wow. impressive book :thumbup: :thumbup: 2 thumbs up.

 

Very cool. I'm always amazed by the wealth of knowledge this site has. Thank you for this, Dewey and Jon!

 

Sorry, didn't see this thread so I posted about it in the Lounge. Great work you guys! :thumbup:

 

Thanks for the comments guys. And for the lounge post by It1silverhawk.

This book was clearly a collaborative effort and I am hugely indebted to Jon for the many many hours, days and weeks he put in to edit and fine tune my original text as well as assisting with the images and layout.

It should also be pointed out that New Interiors (Randy) was an integral part of this effort with his many pictures (see chapters 6 and 7) and the great scratch-built cars he has shared with us all here on the site.

 

It should also be pointed out that New Interiors (Randy) was an integral part of this effort with his many pictures (see chapters 6 and 7) and the great scratch-built cars he has shared with us all here on the site.

That doesn't surprise me. It's his MO also, and he strikes me as a very cool guy. I think that when it comes down to it, the idea is genius and that it revolves around the two beautiful rods you've hand crafted is testament to its helpfulness. Truth in advertising, eh? :thumbup:

 

I've saved this up as a .pdf file as I read things like this at random times. Great work! ONLY with permission, I may share the files, but be warned, the single copy is 15 megs or each chapter is around 1 meg with many chapters. Like stated, without permission, it'll sit right here. Again, this is a great piece of work and thanks for offering it!

 

Dewey - I just thumbed through a couple chapters, and the wealth of information is amazing. With this bit of inspiration, just might have to fire up the TurboCad (err, learn to use it better that is ) to see what can be done

Congratulations on this work

Dave W

 

I've saved this up as a .pdf file as I read things like this at random times.

You raise a good point, KMatch. Jon and I both felt quite strongly that this book, and any future books published by Hotrodders.Com, should be easily accessable and available on-line at no cost. So you are not only free to read the book but to download and share it as a PDF file or in any other format you might choose. We felt this might be helpful to those may want to take material out to the shop with them to use as a reference from time to time.

There is one major drawback to downloading, however. I think in most cases you will no longer be able to click and view the full resolution photographs. This is one of the great advantages of doing a book like this on the web as opposed to the old fashioned printing process. You can view the thumbnails that are in the text and then click them for a full size version whenever you need to see more detail. This feature will be lost with most downloads and off-line viewing of the book. (BTW Jon is doing his best to come up with a solution for that problem as well.)

The other important issue KMatch raises involves copyright. We have provided the entire text under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 license. This is a fancy way of saying you are free to copy, distribute and transmit the work PROVIDING you attribute the work to the author and that you do not use the material for any commercial use or alter, transform or build upon those portions of text you might wish to copy and use. And you can do all those things without requesting specific permission as KMatch has so kindly offered to do. For any other uses of the text (such as commercial use), you must first have written permission from the author.

The photographs in the book are a somewhat different matter. These images come from a wide variety of sources and the rights to the photos belong to the original photographers. In the vast majority of cases (including all of my own photographs) the images carry a Creative Commons license and you are free to copy and/or distribute the images as long as you provide an attribution and not use them for commercial purposes.

The balance of the photos in the book have their own individual copyright limitations depending on the source and the photographer. When in doubt, simply click on the thumbnail and you will be taken to a full sized version of the image which will have the copyright information printed directly below the photo. Please honor the copyright limitations since all of these photographers have been kind enough to allow use of their work in this book at no cost so that we could make the material available to you free of charge.

So not only do we allow readers to copy and share this book as KMatch suggests, we highly encourage it, providing it is done within the confines of the copyright and licensing guidelines.

 

Dewey, amazing, absolutely amazing, great work!

Who needs a publisher when you can do work like that, beautiful! :thumbup:

Brian

 

Dewey & Jon;
Wonderful work. As a 29 year old hot rodder, I still remember being 20 and feeling like sometimes it was almost impossible to get encouragement on large scope plans, not to mention a lot of the 'low buck' rods are also 'unsafe rods.'

