'Cheetah,' the iconic 1960s car, coming together as local Grafton father and son team make headway

LORAIN, Ohio - Craig Ruth and his father Bob work side by side re-creating a sports car from days long gone. Ruth Engineering is building a Cheetah for Carl Buccieri.

This Cheetah is being built like the others beforehand, from the ground up and one at a time. Carl wants to race the Cheetah at the East Coast Timing Association in Wilmington, Ohio in April. Before that happens, the Ruth Engineering team is methodically going over every aspect of the design and crafting this piece of machinery or as Carl calls it, "a piece of art."

This week, Craig and his dad are assembling and fitting pieces to the chassis. They dropped a mocked up block into place to line up distances and make sure all the pieces of the engine, tranny and differential are aligned properly. They are also checking the upper control arms on the front end.

The body is over in Carl's shop. By this weekend, they want to have the frame primed and painted and start assembling the car. There is a lot of work to be done before they have it ready for the Piston Power Show at the Cleveland IX-Center in the middle of March.

Time is getting a little tight but as Craig puts it, "that's how we work."