The NJ Region of the AACA has held its annual Spring Meet (car show) on the first Sunday in May for as long as I can remember, and probably much further back than that. Traditionally, the Chief Judge for the Meet holds a judging seminar a week or two before the show. Last year, our long-serving Chief Judge retired from the position, and with a new Chief Judge comes a fresh look at the way we do things. Our new Chief Judge Anthony decided to make two rather simple changes: one, conduct more than one judging seminar, and two, conduct the first one a few months before the show. The overall intent is to increase the number of volunteer judges.
Our newsletter editor-in-chief, Dick Bettle, graciously agreed to make his garage available for the first of these seminars, which was held on a ‘balmy’ (40-ish) January Saturday. Including our host, 17 members of the club turned out, which I felt was an impressive showing. Craig Kunz, our Regional VP, agreed to stand in for Anthony, who is dealing with some medical issues. We surrounded Dick’s 1930 Ford Model A Coupe which was our vehicle exemplar for the day.
Several attendees are experienced National AACA judges, having judged at Hershey and other National shows around the country, and their input is valuable at these kinds of seminars. At the same time, AACA uses a 400-point judging system and drills down to a microscopic level which our Region does not. The NJ Region’s judging sheet uses a 40-point system, with 10 points each assigned to exterior, interior, engine compartment, and chassis. One of the major learnings which Craig successfully delivered was understanding the difference between the National 400-point judging sheet and our 40-point one.
It was a fun exercise with Dick’s Model A. Most club members are all too familiar with this car, as Dick and his wife Bobbi routinely put 4,000-5,000 miles a year on it (that is not a typo: four THOUSAND to five THOUSAND miles a year). To the casual observer, this is a bone-stock 1930 Ford. However, Dick, a life-long car fanatic whom I consider to be one of the most technically savvy people I’ve met, has executed dozens of modifications to this A. Among other upgrades: radial tires on smaller-diameter wheels, an alternator, a Honda distributor, a performance cylinder head, and upgraded electrics including a navigation system (yet he has retained cable brakes). On a 40-point scale, we ended up deducting 13 points for a final score of 27. The radials and the engine mods were major deductions. While some attendees wanted to score a “0” for the engine compartment, Craig and other judges noted that the car retains its original engine block, so only 5 points were deducted.
After two hours in the garage, Bobbi entered the room to announce that lunch was being served upstairs, where we found homemade lasagna, meatballs, water, coffee, and various cupcakes (some club members admitted that they were really here for the lasagna). Dick and Bobbi were generous to a fault by hosting and feeding this crowd of hungry car guys. Oh, and the next judging seminar is in March at my house. I need to go clean the garage.
What car guys REALLY love to do: eat, and talk:
All photographs copyright © 2024 Richard A. Reina. Photos may not be copied or reproduced without express written permission.
richardscarblog 
Fabulous. He actually uses this car opposed to “ looking at it” bravo ! I had the privilege of knowing a great man who passed several years ago in North Wildwood who owned and used his Model A in every condition of weather you can imagine! What a fabulous automobile
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Hi Nick, nice to hear from you, and thanks for the comment. I could not agree with you more! Best, Richard
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Richard, you have good friends! Hugh
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Thanks Hugh! I that that to be one big advantage to belonging to a car club (or two). Best, Richard
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Hi RIch!
Very nice article and it looks like a good group of guys! To be honest, I think the 40 point scale is the right solution for most regional meets for any club! But, I was really shocked to see how few points were subtracted for the modified engine! If I had that car, I probably would have made those same modifications, but I would have expected to be treated more brutally in terms of lost points.
The reason why we use French Rules at Fort Lee is really two fold. The first is we aren’t a club and we have to put together a panel of judges every year…and it does change somewhat year to year. So, we cannot count on everyone having the expertise of “how things should be” on such a wide variety of cars as we are aiming to get. The second reason is that we want our entrants to have a good time. That is really more important to us than is that a 38 point car or a 39 point car? We want our team of judges to review, select, and agree on which cars are the most visually striking in each class. That is a concept that both judges and entrants can generally agree on. Of course, when you give awards you are always going to offend the non-winners, but we shoot to select our winners in a way that even the people who do not win will understand the reason why the car that did win was selected. Having done this for two years now, we have created far more happy people than disgruntaled people. We consider that a big success.
I think your judges meeting was great. I like the idea of “teaching Judges to Judge”, but it is easier to do when you first have a club, and secondly, when your club specializes in one make or model. If you have not seen the Rolls-Royce Owners’ Club judging…also a 400 point proposition, you haven’t seen anything. And the Corvette Club is similarly detail oriented. I have nothing against that…..we just can’t do it at our event.
Hope all is well and keep on having fun.
Bob
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Hi Bob, thanks for your very insightful comments! They are most appreciated. Certainly, the most “contentious” discussion of the day surrounded the heavily-modified engine. There were plenty of attendees who would have taken off more points. However, the more experienced judges swayed us by saying: if there was a small block Chevy V8 under the hood, we would have awarded zero points (minus the full 10). However, the block and head were actual Model A parts. Awarding it a “5” was still severe for a 10-point category, as it was a loss of 50%. BTW, I really love judging to French Rules as we did in Fort Lee! I think in this hobby there is room for both! Best, Richard
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[…] our new chief judge Anthony C., decided last year to expand the number of judging seminars. As covered in this recent blog post, the first such seminar was held at Dick B.’s house in late Ja… This month, your humble blogger agreed to play host. We started with a 9 a.m. breakfast (assembled […]
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[…] point values resting with the Chief Judge. This turned out to be a fun exercise, very similar to the two Judging Schools that the Region conducted earlier this […]
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[…] As they did last year, the Bettles of Florham Park hosted around two dozen members of the NJ Region of the AACA at their home for a seminar on the finer points of show car judging. There were several twists compared to 2024. First, the family 2000 Saturn station wagon is now, at twenty-five years of age, AACA-eligible, so it was moved into the garage and used as the target vehicle. And in addition to the vehicular judging, a separate seminar was conducted upstairs on the administrative side of the judging juggernaut. […]
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