In Wheel Time Podcast: Your Go-To Automotive Talk Show Apr 2, 2024

Driving Through Time: Vintage Cars, Family Bonds, and Collector Culture with Greg Riley

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Welcome to another In Wheel Time podcast, a 30-minute mini version of the In Wheel Time Car Show that airs live every Saturday morning 8 to 11 am Central.

It's the In Wheel Time Car Talk Show.

Greg Riley with Garage Deluxe joins us to talk about a collector car tour not too far away, Nope.

Also, Jeff has this week's racing calendar and Mr Morris has an in-depth review of the Infiniti QX55.

All right, Something tells me that that's a pretty nice vehicle.

Yes.

Very nice, very nice.

Yeah, there's something about that QX55 that just has a ring.

I like it Wasn't there a Cadillac 55 or something.

There was a lot of things in 55, yeah, I was already here.

Yeah, today's In Real Time is sponsored by Houston Mecham Auction, april 4th through the 6th at NRG Center.

Howdy, along with Mike out of this world, mars.

We need more Jeff Zekin, and I'm Don Armstrong, our engineer.

It Director of Engineering is what I have noted here.

David Ainsley is still in bed.

Yeah, he hasn't checked in with you yet, has he?

No, sir, he's sleeping in.

Randy Borchardine checked in.

It's been a while since we've had a chance to talk to him.

Paint house we need to talk to him.

Yeah, absolutely, he's been pretty busy.

He said Suze is hobbling in this morning.

She heard us or something.

Yeah, Smelled us, I probably.

We had donuts, so she's looking for donuts.

Yeah, exactly.

Well, look who's joined us now, ladies and gentlemen, here he is, greg Riley, good morning, and I have my headset on.

I heard you mentioning Mars and the headsets.

He said to make sure I had a headset, so I've got my headset on, so I'm official.

You are official, official something, but you know, whatever it is, that's what it is.

Good to see you, greg, how are you, my friend?

I'm doing great.

As a matter of fact, I was thinking earlier.

It's been two years since I was last on with you guys, Are you?

serious.

It's been two years, Two years and I've been really busy for the last two years have you Avoiding us.

Well, something happened today, because you're not too busy enough to talk to us.

Well, we're going to go play cars.

We adopted two kids, so the last two years have been taking up with adopting kids and integrating them into our family of now seven kids.

Well, congratulations Very good, holy Toledo, greg.

I mean, you know there's some sort of obviously some thing going on with you that you adopted kids.

I like it.

Can you name them all?

Well, let's see there's Katie, Brian, joni, brandon, colin, morgan and Wyatt.

I think I got them all, that's seven.

If you ask me the, birthdates, we're going to have problems.

Okay, now are they of driving age and you're going to get them all nice cars.

Well, we have five of the seven that are actually grown, and then we have a 10 and a 13-year-old, and I'm officially the oldest dad in the elementary school and I get called Grandpa all the time.

That's also technically true.

Well, very good, very nice.

Well, so Garage Deluxe.

You know, and I had to call Mars yesterday.

I said, you know, I can't find Garage Deluxe.

All I keep pulling up is these companies that do these really cool build-outs on Garage.

But I don't think Greg's that person.

He says, oh well, no, you can find us on Facebook though.

Garage DLX.

It's because the Euro Garage Deluxe is taken by a European garage band and I couldn't get that Euro.

Anyway, you can find us on Instagram and on Facebook.

Actually, my main website is GSRileycom, because I do a number of other things besides just the car stuff, so it's all integrated into one website.

Nice.

Okay, I'm writing this down as we speak.

Yeah, I am too, because I couldn't find anything.

And Morris says well, wait a minute, calls me back three hours later.

Well, I found it, it's GarageDLX.

I minute calls me back three hours later.

Well, I found it.

It's garage, dlx.

I was at home when you called.

I was on the road when you did.

You didn't say it was at the liquor store.

You know I gotta give you a hard time always.

So, Greg, tell me about this.

Collector car tour.

Well, we're doing a tour of historic Beaumont, texas, april 18th, 19th and 20th, and it's mostly pre-World War II cars, but we do have a few post-war cars.

You know, mostly when you think about these types of cars you think about the Concours type events where you see the cars on static display.

But the owners love to drive their cars just as much as the hot rodders and street rodders and other guys do, and so this is the fourth such tour that I've done that allows these guys to get together, have some camaraderie, eat some good food, go to some museums and have fun driving their cars.

