CDoherty95

Hey y'all. I'm not sure if y'all have heard of Rusty Cash, one of the, if not the best and most well known Boss Hogg impersonator. If any of you were ever at a Dukes event and there was a Boss Hogg character, chances are it was Rusty. Well unfortunately, he was rushed to hospital earlier. His wife Dana announced this on Rusty's Facebook page earlier, and left a message two hours later saying Rusty was in surgery and it wasn't looking good. So for any of y'all that are religious, please think of Rusty in your prayers, and for those with Facebook who want to send Rusty a message his personal Facebook is "Rusty Cash" and is public Facebook is called "The Boss". Get well soon Rusty!

I was watching "The Boars Nest Bears" earlier and remembered another story Tom told us. About midway through season 4 the crew learnt that Warner Brothers lease on Lake Sherwood wouldn't be renewed for season 5, as the land was to be sold and the lake drained. Tom and the stuntmen got together, and decided to try and find a ranch that they could buy and rent out to WB. They discovered Valencia Oaks Ranch, and naturally agreed to keep the deal secret from WB until they owned the ranch. I think Tom said they were going to buy the ranch for $1 million, which wasn't that big a deal divided up between the stuntmen because they were all earning good money. They were literally days away from signing the papers for the ranch when WB found out, and promptly bought the ranch for $1.2 million! Hoss do you remember any other stories that haven't been posted already about the ranch?

The second train jump General was previously owned by someone who removed the standard engine and replaced it with a custom 4 speed manual Ford engine. Apparently none of the stuntmen wanted to drive it because the jump equipment they used was so tight that they were unable to move much once they were strapped in, hence they couldn't change gear. The stuntman that was going to do the jump was John Cade. He was hesitant about using the manual General, until Tom took him for a ride on the section of road they had closed off. The engine was so powerful that it was able to reach 90mph in second gear! This meant the team could strap John into the car, put it in second gear, and he could simply gun the engine. During the test run a crew member saw the speed and power of the engine, and asked Tom if he would be able to have the engine and drivetrain from the wrecked car, after all it was going straight to the crusher anyway. Tom agreed, as it wasn't planned to be a huge jump and the engine and drivetrain would survive mostly intact. Well as we all know from Hoss the camera hit the barrels at the side of the ramp which sent the car off coarse. The massive speed reached also meant that the slightest mistake at the ramp meant a huge difference in where the car would land. The car landed with such force that the bell housing split and crumpled, throwing bits of gears all over the road. The brakes also failed on landing, and in a true Dukes irony moment John crashed into the only telephone pole about half a mile down the road. Well when I say crashed into the telephone pole I mean T - boned the Sheriffs car the crew had parked in front of the pole in the unlikely event the car went that far off coarse and hit the pole.

I had forgotten about the tow truck until you mentioned it now, and it's also reminded me of another story with a Jesse pickup an a General Lee. Firstly though, the crew used the tow trucks mainly as props, but would sometimes use them to tow a car out at one of the ranches. They were in the middle of filming season one or two, and a car ( did Tom say it was a General Hoss? ) slid off the road into a dry creek. On this particular day instead of using the tractors at the ranch the crew decided to use Cooters tow truck, after all that's what it was built for right? Well as the crew hooked up the car to the truck and began to winch it up, the truck bed and rear of the frame separated from the cab and front of the frame. It turns out a previous owner had welded the cab and bed to the frame instead of using the factory bolts, and the welding and towing weakened the frame until it snapped in half. And now onto the Jesse pickup and General Lee. As I'm sure some of you know the Mean Green Machine from Season 5 was built out of a wrecked Jesse pickup. And because the only time we see Uncle Jesse's truck wrecked is in Enos Strait to the Top we all naturally assume that the truck that rolled over went on to become the Mean Green Machine. However you'd be wrong. One day during filming of the second half of Season 4, the crew were on lunch break out in Lake Sherwood. Corey Eubanks and I believe Russell Soelberg ( I'm almost certain that's spelt wrong ) were both sent out to find bales of hay and cattle for the afternoons filming. Russell took a Jesse pickup and went off to look for bales of hay, while Corey went off in a General Lee to find cattle. Neither of them thought to bring a radio with them, and as Lake Sherwood was private property, the two boys were able to break the speed limit. Now what could possibly go wrong? Well Corey and Russell both came round a corner from opposite sides and BANG!! Both the Jesse pickup and General Lee sustained heavy damage to the front, and were towed back to Tom Sarmento's shop on the ranch. Stunt coordinator and legend Paul Baxley was just returning from a mornings filming on location, and just happened to be passing Tom's shop when the cars were being towed back. Needless to say he wasn't very happy... Tom told me and Hoss that the truck was repairable, and was nearly in the bodyshop when he and his team received the order to build the Mean Green Machine. To do this they simple cut away the bed, cab, hood, fenders... Everything besides the engine, drivetrain, steering and brakes were removed to allow the Mean Green Machine to be built. As you can imagine a cars engine gets quite hot. And you can probably imagine that a car without windows can get quite hot. Apparently the stuntmen hated driving the Mean Green Machine, because it didn't have a firewall and it didn't have proper windows, making it a sweat box. Hoss do you remember Tom telling us about the second General Lee train jump?

Ok ok ok I'm sorry I'm so slow! I intended to edit the video to have pictures and video clips over Tom's voice, but I could never manage to separate the audio from the video. And then as if the plan couldn't go any worse.... my laptop crashed and I lost the video footage. Sorry everyone, I know you were all really looking forward to the video. Hopefully if Tom is over again next year I can record our interview again... Haha just kidding!! Here's the youtube link to Tom's interview. Unfortunately youtube wouldn't let me upload the video as one, so I had to break it into three parts. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Tom Sarmento's Interview! Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - And once again thanks to the amazing Libby Tobin who let me and a Hoss, basically two complete strangers, invade her house for a Saturday.

