IRON TRAP BUILDS
Here you’ll find our past and present cars we’ve owned and built. You’ll also find our current project cars you’ll see on the channel.
The Car that “started it all” for ITG. This was one of the first cars on the channel and holds a special place in our hearts. This car was built up from a pile of parts by Matt before the channel really was even started. The car earned its nickname after Matt found it at the Wheels of Time street rod show swap meet where the seller stated the car was a local “barn find” before he tore it apart and was supposedly always a “Berks County” car. Possibly the most famous landmark in Berks County, PA is the Pagoda ( as seen on our early logo) and some call Reading, PA the “Pagoda City” and the rest is history! The 1930 Model A Coupe was built as an “east coast” style car with a 5.5” channel and no chop. It features a 1941 Flathead that has been bored out, ported and relieved with a Weber cam. A 1939 Ford trans and 1946 Ford banjo rear moves the car down the road. The chassis was custom built by Matt while working at Eastwood and can be seen in some of their videos he did while employed there. The Coupe sports a 3” Mor-Drop front axle with 1935 Ford 16” wire wheels all around with replica Lyons spun wheel covers. The rubber rake is created by using 7.50-16 and 5.50-16 Firestone pie crust tires all around.
This is the car that jump started the ITG YouTube Channel. Even before Matt finished the Pagoda City Coupe he was dreaming of a roadster project. This all started with a smashed up pink 52 Cadillac bought for $500 at an auction for the engine. Years later Matt found a 1930 Model A Roadster at an estate auction (notice a pattern here?). Unfortunately he lost the car to an internet bidder and went home with some other stuff. That following week he was alerted that the winning bidder expected the car to be a lot nicer and backed out on the sale. After making a deal with the auctioneer and the widow he was able to purchase the car for his back up bid. The widow proceeded to tell him that her husband bought the car in the 1960’s and they used drive the car around when they were dating. He used to come pick his sweetheart up in the car and even though they parked the car it was kept all these years. The SweetHeart Roadster was born in that moment! The car has changed a lot since it was brought home and sports a ton of custom body mods including a restyled body lines on the cowl, 32 Ford firewall, Duvall windshield originally for a 36 Ford, custom built doors, wheel wells, dash, etc. The engine is still a 331 Cadillac bored, custom grind cam, adjustable isky rockers, and some other modifications. The trans is a 1937 Lasalle with a 1936 Ford rear in the back. The entire bottom of the body has been remade so that it follows the 1932 Ford chassis that it sits on. The idea was to make the body look like it came from the factory this way. The car is built in a nostalgic manner with the idea that it was an early hot rod that was changed with the styles until it landed on this version roughly between 1958-1962. The idea for this car is to be one “right out of the little books”
This car was a full build from start to finish on the ITG channel and was used as an example of what you can build out of a rough body and a small budget. Contrary to popular belief this car didn’t get its “Free” name from the entire build costing us no money. It came from he body being a acquired for free off of Facebook Marketplace and the frame rails being free after we pulled it from the “garden” at our friend Pete Trumbauer’s house. Aside from the interior, engine machine work, and the paint application everything was done in-house at ITG. The body started life as a 1919 Ford Model T Touring (4 seater car). About 10-15% of the original un-modified body remains. The front seating area was cut out of the car and the back half/seating area of the car was slid forward to make it a roadster with extra room. A smoothed out 1925 Ford Model T turtle deck and sectioned 1932 Ford grill were added. Matt built custom doors from scratch, new lower quarter panels. Lower cowl panels and much more to give it a “factory” roadster look. It utilizes the original rear suicide door hinges and latches. The frame rails are from a 46-48 Ford and have been shortened over a foot and the frame rails sectioned front and rear to proportionally fit the car. The crossmembers are a mix of Model A ford and custom. The front axle is a 3” dropped Model A axle by Kohler Kustoms. The engine is a 59AB Ford Flathead built to “full house flatty” specs. 3-3/8 bore, 4” Mercury crank, ported, relieved, big valves, Isky 404A radius tappet cam, Edelbrock Block Letter heads and 3x2 intake with chrome Stromberg 97’s with Scott velocity stacks. A 1939 trans and rear move the car. The custom headers were dreamed up by Matt and built by his good friend Ben DeAngeli. The interior was done by J.Somic upholstery.
