The man in the gray T-shirt and backwards cap knows most of his followers did not come for cars. He says so in the first few seconds of his video, standing outside in the sun in front of a Honda hatchback with a dark hood and red digital camouflage down its sides. “A lot of you may know me as beard dad cards,” he says. “One thing a lot of people don’t know about me is that I’m a huge Honda enthusiast.”
The video was posted by @beard_dad_cardz, who writes in the caption that he has “officially started my car channel dedicated to my love of building Hondas.” In about a minute and a half he covers who he is, how long he has been at this, what he did to the car behind him, and what happens to three different passengers once he straps them into it.
@beard_dad_cardz Hey guys I’ve officially started my car channel dedicated to my love of building Hondas! I hope you guys enjoy the content as much as I enjoyed making it! . Long from videos with a full breakdown of the car and what I’ve done so far is available on my YouTube channel @ BeardDadCarz! . Follow me on instagram as well for short form content and my latest build I’m starting from scratch!
He puts a number on the hobby right away. “I’ve been building Hondas for about 15+ years now,” he says, with “15+ YEARS” printed across the screen. “And just recently I built this one.”
From there the camera leaves him and goes to the car. One shot looks straight down into the engine bay, where black piping curls up beside the valve cover and everything around the engine is the same deep black. The next looks in through the open driver’s door at a stripped, purposeful cabin: a light-colored steering wheel, a tall shifter with a white knob and a racing-style bucket seat.
Then he explains where the car started. “This car was red,” he says, over an older clip of the same hatchback in plain red paint on black wheels, with a tail light missing and the rear hatch area partly taken apart. “I actually pulled everything out of the engine bay, cleaned it, scuffed it, painted it.”
The footage that follows backs that up. The car sits in a workshop with no engine in it at all. The bay is an empty shell, already glossy black, and the windshield is wrapped in plastic sheeting to keep paint off the glass. He names the color he chose as S2000 black.
The words “*COLD START*” come up next, over a shot of the finished car with its hood propped open and the builder standing at the fender. After that the hood is shut and the camera looks at the car head on, showing a cutout in the hood itself.
The second half of the video belongs to the passengers. Each one is filmed from the dashboard, belted in, with a small microphone clipped to his shirt.
The first is a man in a tan cap and round glasses, and the builder checks in with him before anything happens. “Excited or not?” he asks. The answer, printed on screen as well: “A little bit of both.” The passenger adds a detail that explains the nerves. “I never been in no fast cars.”
“Ready?” the builder asks. “I’m ready.” “You sure?” “Yeah.”
A few seconds later the same passenger is grinning with his mouth wide open, and the caption on screen reads “OH MY GOD.” He follows it with “that’s crazy” and a laugh.
Two more riders get their turn. A man in dark-framed glasses and a light T-shirt spends his clip laughing with his whole face, head tipped back against the seat. A third man, sitting in a bucket seat, purses his lips and blows out a long breath as the car moves. The video closes on the car with its hood up and the words “FOLLOW FOR MORE!” above his YouTube and Instagram names.
The caption says the longer videos, “with a full breakdown of the car and what I’ve done so far,” are on his YouTube channel, and that he has another build he is “starting from scratch.” So this clip is the short version. Even so, it holds a few things worth taking away, whether you build cars or just get offered rides in them.
The first is the order he gives for the engine bay, because it is the right one and people skip steps. He pulled everything out. Painting around an engine leaves the old color showing behind every bracket and hose, and on a car that used to be red, that old color is exactly what a color change is supposed to hide. An empty bay is the only way to reach all of it.
He cleaned it next. Engine bays collect years of oil and road grime, and paint will not stick to grease. Then he scuffed it. Fresh paint needs a dulled surface to grip, and a glossy factory finish that has not been sanded tends to let new paint peel. Only after those three steps did he paint. Anyone planning the same job should expect the preparation to take far longer than the spraying, and should mask the glass and anything else staying on the car the way the plastic over his windshield shows.
The second is how he handles his passengers. He asks how the first rider feels before the car moves, and when the man says he is ready, he asks again: “You sure?” That takes five seconds and it gives a nervous person a real chance to back out. If you own something quick and want to share it, that is the way to do it. Ask first, ask twice, and make sure the belt is on, as it is on every rider in this video.
If you are the one in the passenger seat, the first rider is a good model too. He did not pretend. He said he was a little bit of both and that he had never been in a fast car, which told the driver exactly who was sitting next to him.
The last point is for anyone thinking about documenting a project. The clip of the red car and the shot of the bare black shell are what make this video work, and they only exist because he filmed the car before and during the job. Take the pictures before you pick up a wrench. You cannot go back for them later.