The Strutmasters Museum Presents the... The 1940 Buick Super 8 Coupe
Here on the Strutmasters grounds in Roxboro, NC, we have a HUGE custom car collection museum between our offices and our warehouse. The museum hosts a wide array of vehicles: from classic coupes, to hot rods, to retired Strutmasters.com-sponsored NASCAR series trucks and ARCA race cars. Chip, the founder and President of Strutmasters, always likes to show our guests and customers the museum, so we thought we would show it to the rest of the world, too! Our museum depicts Chip’s life through the murals, cars, and displays. From Chip’s first drag car to the Strutmasters’ NASCAR truck, the museum shows its guests how Strutmasters all began. The first car we have in this series of blogs is the 1940 Buick Super 8 Coupe. This Buick Super 8 was Chip’s introduction into collector cars. It was the first collector car he ever owned. Like most of his collector cars and the cars in our museum, this Buick has a story to it. There was a well-known car collector that lived right here in Roxboro. He probably had one of the biggest car collections in town. One day in 2003, Chip discovered that this big car collector had passed away. What’s more, is Chip heard that the man’s wife was selling off his collection. Well, Chip had had his eye on this particular 1940 Buick Coupe, so he called the man’s wife to see if it was for sale, to which she replied with a ticket price $15,000. Strutmasters was, at that time, still in its infancy stages but doing very well. However, Chip definitely felt that $15,000 for what was to be the first of many items in a new hobby was just too rich for his blood. So, for the time being, Chip felt that collecting cars just might not be for him. Interestingly enough, it just so happens that the same woman called back some months later in 2004, asking if Chip was still interested in her late husband’s 1940 Buick. Chip told the lady that a lack of interest had nothing to do with his decision not to make the purchase, but it was the ticket price which helped him to make that decision. So the lady cut the price in half, wondering if that ticket price was good enough to help Chip make a different decision this time; and as it turns out, the new ticket price was just right. The Buick worked just fine. The tires were old and dry-rotted from overexposure and under use, and the brakes were in a comparable state. So Chip drove it to his building and replaced the brakes and swapped the old tires for some white walls. When Chip was asked about a particular memory he had of the car, he retold a story of his attempt at first putting it on display in a Strutmasters building….on the second floor! Chip said they tried and tried to make the car fit in the freight elevator, but it just would not fit. He finally had to remove the bumpers from the classic Buick in order to get it to fit on the freight elevator! In the end, everything came off and reattached without a problem!
Here on the Strutmasters grounds in Roxboro, NC, we have a HUGE custom car collection museum between our offices and our warehouse. The museum hosts a wide array of vehicles: from classic coupes, to hot rods, to retired Strutmasters.com-sponsored NASCAR series trucks and ARCA race cars. Chip, the founder and President of Strutmasters, always likes to show our guests and customers the museum, so we thought we would show it to the rest of the world, too! Our museum depicts Chip’s life through the murals, cars, and displays. From Chip’s first drag car to the Strutmasters’ NASCAR truck, the museum shows its guests how Strutmasters all began. The first car we have in this series of blogs is the 1940 Buick Super 8 Coupe. This Buick Super 8 was Chip’s introduction into collector cars. It was the first collector car he ever owned. Like most of his collector cars and the cars in our museum, this Buick has a story to it. 
There was a well-known car collector that lived right here in Roxboro. He probably had one of the biggest car collections in town. One day in 2003, Chip discovered that this big car collector had passed away. What’s more, is Chip heard that the man’s wife was selling off his collection. Well, Chip had had his eye on this particular 1940 Buick Coupe, so he called the man’s wife to see if it was for sale, to which she replied with a ticket price $15,000. Strutmasters was, at that time, still in its infancy stages but doing very well. However, Chip definitely felt that $15,000 for what was to be the first of many items in a new hobby was just too rich for his blood. So, for the time being, Chip felt that collecting cars just might not be for him. 
Interestingly enough, it just so happens that the same woman called back some months later in 2004, asking if Chip was still interested in her late husband’s 1940 Buick. Chip told the lady that a lack of interest had nothing to do with his decision not to make the purchase, but it was the ticket price which helped him to make that decision. So the lady cut the price in half, wondering if that ticket price was good enough to help Chip make a different decision this time; and as it turns out, the new ticket price was just right. The Buick worked just fine. The tires were old and dry-rotted from overexposure and under use, and the brakes were in a comparable state. So Chip drove it to his building and replaced the brakes and swapped the old tires for some white walls. When Chip was asked about a particular memory he had of the car, he retold a story of his attempt at first putting it on display in a Strutmasters building….on the second floor! Chip said they tried and tried to make the car fit in the freight elevator, but it just would not fit. He finally had to remove the bumpers from the classic Buick in order to get it to fit on the freight elevator! In the end, everything came off and reattached without a problem!
