Edgewater Sports Park

    As long as I can remember I have been involved with racing. Starting when I used to help my dad paint race cars in our garage, and then we would go watch ¾ midget races at Rushville. We also watched a lot of drag racing. Our local dragstrip was Edgewater Sports Park. Located in Miamitown, OH. Edgewater is kind of in the middle of no where. which is great, because the drive there and back is half the fun. Every weekend during the summer Edgewater has races. Friday night is test and tune, Saturday is bracket racing, and if there is a special event it is on Sunday.

    In the late 1980’s my dad used to have a sand rail that he would take to Edgewater to race on the Dirt 1/8th mile that was located behind the far side grandstands. His sandrail was equipped with all the goodies and ran on methanol. It was a purpose built racecar. None of this hillbilly gas buggy junk. It was painted candy red and had tons of polished aluminium and chrome. Dad had a lot of fun with it and always ran well. My mom however hated it because she wanted something they could drive on the street.

    Unfortunately my dad sold the Sandrail before i was born. and i never got to see it (except for pictures), and the dirt track behind the far grandstands disappeared. My dad used to tell me stories about how he had the christmas tree all figured out and could get crazy fast reaction times. He would tell me that he could always tell when the lights were about to go green because the third amber light would start out dim and progressively get brighter until finally the green would light. Edgewater is a super historic race track that has played a huge roll in the history of drag racing. This was just a little side venture that took place for maybe a decade or so. However, I have seen very few pictures and heard  very few stories of  the little ⅛ mile dirt strip and if anyone has any please feel free to share!
 

   

Where I'm From

I believe in life it is always important to remember where you came from. Too many people grow up, move away, and forget all about the people, places, and things that got them where they are.  Luckily in my life I have had the opportunity to experience a lot of awesome things, go a lot of awesome places, and have met great people. And being from a podunk town in southern Indiana only a short 45 min drive away from Kentucky I can assure you that none of them have lacked excitement.

I’ll start with a brief explanation of where I grew up. My home address read Greensburg, IN, which is a small town in Southern Indiana with a population of 11,638, and their claim to fame is that we have a tree growing out of our courthouse. But I did not live in Greensburg. NO, I lived about 2 miles outside of Clarksburg, which is about a 20 min drive outside of Greenburg. Clarksburg consists of 1 gas station, 2-dozen houses, and more churches than any town its size should have. If it wasn’t for the occasional overwhelming smell of battery acid (go figure) and the single 4 way stop you would probably miss it.

photo credit Steve Hull 2009  

I grew up in a house way up on a hill and surrounded by woods. Our garage is a decent 1500 square foot building with four bays, one of which is a spray booth. This is where I work with my dad as young as the age of 6 painting racecars, hot rods, helmets and whatever else we got into. I learned a lot there and am still learning in that very same paint booth.

At the age of 14 I got my first job detassling corn. This SUCKED! But it made money and I liked that. I did that for two years making $4.25 an hour. When I turned 16 I got my first real job in a local body shop, Corvettes and Classics. My boss and the owner of the business was Kenny Shingler. He was from a SMALL no name town outside of Athens Ohio that made Clarksburg look like Abu Dhabi. This is where I learned the most about bodywork and painting. Even today Kenny still produces the highest quality paint jobs I have ever seen, Seriously his work towers over any Riddler winner car I have ever seen.

