The Classic is tomorrow morning, and today I spent the day hopping all over LA attending various events in the run-up to the main event. Getting woken up this morning at 5:00 am to the cries of “VTOOOOOOO” and a herd of Busses starting up ended up with a 7:00 am start to the day — farrrrr too early for anything productive other than these nature shots of my campsite at Blackstar. After an early morning brunch/stop over at Jaycee Enterprises, and a stop at DPR Machine (look for this shop in a future Blog!), I headed over about mid-morning to Rimco, under the strong new direction of Dennis Hildebrandt. Hit the jump!

Rimco is a well known fixture in the history of Southern California when it relates to Volkswagens. Eddie Riddle opened Rimco in 1962 and quickly attained a stellar reputation for the quality of his shop’s machine work. In fact, Rimco was the shop of choice for many of the “old school” VW drag racers, pushing the limits and testing the boundaries of what the humble 1600cc VW air-cooled rig could accomplish. After a rough patch of quality control issues following Eddie’s passing, Dennis took over Rimco with a new direction and a strong message. Rimco is going to be the shop of choice once again. So far he’s done a stellar job, and it inspired the crowd of people that flooded the parking lot to show off their rides and hang out with fellow V-dubbers.

I got a chance to meet Dennis personally, and he was awesome enough to take me behind the scenes and show me the various lathes, mills, and drills used to take worn and sometimes downright thrashed engine parts and make them like new again. Specializing in engine case and cylinder head work, Rimco also has a variety of other products and services. At the BBQ, the Rimco crew was raffling off an engine case as well as gift certificates, t-shirts and other schwag. They did an awesome job feeding everyone too!

Various note-worthy characters made appearances: a dynamic duo from Venice Beach Florida drove for 13 days across the country to Venice Beach CA in… the Boatswagon! Yes, that is in fact a speed boat mated to a Bug pan. Check out the story on them in another post.

Another surprise came in the form of Mike, of Bouncebus.com. You might remember I did a little story a while back on his baller Bay window bounce house, which he debuted at the Rimco BBQ for the kids and will be using again tomorrow at the Classic. Let me say in person, the thing is even cooler than the pictures — and it was a favorite with the 12 and under crowd. Be sure to check out his little who’s who profile in another post as well.

Finally, a surprise and maybe incognito appearance was made by the “Foose Bus,” a product of the famed builder from Overhaulin’ Chip Foose. The bus itself is controversial, with purists screaming bloody murder while those less anal about such things find the split a tastefully custom restoration. In any case, it certainly turned heads for better or for worse.

Towards the end, Dennis surprised everyone with a little gift to the early birds that showed up and made the event as fun and interesting as it was — the first ever Rimco Awards! Be sure to check out the gallery to see all the winners. The trophies themselves were made of a junked flywheel, connecting rod, and metal Rimco logo all welded together into one giant paper weight. However, it’s the most badass paper weight you’ll ever see, and only they have them! Jealous? You should be.

Thanks again to Dennis and the crew at Rimco for an awesome early afternoon and excellently executed pre-Classic event!