I dont mid 'rat rods' as a genre, I do loathe junk rods. Its awesome to see someone build a car with attention to detail and a systematic approach to the process. Dewey, your attention to detail and your patience are astonishing...Kudos

To me this is what hot rodding is all about, coming together, helping each other to enjoy the hobby.

 

Very impressive! I will definitely go back a read more.

 

Who needs a publisher when you can do work like that...

Ah but I DID have a publisher...one of the best...Jon/Hotrodders.Com.

 

Ah but I DID have a publisher...one of the best...Jon/Hotrodders.Com.

Ahh well it is absolutely beautiful! :thumbup:

Brian

 

I'm going to download the book to a thumb drive so it wont use a bunch of my hard drive storage, but am curious if this book will be also available in a print edition in the future. I'm not a real fan of e-books though I guess I'll will soon have to get used to that format.

Dave W

 

... but am curious if this book will be also available in a print edition in the future...

Jon's original plan was for a print edition. However, with the huge number of color photographs and the need to have those photos available in decent detail (size), it quickly became apparent the print edition would demand a price tag well beyond our target audience. We felt hot rodders want meat and potatoes technical assistance at a reasonable cost...not a coffee table collectors' item with a three figure price tag.

I'm a bit "old school" like you Dave and I enjoy having a hard copy of what I am reading. But as Jon and I put this book together, the advantages of a web-based electronic publication became more and more convincing. We can basically have our cake and eat it too. The book can be made available at no cost while at the same time delivering more than 1,000 pictures and illustrations in both an easy to see thumbnail format AND at full resolution for those who want to see things up close and in greater detail. In a printed format, those detailed pictures would be virtually impossible.

Yes, it is a bit new and experimental to publish a book in this way. But personally, I feel the internet provides an advantageous mechanism for delivering material such as this in viable and affordable manner.

That's not to say that at some point in the future we might not discover a method for delivering the book in an alternative format...be that print, CD, DVD, or what-have-you. Those opportunities are being explored by Jon on an ongoing basis as he prepares for adding more books to the Hotrodders.Com library. But in the foreseeable future, readers will have to download the pictures and text that they need and either use them from a computer platform or print them out if that is what they prefer.

 

That makes sense, Dewey. I was just hoping that a hand held hard copy would be available. It's not a problem using a thumb drive as I have several that aren't being used. Or, like you said, a CD or DVD.

Dave W

 

That makes sense, Dewey. I was just hoping that a hand held hard copy would be available. It's not a problem using a thumb drive as I have several that aren't being used. Or, like you said, a CD or DVD.

Dave W

Print it out on your printer !

 

:thumbup: That is awesome!!!!!!!! Now I can get answers without asking or pestering you Dewey. Thanks to all involved with this publication.

Tony

 

Dewey, very very impressive! Where you found the time to do all this amazes me, very professional looking piece of work. It wouldn't surprise me if a publisher would want to create a nice coffee table type of book, the hard part is done by yourself and Jon. :thumbup:

Dan

 

WOW! watching the build process and the ongoing posts was interesting enough but to see it all documented in one place in such a professional way is truly amazing. Thanks for sharing and I am in total AWE! :thumbup:

 

... Now I can get answers without asking or pestering you Dewey.

It's never a problem for folks to ask questions. In fact, that is part of the reason for this thread, to respond to questions about the content of the book.

So Ford Junkie, feel free to continue firing off whatever questions might not be answered in the book.

 

Don't worry the questions will be numerous for sure from me.

Tony

 

Cool

This is cool Dewey. You and Jon as well as all the contributors should be proud of the finished product. The E-Book concept is cool, just can't get your autograph at a Barnes & Noble reception. HaHa

Any plans for more E-Books Jon?

:thumbup: Nolan

 

The E-Book concept is cool, just can't get your autograph at a Barnes & Noble reception.

Ah, perhaps we could all meet up at at a local White Castle and I could autograph sliders.


And hopefully there will be many more books to come. We have a lot of talented and experienced folks in our midst.

 

That an awesome concept, the layout is great and easy to use - incredible job!