumbest thing you've ever done in a car?
Oh, well, that's easy.
It's a city story.
Okay.
So, you know, I was in high school, I had a, you know, I had a job and I bought
a Porsche 911, you know, it was, you know, air-cooled.
In high school?
Yeah.
What year was this?
The car was a 70.
It was used, and I graduated high school in 1972.
But I was doing close circuit television installations.
You know, I had a company on the side that did that when I was in high school.
Of course, that's a while.
Yeah.
I had this Porsche 911 and a friend of mine had one of those new 240Zs.
And this is in capacity.
And so one night we went out on I-35 to get this sorted out.
And it was a moonlit night and my friend, we were side-by-side on 35.
There wasn't any traffic.
And my friend, you know, Neil shut his lights off so I shut my lights off.
Oh, no.
And we were, we went screaming by a cop.
With our lights out, I think it really startled him.
You know, if he's using the side of it.
These two bullets, you know, unlit bullets just in the moonlight when screaming by him
and he came after us and he was just beside himself once he got us pulled over.
I mean,
Was that going to ask if he ever got beside you?
Yeah, he did.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And my question was going to be, was the dumb thing racing in the dark or the dumb thing
pulling over?
Yes.
So did he, did you get a stern, stern warning or was it ticket time and talk to dad?
Yeah, it was ticket time.
And we got tickets.
He said you were going too fast for me to catch you, to clock you.
I don't know.
Oh, wow.
1972 technology.
How good to the speed gun to possibly be.
Plus, if you went by him and you were doing 80, he's got to come from a dead stop and catch up to you guys,
which means he has to be going a lot faster than you are.
So you could tell him I wasn't going that fast.
This is just your fault.
Yeah.
But, you know, what was funny about that?
And I did, it wasn't funny to him, but when I, I was working in a, also did a little work in a laboratory where they were developing.
You remember custom with a K in Chinook, Kansas, they built the rock and roll rolled and pleaded amplifiers.
Yes.
Yeah.
Okay.
So this was a development lab for them and they were developing, they also had a contract to develop custom got into the radar.
Oh, radar.
Oh, and so.
Yeah.
So I was doing that on the side too.
About the same time I got pulled over.
Oh, lovely.
Did you tell the cop I know all about that thing you want me to show you what's wrong with it?
Yeah.
Here, let me reset it.
Oh, it's smoking now.
You know, I'm looking at Hagerty.
How much did you buy that?
Oh, you can't.
Those are extraordinarily expensive now.
How much did you buy the car for back in the day?
Mine alone.
Yeah.
It was, I think it was about $5,200.
No.
Nice.
They were selling I think for $8,500, just the 911, not the S or the other ones.
Yeah.
If it was in good condition now, it'd be $85,000.
Oh, I know.
Good times.
Well.
I bought it.
The big question on my mind is who won?
Yeah.
The 240 was a 911.
Did your buddy keep going?
No.
He pulled over too.
I mean, once we saw the lights, you know, we were, you know, we should have kept going
and we could have gone out to still well and, you know, who knows how far we would have
gone.
So who won again?
I'm sorry I didn't hear you.
Oh, you know, initially the 240.
Oh, really?
Because the 240Z's got more torque and but the 911's got a better top end.
But the early 240's only came with a four speed manual, I think.
So eventually the 911 probably would have walked on him a bit.
Well, what was the 911?
It was a manual too, I would imagine.
Well, it was a manual, but I think it was a five speed.
Steve, we have to ask you, you owned one.
It was a five speed.
Okay.
So eventually Steve would have walked him.
That's what he said.
The 911 had the top end.
I had the top end, but I had to catch up with him because he pulled away.
You know.
I see.
I see.
So from light to light, the 240's got you, but on the highway you got him.
Yes.
Okay.
Okay.
That's a really important question in this interview.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
I can now sleep properly.
Yeah, the inquiry might get annoying.
We've been speaking with Steve Volk, executive director of the Shelby American Collection
in Boulder, Colorado.
Steve, please tell us where we can find you online and on social media.
Yeah, you can find me at the Shelby American Collection.
You know, we've got, we're pretty active on social media, so please follow us.
And you can, if you need to reach out to me on the museum site,
ShelbyAmericanCollection.org, just hit info and you can send me a note and I will get it.
Steve, thank you so much for being with us.
We appreciate you taking the time.
Oh, I enjoyed it.
I hope I didn't talk too much.
Okay.
Well, Steve's done some stuff.
Couple of things.
Thing or two.
One or two.
One or two.
You know, in high school.