And I jokingly call it the automotive luxury lifestyle, but that's really a misnomer because most of these guys, just like me, they spend most of their time under the hood breezy to keep these old Crocs running.

But it's a lot of fun and we've got some really fantastic cars lined up for the event.

Give me an example of some of the cars, Greg.

Well, we have a 1929 Packard Roadster, a 1936 Chord 810 muscleback I forgot the exact name of it.

We have a 1937 Mercedes.

I was just going to ask is that that red one?

Yes.

Yeah, okay.

What we're doing is we're rolling the pictures that you sent Mike while you're talking.

Yeah, we got that yellow one up with the hood up right now.

Oh, that's a LaSalle, that's a 1940 LaSalle and we also have a 1957 Rolls-Royce.

And I'll be bringing my 1957 Ford Skyliner which you guys may remember a long time ago, when I was on the radio program I drove it down to the radio station.

But that's been a long time ago and a lot of cars ago.

But we're going to have a lot of fun and the folks over in Beaumont have really rolled out the red carpet for us.

We're promising local media coverage by the CBS affiliate, and the various museums and stops that we're going to make have really gone up the way to accommodate us.

It might probably be the same way with the McFadden Ward House, which was built by an oil baron in 1903.

And that's one of our major stops and they're going to allow us on the driveway on the grounds.

Nobody gets to do that.

So we're going to get to do that, which is a lot of fun.

And there's a number of different stops we're going to make.

I could go through them all but coincidentally the Cars and Coffee event over there on the silos is going on the morning of Saturday the 19th, and so we're going to go out there and join all the hot rodders and street rodders and they're not going to be expecting us, but I think they're going to get quite a kick out of what we show up with.

They're crashing to party.

Exactly how fun.

Are you going to take any Corvairs over there?

You know, I don't have a Corvair running currently, although I have two sitting in my garage.

Okay, and, as you know, I have quite a history of those cars and I do a lot of work for other people and I'm actually in the process of building a 150-horsepower turbocharged engine for a club member.

It's going to be really nice and it's kind of a legacy thing.

The car belonged to his dad and he wants to keep it forever and have fun with his kids and pass it along, so we're going to make it really, really nice is it uh?

is it what year?

Is it?

63 convertible 63 little square body one yeah, the little, the earlier ones, that yeah, I know you're a fan of the later ones, at 65 to nines and I've got a 65 as well and uh.

So anyway, we have fun with forbearers, but I like all kinds of cars.

I mean, you know I'm.

I don't think I ever met a car that I didn't like.

I've been doing this since I was 10 years old and I'm not ashamed to tell you that I'm coming up on my 62nd birthday in about six weeks.

Well, I think a birthday spanking is in order.

I'm not going to give it to you, but I think we could probably line up somebody that could.

My wife already has that plan.

It won't be a problem, I got it.

We're going to have a lot of fun and go to a lot of interesting places.

We're going to go to the Fire Museum of Texas.

You know they used to call Beaumont the museum capital of Texas and it's probably not top of mind when you think of somewhere to go and have fun and play with your cars.

But there's some amazing things to see and do over there and some very interesting history.

As a matter of fact, one of our local heroes, which is a Wildcat oil man during the 1930s, owned three Duesenbergs.

He bought three Duesenbergs too.

Well, that's not something you typically associate with Beaumont Texas.

You don't think about Duesenbergs and Beaumont Texas in the same sentence, but that's a real thing.

So we're going to tell people about that history and kind of tell you how all that came to be.

And I grew up over there and Mike grew up over in the Gova Triangle area as well.

But one of the things that I experienced as a kid is there was a lot of money over there, so there was a lot of interesting cars.

When I grew up they tended to be more towards muscle cars and luxury cars.

I used to say that the city was awash with Eldorados and Fleetwoods and things like that.

There you go.

And my dad actually owned a couple of gas stations, so I spent a lot of time during my youth with my dad servicing these cars and he used to play a game with me called Identify the Car.

So during slack times we would sit in front of the gas station and as the cars came by, I had to identify what they were.

So, anyway, front of the gas station, and as the cars came by, I had to identify what they were.

And so, anyway, that's what kind of started all this for me, and I'll tell you a little bit about folks, a little bit about that, when they come on the tour.

Well, I do know that there is a Spindletop Oil Museum over there as well.

I know that I visited that, actually did a video over there, and they had a very cool, I guess, a 40s era gasoline tanker truck that delivered gas to the gas stations back in the day, completely restored in a tight barn in there and I thought, man, would I love to have that.