Thanks Mufn! It's one step closer to a Dodge Charger!

Haha trust you to come up with something like that Hoss! I'd imagine if the hoses were longer it would go slower, purely because there's a greater distance from the compressor to the horns. Would that be right?

I didn't get a chance to get to the wrecking yard today, do instead I decided to wire up the Dixie horn with help from my uncle who knows a lot more about electronics than me. We have to drill into the firewall (the bit of metal between the engine and cabin) to run the wires for the horn switch into the cabin. We plan to use bathroom sealant to fill the hole that we drill. Unfortunately we didn't have any bathroom sealant and it's meant to rain for the next few days, so we decided to just wire up the horn to check that it actually worked. Lets just say I'm not going to be the most popular neighbour because the horn is unbelievably loud! http://i1098.photobucket.com/albums/g368/GeneralLeeBike/Corsa%20Project/534658DB-AB17-4136-B7FC-B0751EF58289-25377-000011E8A98042AD_zps03f0b63c.mp4

The carpet in the boot / trunk was well worn and had started to cave in around the spare wheel. I decided that instead of trying to find one from a scrap car I would build a false floor out of plywood. This was fairly easy for me, as I did woodwork in school for 6 years, and this build is only going to require glue and screws. I started out by emptying the boot of all the stuff I'd managed to collect for this project. I know it's a huge boot... I then pulled out the carpet and made a template for the wood out of masking tape. I then got a few lengths of wood from my grandparents neighbour. The car hasn't got insurance, so I'm working on it at my grandparents house. I cut the wood and loosely fitted it into the boot space. That's all I managed to do. I'm going to try and get plywood this weekend so I can tick off another thing on my "To Do List". And finally... I love taking panoramic photos on my phone, so decided to get one of the interior of the car. The sun visors are new as well. They came with the seats. I had to wire them into the same circuit as the interior light. That's all for now! I'm hoping to get to a large wrecking yard tomorrow to get a load of small little bits that should make a big improvement to the car.

Hoss you really shouldn't show me things like this. You know I'll just try and do it! I forgot to mention this yesterday, but I tinted the side back seat windows because a) it's meant to lower the insurance rate, and keeps the car cooler in hot weather and gives a sense of privacy to people in the back seat. The tint comes in a big roll, sort of like aluminium foil or something you might use to cover food in the kitchen. It was really easy to do, and cost a quarter of what professionals would charge. I've also become a frequent visitor to the local wrecking yard. I've picked up small things that didn't work or that were stained by the smoke. One of the things I bought was the interior light. You can see the difference between the old and new light.

Thanks Roth Ill try that tomorrow! I don't smoke, and probably never will but I still don't mind the smell of smoke. The problem with the car was that the smoke smell was stale, so smelt really bad. I might try and get rims from a newer model corsa, but for now my budget is down to zero haha so the wheels will have to wait!

Hey Roth. Yes that's just what me and my cousins called him. I guess it just came from when I was a baby and could only say stuff like "momma" and "dadda". The grill is off because I mounted the horns and compressor to the metal bumper piece behind the grill and in front of the radiator. Don't worry though it's back on now! I've got the Tom Sarmento video on my laptop for a while now, but the version of windows movie maker I have won't let me add pictures over a video. If people want me to upload the whole video as one unedited video I will, but I originally intended it to be a bit more professional.

After removing the roof to try and clean it, I turned my attention to the seats. As you can probably guess, having someone smoke in a car for 16 years will leave a bit of a smell. I tried several times to clean the seats using industrial strength cleaning products and a steam cleaner, but it was no use. So I decided to throw out the old seats, and buy secondhand heated leather ones. While the seats were being changed I went out and bought some carpet cut offs, and laid them down over what was left of the original carpet. I know it's probably not for everybody, but I'm personally happy with the outcome. While I was out buying the carpet, I also bought some cream and black leatherette to cover the doors and boot shelf and roof. The original material in the car was fabric, so I was able to just spray glue on the leatherette and corresponding piece and bond them together. Here's a before and after shot of the boot shelf. I then decided to cover the roof in black leatherette. I was a little hesitant as to how it would turn out, due to it being such a large surface, but I think it came out very well. I then decided to move onto the exterior of the car. Namely the faded plastic trim and windows. When the car rolled off the production line in 1997, the wheel arch trim was black. Yet somehow in the last 16 years, the trim has somehow managed to go from black to pretty much white. Spraying them was a very quick job, and definitely made a huge difference to the car.

Hey y'all! I know my presence here over the past couple of months hasn't been great. I've had some big changes in my life. From my Granda dying, to finishing school, to a nasty breakup and lengthly fight with my ex. Anyway I'm back now with my latest crazy invention! Well when I say invention I really mean this : This was my Granda's car, which he gave to me just before he left us. It's a 1997 Opel Corsa, which is a fairly popular small European car. It's popular largely due to its small fuel efficient engine, and it being relatively cheap to run and modify. Granda was a relatively heavy smoker, and smoked a couple of cigarettes per day in the car for 16 years. So as you can probably imagine the smell was horrendous. And if that wasn't bad enough all the trim pieces were stained yellow ( they were meant to be light cream). And just in case you don't believe me, here's a picture of the roof lining. You can see how discoloured and stained the roof had become after 16 years. My initial plan was to clean the interior with an industrial based cleaner. After spraying and wiping down the dash 4 times this was the colour of the waste water... And of coarse no car is complete without the Dixie horns!

Roth that's a screencap from Undercover Dukes. Corey plays the tow truck driver who pulls the bad guy out of the pond.