Like he's lost.
He has his own job or his own business.
And I'm just like, God, I was such an under motivated punk.
Yeah, I worked at a lumber yard.
I was working at a restaurant.
Yeah.
I don't even know if I was good enough to work at a restaurant at that time.
I don't know.
I got fired from a couple of restaurants.
Oh, there you go.
Well, you know, the stuff he was going through, talking about the 80s, what he was doing,
I'm just like, wow, what, what the heck.
And it was cool because that also got to fund his, his, you know, his car attic stuff,
you know, you know, you get the museum up and going later on in life.
But then he goes back and says, Oh, I was doing this in high school.
They had my own business.
I'm like, what?
I was already blown away as it was.
What kid do you know bought their own Porsche?
Yeah.
Two year old Porsche.
Two year old.
Yeah, he's those used.
Not much.
Yeah.
Not much.
Not very.
Yeah.
You know, I knew some kids who had Porsches in high school, but typically their parents
bought them for them and they were not two years old.
They were a lot older than that.
Right.
So pretty cool that he was able to do that sounds like the guys always known what he was
doing.
Kind of interesting that he went from dental school saying, I can't see anything.
Oh, I got a good idea.
I'll make a little fiber OPTIQ light.
I don't want to be a dentist, but I'll make it smaller and then smaller.
But I can't see shit in your mouth.
And he's one of the reasons why we have such.
Well, I mean, to the technology of the hard drives and our phones and he's responsible
for technology, you know, a lot of technology.
He's responsible probably for the evolution or the genesis of the lights that Dennis used
now.
You know, I should have asked him if the mini disk was his fault.
Well, you probably didn't get a chance to ask him because I was too busy asking him
if he's still flossed.
Did catch me.
He said he was trained.
He was trained too.
He had to.
Who said pregnant posses were going, wait a minute.
Yeah.
Well, Mark, I looked at each other like, did you just say floss?
Well, do your, don't you?
It's yes or no.
I mean, it's not a hard question.
There could be a maybe in there.
I flossed right before the show.
Look at you.
What a good guy.
Well, I also brush my teeth.
I didn't want to breathe, you know, dragon breath on either of you.
Oh, that's what you say.
That's what I appreciated.
See, see my concern for my fellow man.
No complaints over here.
Hey, right before we wrap everything up, I do want to congratulate Dave Kenny.
We may have said so last week, but Dave Kenny had his Studebaker Avanti R3,
one of nine, accepted to the Petal Beach Concorde Delegance this coming August.
That is an amazing accomplishment.
You know how much we've talked to Amanda about having McPherson colleges,
the restoration programs, 53 Mercedes get accepted.
Dave Kenny all on his lonesome.
And I talked to him today.
I congratulated him.
I wanted to say it publicly.
Well done, Dave.
Good on you.
Awesome.
And congratulations on your 400th show between the, you know, the three of us.
You know, Corey, you came in and there for a while, I didn't even know if I was going to make it,
but you kept it rolling.
You kept it going.
And, you know, well done, you 400 shows.
And, you know, you've talked about how much, how I got you hooked and got you started on it.
This is all your fault, Groves.
But you kept it going.
So good on you.
Well done.
And we're in a nice little studio.
Yeah, this is the nicest studio we've had yet.
There's a bathroom right there.
Outside of the radio station, which belonged to me.
Literally it figured it would.
Which belonged to none of us.
Oh yeah.
Go to the radio station.
Almost had it on the air, but then they changed PDs and the next PD was like,
I don't understand.
It's about cars.
Yes.
You know, the difference of having your own place studio-wise like this is now you're in complete control.
You know, you can't be like, oh, they got something going on.
So now we can't do it or they're changing something.
So now we can't do it or whatever.
Well, and the joke I've made to a couple of people is if I wanted to,
I could come down here and record in my underwear.
So there.
So congratulations to you.
Absolutely.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I appreciate that.
That's really cool.
The big 4-0.
Now I'm going to walk out of here and break my arm, pat myself on the back.
You should.
But 400 shows, man.
Think of all the cool people we've talked to.
Yeah.
And we've talked to a lot.
Like I said to Steve, we've talked to Peter Brock more than once.
Yeah.
Talked to Malcolm Brevin.
I remember talking to him.
Did we talk to Malcolm once or twice?
I remember at least once because it was kind of wild.
And that's what I kind of took.
I looked for Bricklands for a while.
There was even a couple that came across Facebook Marketplace.
You still see them?
I'm too far from here.
That's amazing how much I point those out now ever since.
Oh my God.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's a Brickland.