Now.

That would be a great vehicle to take on the collector car tour.

Yes, I think you're thinking of the Texas Energy Museum in downtown Beaumont and they have a lot of interesting vehicles in there and you mentioned the tanker truck, but they also have some horse-drawn tankers in there as well.

And in addition to that there is what is now known as the Boomtown Museum.

When I was a kid they called it Gladys City, but it's a recreated Boomtown Museum from the Spinneltop era and they have a gusher out there, kind of our finale Saturday evening, because they're going to blow the gusher for us.

The Lucas gusher spewed oil 150 feet in the air for nine days because they didn't know how to cap it.

And I tell people that you don't necessarily think of Beaumont in the automobile industry in the same sentence, but they grew up together.

When the Lucas Gusher came in, it kind of proved that gasoline or oil was plentiful and cheap and up until that time, you know, there was kind of a battle between steam cars, electric cars and gasoline cars and it proved that the ability to produce gasoline inexpensively and abundantly was going to be a thing.

And in fact the ExxonMobil refinery over there, which was then called the Magnolia Refinery I believe I'm saying this correct is the oldest continuously operating refinery in the country, if not the world.

I had no clue, but I do know that John Hovis has a Magnolia sign in the Hmi hideout, so, uh, we knew that it did exist.

Um is is.

Is this a club garage deluxe?

Is it a club?

well, garage deluxe is kind of my online presence.

Um, it's uh, you know it's it's kind of a virtual garage as well as my real garage, and it's just kind of a way for me to share my passion for cars with, uh, with my friends, and you know I do a lot of actual work on cars, but it's also a virtual garage.

It's kind of a virtual gathering place, if you will, and I gosh, I've been using that name for going on 20 years now and, uh, it's a lot of fun and I have a number of followers on facebook and instagram.

But, you know, you guys are you guys are serious journalists.

Okay, I'm a guy with grease under my fingernails just having fun in my garage and sharing my passion with my friends, and that's really what the Garage Deluxe thing is all about.

Yeah, well, we're really of the elite.

That's what we are.

We're up there.

We're the elite garage.

No, we're not.

We're not even supposed to be here.

No, we're not.

We're not even supposed to be here.

No, we just kind of fell into this garage and we started doing a car talk show, and somehow we're still doing it.

I'm not exactly sure why you mentioned the various clubs, and so we have members of the Antique Automobile Club of America, the Classic Car Club of America, the Sports Car Club of America that are going to be part of this thing, and we're going to get to do a couple of private garage tours.

There's a gentleman over in Beaumont whose name I won't mention, but he has a garage full of supercars and we're going to go see his supercar collection.

And then I have some friends that are part of this Lemons Racing effort and we're going to visit their Lemons Racing garage, and that's just a couple of things that we're going to do.

It's not all about just museums and things like that.

You know really what this is about is about a group of guys getting together and playing cars.

We just play with stuff that's a little older and weirder than some of the stuff that you're probably familiar with.

Well, so am I invited in my 23-year-old Corvette.

You absolutely are, absolutely okay.

Basically, the only thing that we're excluding and it's not we're not trying to be exclusionary is we're not including, uh, hot rods, uh, street rods and modern muscle cars and things like that, and the reason for that is those guys have plenty of events cars and coffee events, uh, power tours etc, etc.

so this is kind of for a different group of people that they don't really have as much of an outlet to show and drive their cars.

They tend to be maybe a little bit older cars or, in some instances, a little bit more valuable, but it's a way that those guys can go and have fun driving their cars in a group.

It's kind of like when you see the group of Harleys you see 30 Harleys, except we're a bunch of gray old guys driving really old weird stuff that nobody ever sees, and with the pictures that we were showing of that, of what you sent Mike, it seems like there's a great Gatsby kind of theme, with all the older cars and people are dressed in the period of that vehicle, the women have the long flowing dresses, the mansions and things.

So to me it's a great Gatsby kind of look, absolutely.

And the Texas Venture Society is going to come out and mention costume.

Some of those folks are going to come out in costumes and join us in various parts of the tour.

So this is going to be great fun and it's not the typical thing that you see when you think of car show or people having a car show.

Well, I have to tell you that I'm going to be dressed in costume too, but I'm not going to tell you what that is.

Scott's going to tell you what period that is.

Oh my God.

I'm worried he's going to come as one of these furries, in a bunny suit or something.

We don't discriminate, okay.

