08-18-07 Tacoma, WA. Amid an ill-fated nostalgia drag race bearing his name, Bucky Austin was kind enough to let his fabricator/restorer, Dave Jeffers, take a few rain weary drag racers on a tour of his "Tacoma Place" (aka Bucky's Playhouse) where his and partner Tim Wynne's car collections are on display and where Austin's restoration projects come to fruition.

 

 

Between rain showers that ultimately canceled "Bucky's Nostalgia Nitro Ball" at Pacific Raceways in Kent, Jeffers took a few of us to the Tacoma Palace which for years was a car dealership (below).

 

 

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After maneuvering though an elaborate alarm system, the tour began down in the basement which is, in short, a drag racers paradise. To a non-gearhead this would appear to be something akin to a junk yard, but for us it was the ultimate parts store.

 

Everywhere you look there is a treasure from the past.

 

A recreation in progress - The Dead End Kids.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jeffers has a scrapbook of reference material on the car to work from.

 

 

 

 

Dave Jeffers and the late Frank Huszar with the car when it was build at RCS in 1965.

 

 

Among the several cars hanging from the roof awaiting restoration are Jerry Ruth's
last FED with full body and an RCS chassis circa 1968.

 

 

More pipe hanging is Hank Johnson's last FED.

 

 

 

 

 

Everywhere you look there are parts and pieces to drool over.

 

 

There is some method to this apparent madness. One shelf with nothing but 392 cylinder heads and rocker parts.

 

 

Valve covers anyone?

 

 

Fuel injectors and blowers...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Drives and magnetos.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking out of place, there are even some late model stuff laying around.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The shop is very well equipped and allows Jeffers to do literally everything on an given project in house.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Walt Stevens ID'ed this as one of the first quad-link front end cars ever built at RCS when he and Jeffers were employed there.

 

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Upstairs is the museum/showroom where the collections of Austin and Wynne are on display. All of Bucky's cars and dragsters are on one side of the converted dealership and Tim Wynne's on the other. The first shots are from the Austin side.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two other Austin cars, Eagle Electric and Jerry Ruth, that are normally in the showroom were out at Pacific Raceways for the weekend.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These are some of Wynne's beauties.

 

 

 

 

 

Yep, it was a fun two hours. If you ever get a chance to visit Bucky's Playhouse don't pass it up. Thanks to Bucky and Dave Jeffers for making this happen.

 

 

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