They're like, what?
Well, here's the deal with this car.
And then I just go into it.
Yeah.
Let me tell you about your front bumper.
And the wild thing about those, you know, people say that when you buy a car,
then you see every version of that car in traffic.
For us, I think it's if we talk to somebody about a car that they did,
and then we see those wherever we happen to be.
Malcolm Brickland.
Talk about another guy who's done a bunch of stuff.
But we've had, remember we had John Cramer on a whole bunch before he passed last year.
Yeah.
I really missed John, who's such a cool guy.
And he always had his bags packed.
And, you know, we've had Dave Kinney and Greg Ingold on from Haggerty Price Guide a bunch.
We've had Luke Chinnell, a professor in the McPherson College Restoration Program on a bunch.
We've had Amanda on when she can find time for us.
We've had the Kansas City Automotive Museum on.
Yeah.
We've had them on a bunch of times.
At this point, a lot of museums at this point.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We've had such fantastic guests on and such interesting people.
And I've learned a ton doing this.
I knew quite a bit when we started.
I know a whole lot more now.
And I say this a lot, and I usually say it before the end of the show.
This is still my favorite thing to do.
I love doing this show.
Well, 400 shows speak of that.
Well, if it wasn't something you loved doing, you wouldn't be 400 shows deep.
Sometimes finding guests can be a bear.
Sometimes, like right now, we've got a whole bunch of them lined up.
And also, as long as I'm thanking people, we need to thank Cindy Midal.
Cindy has been instrumental in finding us lots of great guests.
Also, Scott Black of Timepiece PR.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Scott has found us a lot of fantastic guests.
Usually, Shelby related.
It's odd that Cindy got a Steve and not Scott, but I'm sure had I asked Scott, he would have got, you know.
And we had guests who became hosts.
Vern was the first one.
Corey was another one.
We've had guests who were so good, they became hosts and we had them on the show for a really long time.
And Corey, thank you for coming back.
Vern, shame on you for not coming back.
This has been so much fun.
And we've gotten to have such cool guests on.
And we've had Greg Stanley on a couple of times.
We just had him on here.
We had him on last week, which will be a show.
Never mind.
You'll hear it soon.
You'll hear it.
And just, you know, I'm trying to think of everybody and my mind's just flooded with all the guests we've had.
400 shows deep, man.
How can you remember everything without it being written down on paper?
And almost everybody that we've had on the show, I've enjoyed having on the show.
Yeah.
You know, every now and then you'll get one where you're...
And even the ones we did enjoy, we did enjoy later.
Well, over beers.
We enjoyed.
And we thank you for being back because you still made it a good show.
We enjoyed later.
And Mark found a way to make them sound good.
Don't forget, by the way, as we're heading out to close the show, anybody needs a, you know, a trade-o?
Oh, that's right.
Yeah.
I'm going to put that...
I'm going to put a for sale sign in the window and if somebody wants to buy a quote-unquote
little mile antique 2000 Nissan XTERRA 4x4, that's a five speed.
Only antique in Missouri, not Kansas.
You got to go...
Nine more years.
It's got to be 35 years old.
Kansas is getting to be a pain in the ass.
I love you.
However, however, one of my motorcycles qualifies as antique this year, that 1990 Harley Heritage
that I'm still working on antique bike.
So, Brett at DrivenRadioShow.com.
That's right.
If you're like, I'm on ETT at DrivenRadioShow.com.
You can't live without that Nissan.
Do that.
And also, I'm going to take bids for names for the T-bird.
Now that I've got it running, it's almost like it's about time to give it a name.
You know, Sybil earned a name fairly early and fairly quickly.
And this T-bird, I just haven't been able to be in enough to get a feel for it.
And the T-bird's really nice and clean.
Tony.
And Steve.
Terry.
Tonya.
I've got some suggestion.
There's one T-Rex, W-R-E-C-K-S.
There's the Thunder Turd.
I've been called at the Thunder Chicken for a while.
The Ghost, but that's a little too classy.
The White Tanic.
There you go.
Because it's white.
And Betty Brick.
This is just a brick on wheels.
And if somebody else has recommendations, put it on our Facebook.
Another pair of guests or guests that we've had on a whole bunch,
Muffy and Gary Bennett.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And Muffy is the biggest T-bird head.
She is.
There is.
That might be somebody you need to consult on Thunderbird names.
Hey, Muffy.
You got some parts.
Hey, Muffy Bennett.
How does linkage work?
I bet she could tell you.
I bet she could.
Three ways to Sunday.
I bet she could tell you.