Listen, I got a really nice pair of red pumps that I'm just dying to let everybody see.

And it is Easter, so who knows?

Yeah, it is Easter, there's no doubt about it.

Well, it is Easter, there's no doubt about it.

Well, it sounds like a great time.

Craig, how many cars guys are you expected to bring the iron out, as it were?

Our limit is 20 cars because we're visiting some private homes and some museums.

If you have 20 cars, you have a group of 40 people.

I think we're sitting on about 13 right now and we've got a little less than a month to go, so I think we're going to hit the full 20.

There's a newsletter that went out today inviting people and, of course, you guys, so if anybody would like to take part in the tour, they can send me an email at greg at gsreillycom, g-s-r-i-l-e-ycom, and I'll send them entry information.

There is no charge for the tour at all.

We'll go to the restaurant, so it'll be separate checks.

The only thing we're going to pass the hat for is we're going to have boxed lunches at Wuthering Heights Park over there, which is a really nice park with plenty of parking and shade and all that, and we're going to have a nice lunch there catered by a local deli, and I'll pass the hat for that.

But other than that, there's no charge at all to participate.

You can participate in some of it, all of it or none of it.

Whatever you want to do, we're going to accommodate you wonderful fun.

Three weeks away, and it's the garage deluxe collector car tour and uh, they're going to make a run over there at the beaumont area, historic beaumont, texas.

You're familiar with that, aren't?

you mars, yeah, and, and he sent, he sent me the information.

You're going to dig out something of your collection and take it.

Well, I'd like to at least stop by and see some things.

I think that old lawnmower of yours would probably be okay.

And you can dress like Rhett.

Butler.

I have a hat.

Let me tell you, I have a hat.

Well, you're going to have to get the dye out, maybe a wig, but whatever the case may be, I got my little stock cap, like the British sports cars got.

Oh yeah, yeah, A derby, that's what I'll have my little floppy hat A little derby Got it.

Greg, it's great to talk to you, my friend.

Thank you for having me on.

I really appreciate it.

It's good to see you, and.

I hope it won't be.

Yeah, congratulations on the adoptions.

Yeah, thank you.

Thank you very much, john.

Thank you, talk to you soon.

Greg Riley Garage Deluxe Collector Car Tour April 18th those are some good pictures Find out all about it at Garage DLX on Facebook.

Okay, yep, all right.

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Mecham Auctions, the world's largest collector car auction company, returns to Houston Texas.

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From avid collectors to those new to the Mecham experience.

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Well, leave it to me to punch the wrong button.

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We were having a conversation about some studio adjustments that we're going to make.

Welcome back to the In Wheel Time Car Talk Show Time now for the racing calendar.

Oh that's me.

About this episode

Greg Riley from Garage Deluxe shares insights about an upcoming collector car tour in historic Beaumont, Texas, featuring pre-World War II vehicles. The discussion touches on the camaraderie among car enthusiasts, the unique cars expected at the event, and the rich automotive history of Beaumont. Greg also shares personal anecdotes about his family and his passion for cars, emphasizing the joy of driving and maintaining vintage vehicles. The episode includes a review of the Infiniti QX55, highlighting its luxury features and performance.

BMW X4 Cadillac Eldorado Cadillac Fleetwood Chevrolet Corvair Chevrolet Corvette Genesis GV70 Infiniti QX55

Original notes

As the engine purrs and the leather gleams, we sit down with Greg Riley of Garage Deluxe for a ride through the golden age of automobiles, all while reveling in his heartwarming tale of expanding his family through adoption. This episode is a rich tapestry of emotions and engine oil, blending the love of collector cars like the 1929 Packard Roadster and the 1936 Cord 810 with the joy of new family ties. We immerse ourselves in the art of keeping history alive with these mechanical marvels, gearing up for the much-anticipated Beaumont collector car tour—an event that promises to transport us back in time.

Don your flapper dress or pinstripe suit for a roaring good time as we pull back the curtain on an exclusive vintage car tour and costume event. With a nod to F. Scott Fitzgerald, we recount the intimate gathering, capped at 20 cars to ensure a personal and timeless experience, complete with a catered lunch and no fee to participate. We weave through the fabric of auto enthusiast culture, from the cherished work of God's Garage to the anticipation of future races, including a peek at the racing calendar's upcoming events. Strap in for a journey that's not just about the cars, but the stories they carry and the community they build.

Be sure to subscribe for more In Wheel Time Car Talk!

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