The Forgotten Hot Rod is a 1939 Ford Tudor with a Ford Yblock that ITG rescued from a local salvage yard where it stay for a very long time. The car was a mild hot rod that was last on the road in 1957/58. It was a typical “daily driver hot rod” of the 50’s and 60’s. It was repainted (multiple times), had some funky seat covers, and a “modern” drivetrain installed. We saved the car from certain death and basically did what we call a “sympathetic restoration”. We replaced the entire bottom of the car with new sheet metal, restored the frame/mechanicals, and installed a fresh 1955 Tbird 292 Yblock, and gave it some attitude with a drop axle and staggered big and little tires. The car retained a stock transmission and rear. The interior was then spruced up by recovering the seats with a pleated ox blood/black color combo. In the end we sold ‘39 on EBay and none other than David Freiburger bought it and proceeded to do an episode of Roadkill where himself and Mike Finnegan drove it nearly a thousand miles. The car was then sold to a Roadkill collector afterwards and is in a private collection.
n 2020 the ITG crew helped the Schroll family organize and promote a large collector car and parts auction. During this procedure Matt was able to purchase two vehicles and this red 1934 Ford Tudor was one of the picks. The car was purchased by Larry Schroll in 1970 off a used car lot and promptly parked and taken apart until we found it. We tracked down the history and found that the car was originally built by Barry Skelly over through the 1960’s the car was built. It has a 1955 Chevy 265 V8 with an adapter and the original 1934 transmission and rear. The exterior was painted “Corvette Red” and the interior dash and trim was painted “Corvette White”. The car still wears its original pleated interior and is in great condition. We mainly did a mechanical “revival” replacing worn out parts and only making a few changes. These changes helped improve the styling of the car with the addition of a vintage filled and dropped front axle and a change in tire sizes (8.20-15 & 5.60-15) to give it the “rake” it needed. The car is a perfect time capsule for what early Street Rods looked like in the 1960’s. This car has been sold and is in a private collection in Texas.
The second car in our purchases from the Larry Schroll Estate is this 1932 5W Coupe that was the car that Larry owned consecutively for the longest. The 32 was purchased as a “well used” hot rod in 1963. The car was originally built and raced in the Frederick, MD area where it drag raced at the airport drags in the 1950’s. It had a 312 Yblock back then with a 1954 Ford rear with 4.11 gears and welded spider gears. Larry opted to install an early Olds J2 engine in the car with the matching transmission but he never finished the car. It sat for many years outside until roughly the 1990’s when he moved it to his East Berlin garage where we found it. We were lucky enough to find a lot of the original parts from the car within Larry’s collection. The grill, chrome garnish molding, headlights and stands, and more were found. Matt proceeded to do what we call a “sympathetic restoration”. This includes saving as much of the original metal, paint, and parts as we can while correcting any poor engineering or safety concerns. The entire floor and substructure was fabricated from scratch and it still retains its 10” channel job. The rusted and stuck engine was replaced with a 1954 Olds 324 and a 1937 Lasalle transmission still mated to the 1954 Ford rear. We opted for a center section and 3:31 gears out of an automatic Ford of the same era for street use. Matt was also able to strip off the old black primer put on the car before Larry bought the car and save most of the 1950 Ford Sportsman Green paint. Under the black primer we also found the original “A/G” and racing class and numbers. The car retains its original filled grill shell and radiator combo. Overall the appearance is very similar to its original look probably when it was built many years before Larry got it. We’ve only changed the stance and wheel/tire combo to something a little more streetable.
In 2021 Matt bought a collection of 1934 Ford cars and parts and this car was the one that we chose to “resurrect”. The car was bought in the 1960’s by the gentleman that owned the collection while stationed in California in the military. He found the car in the LA times and the elderly original owner was selling it. Clara Spencer answered his call and after visiting once or twice he was able to buy the car and bring it back to Michigan where he resided. The car had been a daily driver and was garage kept all of its life. Aside from dents and scratches from use the car is nearly 100% rust free. We ended up replacing the engine with a 1936 LB engine and lowering the car very slightly with some staggered tires to give it just a touch of attitude. Matt later removed the house paint that was on the top layer to uncover most of the original paint (and flaking paint that probably caused Clara to repaint it) to give a unique survivor look. The car has been sold to a private collector in Germany where it now lives.