I was on the show for almost three years or something like that going.
I don't know how many episodes that was.
I'd have to look it up.
It was a while.
It was a little while.
I enjoyed every bit of it.
And like you said with guests, I would have never have guessed in my life.
No pun intended.
I never thought in my life that I would have been able to meet even half the people that
I've met through different radio show and with these guys.
And if you're not a long-time listener of different radio show right now,
you're just kind of coming in.
You need to go back and watch some of the or listen to the old shows.
Yeah, you'll find out how much better we got.
The Cannonball Runner guys, we had multiple of them on this show.
Oh, that's right.
We had Doug Tabott and Arne Toman on both.
And I'm trying to remember, is their record 25, 39 or 24, 39?
I know it's in the...
Wow, wait, is it 25?
It's in the mid-20s.
It's really, really fast.
And Doug sent me that terrific picture of their GPS with the quote saying,
at no time did we ever violate 192 miles an hour.
And on the GPS, they're doing a buck 92.
This is the best picture ever.
All the guys that we met through, Vin Wickey from having Ed Bolion on.
And also, Freddie and Tyler, we've both had on.
Oh, Rabbit when he was still here and we've got his license plate up on the studio wall.
But also Christopher Michaels and we've had him on a bunch of times.
What about the time we went out to...
We went out to Indianapolis and watched the go-kart in his backyard.
Travis Bell.
Yeah.
Travis Bell, one of the world's coolest human beings.
Yes, he is.
Who, despite his neighbor's persistent complaints, put up a giant go-kart track in his backyard
and had the backyard 400.
It was really, really cool.
And Cory and I went out to see that.
Just all these cool guests and all these people we've had on.
And it's been so stinking much fun and we've got to learn so much,
but we've also got to meet so many cool people.
And Cory, you were able to get kind of hooked up a little bit with it?
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Nice.
Yeah.
He camped out at Travis Bell's and we've gotten to meet so many cool people.
And just meeting you two?
That's right, Mark.
Good part.
Because you've been here.
I mean, I know you were there.
Going on background noise, baby.
But just with you two, it's been great.
It's nice to come back.
I know I've only been back a couple of times, maybe three times or so since I left the show.
But I mean, it's just been a pleasure, especially right now.
Well, maybe we ought to have you back more often.
Well, I probably wouldn't say no.
Fair enough.
There you go.
Even with all the car stuff, I think the cool thing about this show has been the people.
It really is.
And we've learned so much about the cars, but the people is...
Well, they make the cars just that much more fun.
Yeah.
The people are the real story here.
So, thank you to both of you.
I wouldn't have made it this far without you.
And thank you to all of our listeners from the bottom of my heart.
Thank you so very much for spending time with Driven Radio.
We love what we do and we wouldn't be able to do it without the support of our listeners.
You can find us online at DrivenRadioShow.com.
Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at Driven Radio Show.
And on LinkedIn as Driven Radio Show podcast.
If you have a story you would like to tell or someone you would like us to interview,
please contact me at Brett.
That's B-R-E-T-T at DrivenRadioShow.com.
Or if you'd like to buy Mark's used Nesonic Stara.
Yeah, please.
He's got to.
It's red and it's got a five speed and a stereo that mostly works usually.
Mostly works and they see that mostly doesn't.
But when the weather turns crappy, it's a great truck to have.
Amen.
And that's also Brett, B-R-E-T-T at DrivenRadioShow.com.
I am Brett Hatfield, thanking you all for sticking with us for 400 shows.
And for Mark Elgroves and Corey Pratt.
Keep grabbing.
Thank you for listening.
We'll see you next time here on Driven Radio.
About this episode
Steve Volk, executive director of the Shelby American Collection, joins Driven Radio to connect his unlikely path from dental school to pioneering data storage tech with his lifelong Shelby obsession. He explains building early hard drives and optical media, then shifts to the museum’s Shelby-focused story: Cobras, GT40s, and rare Shelby Mustangs, plus long-term loans and major expansions. The conversation also covers Tapcat Solutions, the nonprofit sweepstakes platform he founded, and a current giveaway of a low-mileage 2006 Ford GT. The hosts wrap with garage wins, show updates, and a few laughs.
Brett and Mark welcome Renaissance Man Steve Volk, Executive Director of the Shelby American Collection, to discuss his amazing background in the tech world, becoming interested in Shelby cars, his relationship with Carroll Shelby, and the extraordinary cars of the Shelby American Collection. Brett, Mark, and Corey celebrate the show’s 400th episode. All this and much more on Driven Radio Show!