American Hot Rod

Why on earth did Boyd dump his first wife for that Jo dame? All she does is walk around looking good and flirting with the employees. Example; when Charlie left, she had to have a closed door farewell session with him. I think Boyd should get back with his first wife, and let the young chick go. And in addition to booting her, he could get rid of those horrid floral shirts. I think that the show would be more interesting if they would just build cars, and dispense with the trite drama. What is the job of the new Black guy? What is his talent? Maybe comic relief? Many people don't like Boyd, but I think he was right when he fired blue bear and Mike.

This truly is a great show. Coddington is the J.R.Ewing of the southern California Hot Rod business and there is never a dull moment. Each custom hot rod build spans 3 or 4 shows each of which is interesting and filled with some unique people. I believe there may be some pressure from the Discovery channel to set deadlines on the car builds that makes for a more interesting show. In reality even if a car is "rushed" for the sake of the show it will be detailed later to be sure it meets or exceeds Boyd's high standards. The Coddington cars built on American Hotrod are even more valuable than a regular Coddington custom and are bringing excellent profits for the primary customer Scotty Gray when he auctioned a few at the Barret Jackson Auction in Feb 2005. Boyd is character himself with his current wife and ex-wife both working there at the shop there is always some tension in the air.

I've seen a few episodes of this and thought in the beginning that it would be like American Chopper, but I was severely disappointed. I won't be watching it again, after the episode I saw last night. The people in this are one dimensional and the mechanic I saw last night spoke in the same monotone the whole time.

Comparing the two series American Chopper and American Hotrod, Boyd seems to have little or no interaction with work in the shop, unlike Senior who is always about the shop checking on the progress of projects and other bits and pieces. For people working with and designing engines, I find it hard to accept that in last nights episode for an Alumatub(?) they could make such a mistake as to mess up the dimensions of the manifold and have to have it welded to fill the gap. I just hope that the car was not going to a customer.

Also there doesn't appear to be the same interaction between the team, that there is on American Chopper. Everyone in American Chopper has no problem with lending their specific talents to a project if they are needed, or indeed giving a hand out when required. In American hotrod they don't seem to interact at all, though there was the play fight to settle a dispute between two team members, one of whom later parted company with the workshop. The fight didn't really serve to do anything other than increase the animosity between the two.

This series should be put out of our misery or come with a health warning.

I have to agree with most of the bad comments that have been made on here. Boyd seems like a complete tool and Duane needs to go to some (actually, a lot!) of Anger Management and Normal management classes.

I think my favourite moment was when Tomas told Duane straight up that "everyone needs to hear they are doing a good job once in a while".

Boyd firing Bluebear was ridiculous as he allowed the situation to go that far in the first place. Don't get me wrong, the editing made the Bear look like a complete Job Knockey but it was never tackled properly.

How he dealt with Charlie leaving in order to provide a better life for his family was an absolute joke - Boyd you are such a self-centred A-hole! Charlie tried to explain things to you but you were too busy bleating on about Chip this, Chip that. Shut up and actually LISTEN TO PEOPLE for a change.

Stop overworking your staff. Then follow up one half-arsed project with another one on an even TIGHTER deadline and having the cheek to say that this one will make the staff happy. Yeah i'm sure losing every weekend that exists and working 18 hour days is gonna make them the happiest bunnies on the planet.

I'd never EVER buy a car from you. Not because your team are not talented - they are! But i would firmly believe that you made them rush beyond their capabilities and my car would fall apart when i got it home.

And after the rant, the worst thing is that I still watch the damn program... AARRGHHH!

I for one do. Its got none of the charm of American Chopper, in fact, it has no charm whatsoever. Boyd whats-his-face comes across as a royal douchebag, as do most of his workers. The remainder of the guys are either seen too rarely or just plain boring. As for the cars, maybe if they'd get a shop that did some more INTERESTING cars, like rebuilds of classic muscle cars, rather than the same looking cars each show then I'd be more captivated...however this is not the case.

If you can't tell by now, I really detest this show and hope to see it canceled to make way for something better than this trite piece of garbage.