This car is another real deal old hot rod that Matt was able to purchase from a newspaper ad in a local farmers newspaper. This car is an old hot rod that was chopped and channeled back in the day. We believe it originally was from the Harrisburg, PA. It’s chopped about 3” and channeled approximately 5”. Matt hand built new floors and substructure for the car and restyled the sectioned 1940 dash that was already in the car. The original frame is still intact with only minor modifications. The engine is a Ford Flathead 59AB bored to 3-5/16 with a 4” Mercury crank and an original set of Ardun heads to convert the engine to overhead valves. This engine also sports an early large Italmeccanica Supercharger. Behind engine is a chrome 1937 Lasalle transmission and an early Frankland Quickchange rear made from an original Ford banjo rear. The front axle is a chrome 1937 Ford V8-60 tube axle with 1940 Ford V8-60 “skinny” front wheels with 5.00-16 tires and replica 18” Ford accessory High Clearance or “milk truck” wheels with Firestone “half tread” Indy replica tires in 8.00-18.
The Delorean roadster was saved from a dilapidated old garage in Detroit, MI. The roadster was originally built as a hot rod in the late 1940’s or early 1950’s. In roughly 1952 Jack Delorean went to California to visit family with a pocket full of cash to buy a 32 roadster. He bought it off a used car lot that specialized in second hand hot rods and customs. The car had trouble on the way home to Detroit and Jack had his brother John help him get the money to have the car towed home. Once back in Detroit Jack had his other brother George build a hot Flathead and he went street racing on Woodward ave in roughly 1952/53. After he was done with the car he pulled the engine and sold it to Ron Semak in about 1953/4. Ron then was the care taker until we found it. He changed the wheels and tires and had big plans for it but sadly he never got it back on the road. This car is a true survivor and Matt and crew have replaced the entire underside of the car and restored the chassis and as many original parts as possible. This is another one where we did a “sympathetic restoration”. Once again this car sports a hot Flathead with a high rise Jack Henry intake, Federal Mogul Copper Bronze heads, a 39 ford trans, and a Columbia 2spd rear.
The Mercury is a true “survivor” that ITG pulled out of long time storage in a very old sand-floor garage in southern New Jersey. This car was in the family since the 1960’s and was last driven in the 90’s to the grandsons prom. It was then parked (from overheating from what we can tell) until we found it. The car is a time warp with mostly original paint, original interior, and almost zero rust. We proceeded to replace the frozen original flathead with a 1940 Flathead with a Winfield SU1A cam, Fenton high compression heads, Fenton 2 carb intake with two Strombergs, and a Lucas dual point distributor. The car was also lowered slightly with an original set of accessory bubble skirts installed. We replaced the original hubcaps with vintage “flipper” hubcaps and cleaned the car up visually.
This car started life as a pile of parts. Matt got the call that a friend of our friend Pete Trumbauer’s was selling an abandoned project. The 32 roadster body has a lot of the major parts and was nearly rust free but was missing a door, chassis and some other parts. After finding all of the missing parts Matt decided to build the car as a West Coast 50’s inspired hot rod. The 3w sports an original 32 ford frame, old chrome front drop axle and chrome banjo rear axle. The drivetrain is a 1955 Lincoln Yblock dressed up with chrome Edmunds Speed Equipment and a 1937 Lasalle transmission. This is one of the many project cars we’re building for the channel and will evolve over time.
The idea with this “shop truck” was to use extra parts we had kicking around to build a “Jalopy Shop truck” We used photos of the dry lakes from the 1940’s as inspiration and set off to build a simple truck using 99% vintage and original parts. We started with a 1928 RPU body and frame we pulled out of a barn on ranch in Texas. We then used a 1937 Ford Flathead with an original McCulloch Supercharger kit we found in an old engine builder’s garage in North Carolina. The final cherry on top was an original 1932 Auburn dash and gauge panel we found in an old closed down salvage yard. The truck uses a 1936 Ford 3 speed trans, a 1940 Ford rear and hydraulic brakes all around. The chrome windshield is chopped 2” and laid back to give it that “fast when sitting still” look. The truck gets its “attitude” from an old Mor-Drop front axle, a rearched Model T rear spring, and 7.50-16 and 5.50-16 tire combo on 40 Ford wheels. Driving this truck is like stepping back in time and every creak, rattle, and squeak is just like it would have been driving your hot rod to the dry lakes in the 1940’s
Mike's 34 Cabriolet, or Crapiolet, was found in Michigan in 2021 when Matt bought a large collection of 32 Fords. The body was in pieces in the loft of one of the barns on the property. We are not sure where the body came from but it was a heavily channeled hot rod before it was taken apart. Using an extra frame and floor from the same estate Matt and Mike pieced the body back together, in stock form. Mike's plan is to make a super simple hot rod, with a few small touches to make it unique. The cabby is powered by a 37 21 stud flathead, with a stock trans and banjo rear end. A nice rubber rake and drop axle has the car sitting just right.