If you are a truck guy or truck woman, the look of your truck is part of your truck world. Whether it is a big rig, half-ton, off-road, or family-groc
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If you are a truck guy or truck woman, the look of your truck is part of your truck world. Whether it is a big rig, half-ton, off-road, or family-grocery store ride, the looks of trucks have driven the truck scene as much as work performance and utility.
For many, it is the low truck that floats their boat … or drives their truck; and while the term “low truck” today, is often associated with skateboards, with the wheels sitting closer to the board, creating a tighter center of gravity, there is a real low truck culture on the truck scene, that many believe began with minitrucks or lowriders decades ago.
The “Lowrider” car culture began in Los Angeles, California, in the 1930s, gained following in the mid-to-late 1940s and flourished in the 1950s, as some trend-setting Mexican-American youths lowered blocks, cut spring coils, z'ed (zig-zag to lower the body) the frames and dropped spindles on their rides. Their goal was to show off their work and their style while cruising as slowly as possible for maximum show value: “Low and Slow” was their motto. Many early lowriders (who called themselves pachucos), didn't customize their cars and trucks for nights at the drag strip. Instead, they wanted cars to look good and be comfortable as they cruised the streets, hoping to gain local cred, and to impress girls. By redesigning these cars and trucks in ways that go against their intended performance purposes, and in painting their cars to reflect and hold meanings from their culture, lowriders created cultural and political statements that stood out then, and that hold over today in terms of style and lifestyle. Low truck enthusiasts have transcended single cultures, and have mainstreamed with continued growth and excitement burgeoning today.
Typically, a lowrider (also called a minitruck) is a customized car or truck with a lowered body. These customized vehicles generally feature individual paintjobs with bright, glossy paint, intricate, colorful designs, and roll on wire-spoke wheels with whitewall tires. Low truck owners often trick out their interiors with vibrant fabrics and finishes. The lowrider or low truck term describes a class of vehicle, not simply the height from ground to chassis, and one of the popular canvases of early low trucks were 1950s Chevy trucks.
This year’s Carlisle Truck Nationals, August 6-8 at the Carlisle (PA) Fairgrounds, pays homage to the low truck culture with “The Low Show at Carlisle”, spotlighting minitrucks, truck clubs, style and creativity. Among the low truck festivities scheduled are a Low Show Skating Parade, open drag runs, Low Truck Limbo Contest, showfield judging, tailgate parties and more.
Shannon Hipple, one of the driving forces behind “The Low Show” hasn’t missed a Carlisle Truck Nationals show since 1999. He got into minitrucks when he was 10 years old, when his parents bought a brand new 1990 Chevy S-10 longbed powered by a 4.3-liter V-6 with a manual 5-speed transmission. His mom’s daily ride, it became Hipple’s first car when he turned 16. Hipple said, “Right about that time, I worked with a kid named Scott, who had a Jeep Cherokee with 2-inch-x-12-inch JL Audio subwoofers, a set of 15-inch American Racing wheels and a neon kit. That is what got me into custom vehicles. So, like many of us in the mid-’90s, I put on just about every possible bolt-on accessory you could get at Pep Boys, the biggest amp I could afford from Radio Shack, and a set of 10-inch truck boxes. Next, I got a set of split 3-spoke 15-inch American Racing wheels and a set of fog lights for the truck. At one point, I probably had a mile of chrome pinstriping tape on it.”
Lowering his truck was next. Hipple said, “I started to notice lowered trucks, and a guy at my high school with a lowered truck put me in contact with his mechanic. After the mechanic installed a 3-inch/4-inch lowering kit on my S-10, I was hooked.” Since then, Hipple rebuilt it, tore it apart, rebuilt it again and began taking the truck to shows including the Carlisle Truck Nationals.
For Hipple, the show and the genre are about hanging out with his friends and the people he has met at shows over the years. He said, “It's the trucks that bring us together, but it's the people that make the scene what it is.”
The club scene at the show is also Hipple’s focus. He said, “I remember walking the field at Carlisle back in 1999 and the early 2000s, and saw trucks lined up all with the same logo on the front or back windows -- I thought it was the coolest thing. In my local area, there were only a handful of minitrucks, so it was awesome to see so many clubs all come together for the shows. My friends and I joined a local car club and in April 2004, we thought about starting our own club. At the local diner, we gathered all of our friends who had minitrucks and had our first club meeting, where we discussed rules and club names. After voting, we decided to name our club ‘Diverse Rides Truck Club’, which was ironic, because at the time, we all owned Chevy S-10s. Our vehicle tastes have changed, so in 2014, we dropped ‘Truck Club’ from our club name and open it to cars as well. We are now ‘Diverse Rides’ and we have about 15 members, just a small part of the Minitruckin Family.”
In the 22 years that Hipple has been coming to Carlisle for the Truck Nationals, Hipple, has seen relationships grow, dedication to the genre increase and creativity expand. This year's Carlisle Truck Nationals will feature trucks from about 20 clubs from all over the country, including such clubs as Acrophobia/East Coast Minis/Evil, Banzai Cruisers, Diverse Rides, Exceeding Limits, Freaks of Nature, Groundscrapers/Visual Reality, Grounded 4 Life, Local Finesse/Low Standards, Low on Air, Sunset, and Time-N-Money.
Low trucks and four-wheeled icons of all kinds are among thousands of trucks presented at the Carlisle Truck Nationals, Aug. 6-8 at the Carlisle (PA) Fairgrounds. Visitors can enjoy or actively be a part of one of the largest and most action-packed truck events in the world. They can see of show off lifted, lowered, classic, antique, modern, two- or four-wheel drive, jeeps, monster trucks, vans, big rigs or mini trucks, and discover trucks that span the decades, from original classics to the newest, latest and greatest models.
Visit www.CarlisleEvents.com for more on the automotive hobby.
Mike Blake, former editor of KIT CAR magazine, joined Carlisle Events as senior automotive journalist in 2004. He's been a "car guy" since the 1960s and has been writing professionally for about 30 years.
