Fast N' Loud

Right now on "fast n' loud"...

Hot rod hunter Richard rawlings

and master mechanic Aaron Kaufman

get their hands on a cream puff '78 cutlass.

I wanna build a traditional-style lowrider.

All right, vatos, let's get to it!

But as the monkeys tackle

their first ever hydraulic build...

I like.

Aaron's new take on old tech might raise a few eyebrows...

Think I'll soon be doing interior like that?

...and leave them down in the dumps.

Yikes. It should be a lowrider right now, and it's not.

Meanwhile, Richard tracks down a rare prewar Mercedes...

Let's look at the hydros.

...but a '64 impala lowrider packs a bigger surprise.

Oh. Aaron's gonna laugh at me on this.

It's a crazy week of ups and downs

that could have the monkeys singing for joy...

...or leave them sinking to rock bottom.

**

Dang it. I was really countin' on this one.

captions paid for by discovery communications

all right, kemo sabe.

I hope you got a good reason for dragging me out into this mess.

Oh, yeah. I got a good one.

I mean, you been, you know, botherin' me a bit

to try to build a lowrider or somethin' like that.

- So... - Uh, yeah.

Well, I got a car that could be just right for that kinda thing.

- It's a '78 cutlass... - It's a little one.

- Yeah. - Yeah.

That, uh, has always been garaged.

Super-nice car. Clean, runs, drives,

does every single thing it's supposed to do.

- So I figure... - That's a...

That's a good body to do it with.

I think so, too. Love to see it.

Well, that's where we're goin'.

So Aaron's been kinda bugging me the last few months

about maybe wantin' to build a-a lowrider.

You know, once he gets somethin' in his head

and he starts stewin' on it and then he kicks me a few times.

I'm like, "well, that's right."

We built a lot of different kind of cars,

a lot of times very low.

But one thing we've never done is really built a, uh,

a traditional-style, uh, lowrider.

I want a car that is... Is a nice car to drive,

is a fun car to drive, but is by all definitions a lowrider,

one that uses hydraulics and much smaller wheels.

Really?

After doin' a little research, I realized there was

a whole Lotta lowriders out there in the lowrider community.

You know, not quite as many as the hot rod community,

but it's still a big market.

I know that we can build anything in our shop.

And... and we do a damn good job of...

Of anything that we attempt.

If we an crack that nut, well, business could explode.

I'm thinkin' he's right up...

Let's see what he's got.

So, if this cutlass turns out to be the right car,

I might just be ready to take this leap.

- Hey, hi, Richard. - What's goin' on, sir?

- How are you, sir? - Good to see ya.

- How you doin', man? Hey. - Aaron. How are you?

- What's goin' on? - So you got a cutlass, huh?

Yeah.

I'm Javier vazquez.

A few months ago,

I bought a model a from gas monkey garage,

and I was thinking of selling my mom's car.

- It's green. - That's all right.

That one doesn't have enough miles on it, man.

You gotta start drivin' that thing.

- Yeah. - '78 cutlass.

Wow. You say this was your mom's car?

Yeah. She don't drive anymore.

Dude, there's not a crack in here. Wow.

Looks pretty good from over here.

Hey, open the hood.

Cool. Let me fire it up.

Your mama knew how to take care of a car.

Dude, this thing is clean.

He's got a beautiful car. This is an amazing car.

It'd be a great car to drive, great car to own,

most importantly, a great car to cut up.

Aside from the faded paint,

I do... I can't imagine findin' one much cleaner.

Well, um, how much do you want for it?

Uh, how 'bout five?

- Five hundred? - Five g's.

Five g's. God.

Jeez. Um, I don't know.

I mean, it seems like I used to buy these cars

for about $500 or $600 when I was in high school.

If you're just talkin' about a '78 cutlass, I mean,

it's probably worth $1,500 if it runs and drives.

But when we got over here and saw this one,

it's a really nice car.

So him asking $5,000 for it is probably about what it's worth.

But I need to get it a little bit cheaper than that

because I'm not real sure

how the, uh, lowrider resale community goes.

How about, uh, how 'bout 2,000 bucks.

Come on, man.

- I'm tryin'. - It's what was my mother's car.

I can't do that.

- Um... - Come on, man. '78.

- It's green. - It is green.

- Yeah. - You know me and green.

I'm... I'm... I'm a freak about that.

Um, I don't know, Javier. How 'bout about 2,500?

The list price is 35.

God, it seems like a lot

for a car like this, but...

You know, the paint's in fine condition, right?

The car runs well. It looks great.

It's not rusted. I don't know. I-I...

I got ya. All right, my man.

3,500 it is.

- You take cash, don't you? - Yep.

All right. Cool.

- Here you go, my man. - Thank you.

- Appreciate it. - Yeah.

Well, let's get this thing loaded, Aaron.

- I'm not loading anything. - We're not gonna load it?

- Well, he said it drives. - All right.

- So... - I'll race you back.

I love good, original cars like this.

I mean, his mom had it for long time.

Super nice. It's not all messed up.

Just a perfect car to launch us into this new arena.

To settle down at $3,500, I think I got a really good deal.

- Thank you, Javier. - See you.

I'm really excited about the prospect of this build

because, if we don't do anything else, we love to experiment.

This is really all about satisfying my curiosity.

I've been curious about playing with hydraulics

for a long time.

But curiosity killed the cat, I thought.

Well, it's a good thing I'm not a cat.

There you go.

All right, you slackers. Time to get to work.

All right. What mess are they bringin' us now?

Check it out. '78 cutlass.

Little old lady drove it to church on sundays.

This car is pretty daggum nice.

It's hard to tell right now from all the, uh,

the accumulation of moisture on the outside the car.

But I couldn't be more impressed with the quality of the car.

Yeah, well, uh, vato, why don't you tell him

what you're thinking of doing?

I want to build a traditional-style lowrider.

- My latino side just went "Ahh!" - Yep.

- So... - I thought you were Italian.

I'm mex-Italian. Half...

He makes it up every day. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Exactly.

So, like I said, we're gonna build a lowrider.

But I want the thing to ride and handle.

I want the car to drive right.

And I don't wanna have to compromise my vehicle

to have hydraulics.

So lowriders have been around for a quite a long time.

It's hard to say exactly when they started,

but one thing's for sure is that they've always been evolving.

The most notable improvement

was when they started adapting aircraft hydraulics

to the suspension of their cars.

And that's really when the fun started.

Like most things, if a little bit's good,

a whole lot's better.

And when it came to hydraulics and Springs and hopping the car,

it really just kind of turned the cars

into a bit more of a toy and less of a vehicle.

It's a lot of fun, but it's also hell on the cars and the riders.

That's why I think it's time to put a gas monkey spin on it.

So is thing gonna, uh, like, three-wheel?

- No. - What?

I don't want... you know...

Ri... ridin' around in the lowriders.

- Covered wagon. - 'Cause I'd really like

to have one that looks the part, sounds the part,

but I don't want it to act the part.

I want it to act like one of our other vehicles.

Does that mean lowrider paint job?

- Yeah. - Can we do all the...

Like the lace, and the boxes, and the lines and the...

Sure. Gotta remember,

lowrider paint jobs are way more involved

than a lot of the hot rod stuff. But still...

You know, I think the sides of the cars look really good on it.

And you just want to freshen up,

maybe paint the whole thing... That's it.

Back to the original color and then do the roof.

Do the hood, the roof and the deck lid

and come out with somethin' really, really nice.