After working for Kenny for a summer I went onto working at a bigger shop in Shelbyville, IN about a 45 commute ever morning. At Joe Baird’s vintage racecar and motorcycle restoration. If you ever feel your life is missing a little culture, excitement, or is just a little too boring, check this place out.  Joe Baird owned the shop. Joe is from Louisville, Ky and was raised on a JUNK YARD. If you have ever met someone who was raised on a junkyard you will understand. We worked next door to an occasionally shady automotive collision shop that was owned by Randy. Randy has a very unique personality to go along with his criminal record. At Joe’s I got the opportunity to work on the types of cars that I was specifically interested in. I worked on vintage sprintcars, excelsior motorcycles, and hot rods. I loved it. Easily the most unique part about working at Joes was the small petting zoo that we had behind the shop. Joe loved animals and at one time had 2 goats 2 donkeys and 2 dogs. The dogs both died and one of the goats turned out to be a MURDERER.  The best of it all was that occasionally I would get surprise visits while painting in the spray booth from Bill the goat who happened to be an escape artist also and would finagle his way into the building from his pen in the back and then down the narrow passage between the paint booth and the wall and then into the booth while the paint was still wet.

            Recently Joe suffered a heat attack and underwent a triple bypass surgery. He is in recovery and is doing well. I wish him all the luck in a speedy recovery.

Gold Leaf Tutorial

     One of the most striking features of a custom paint job is most certainly gold leaf. I am constantly asked how it is I do it. To be honest it is a pretty common trick and nearly every custom painter has his or her own way of doing it. It has been around since before medieval times, and examples can be seen on everything from cathedrals to edgings on paper. It has applications in the sign painting industry, fine art, custom paint, and the craft industries.

    There are very many different way of applying gold leaf. In this tutorial I will explain it the Root Bros. way. We learned from the best and have spent over 7 years perfecting it.

 

In this tutorial we will be demonstrating on the hood sides of the Spirit of Sayler park. The first step is to layout the lettering or the area you will be gilding. We use a Stabilo pencil.

The second step is to apply the Size. Size is an adhesive that is used to bond the gold leaf to the surface. We usually add a bit of gold colored enamel sign paint to the size to tint it so if the leaf nicks or scratches it won't be so noticeable.

 



to ensure the leaf will stick good we leave the size to "tac up" for nearly 6 hours. At this point you can test it by toucking the size with the back side of your knuckle. It should leave no prints. then you can very carefully apply the leaf. Some leaf has two sides so make sure you apply them all the same side up.

 



 

Once the leaf is applied you can brush off the excess very carefully with either your hand or a velvet cloth.



We then added a black outline and a slight drop shadow.

 

If  gold leaf is left exposed to oxygen it will quickly tarnish. It is important to coat it with a clear coat. We always spray multiple coats of urethane clear coat over the entire piece to ensure a smooth glossy finish

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Welcome Race Fans

       Welcome to the new Root Bros. blog! This page will be a great place for us to showcase some of our designs, builds, and paint jobs. Along with ongoing discussions pertaining to HOT RODS, VINTAGE RACE CARS, and VINTAGE MOTORCYCLES. My brother David Root and I have been painting hot rods and race cars since we were 10 years old, beginning with the restoration of our 1958 Mantz ¼ midget that our father Andy helped us complete. Since then we have painted everything from custom bicycles to Top Fuel drag cars.

      Some of our more creditable work can be seen on the vintage INDECISION A/FX, Spirit of Sayler Park sprint car, and the Push and Cane Top Gas dragster. Throughout our lives my brother David and I have been obsessed with racing. Growing up in Southern Indiana my brother and I were lucky enough to get to experience the greatest racing in the world! From watching sprint cars battle it out every Saturday night on the local 3/8 mile dirt oval to watching John Force pedal an uncontrollable nitro burning Funny Car down a ¼ mile at Indianapolis Raceway Park we’ve seen some of the most adrenalin pumping action that racing has to offer.

      My brother and my goal has always been to create INOVATIVE and ENERGETIC new designs that appeal to racers and hot rodders for generations to come. Thanks for stopping by and checking out our page. And stay tuned for more ACTION!


David and I built this bike for the 2014 Cincinnati Cavalcade of Custom's Pinstripers Panel Jam. It auctioned off for $3,000. All proceeds benefited The Cincinnati Shriners Hospital

We painted this 1950's Hillegass sprintcar, the Spirit of Sayler Park, in memory of the Soudrette racing family