Innehållsförteckning för No 165 February 2019 från NZV8

HI Todd, I have just read the magazine with the article on Te Aroha Cruise-In, also the Anderson Falcon — the original I saw racing at Bay Park many years ago. I also enjoy the articles on Central Muscle Cars, they’re pretty fast and loud. I noticed your photographer at the Te Aroha event trying to get a decent shot of the black Dodge Challenger ‘EATU4T’. It would make a great feature article in your magazine and got Best Engine on the day. Here is a shot I took at [the] NZ Warbirds open day last Sunday. I didn’t have to worry about people walking in front of me so got some reasonable shots. Keep up the good work on a great magazine. Regards, Warren Connett Hi Warren, Cheers for…

There are few racetracks on this side of the globe that strike the equal amounts of fear and excitement in drivers that the original Pukekohe Park Raceway did. Taranaki driver Glenn Smith felt both of those emotions on 8 and 9 December, when he managed to break the long-standing outright lap record behind the wheel of his Crawford Porsche Daytona Prototype. The record-breaking lap was an impressive 52.139 seconds, but that record didn’t last long; the following day, he dropped it further to a 51.807 lap. With the track having gained additional corners down the back straight a few years ago, there have been very few chances since for drivers to experience the high speeds of the original (long) back straight. Smith made the most of it by nudging close…

As our third, and very successful, season of Teng Tools Muscle Car Garage has now finished on TV3, that can mean only one thing: you’ll have to actually do all those Sunday jobs you’ve been putting off. It’s also time to announce our $5000 grand prize winner for the Teng Tools 622-piece Command Centre Tool Kit, Meguiar’s Car Care Pack, and a $500 Mount Shop gift voucher. The lucky SOB is Paul Candler. So if you know Paul, he now has some fresh 10mm sockets ripe to go missing and plenty of extra car wash in the shed. The good news is that we have season four in the works now, and it will be airing May 2019, so you’ll be able to try your luck for either our grand…

Hey, Nick, sweet-looking Bronco — you don’t see many around, especially with young guys at the wheel; what’s the story with it? I’ve wanted a Bronco for the past 15 years, but I’ve always had Falcons, old and new, for a daily commuter, then my mates started to get into off-roading, and I tagged along with them a couple of times and got sick of being in the passenger seat. So, I bought a Safari and did an RB25 swap. It was a fun wagon to drive and take off-road, but I’m a V8 man, and it just wasn’t me. I had to get back into a V8, so the Safari went up for sale and there were two Broncos on Trade Me at the time — an ’80s one…

“I’ve always wanted to buy a 1941 Willys coupe, but they hardly ever come up for sale in New Zealand,” Turtle tells us. “So, when I saw a Willys body and chassis for sale on Trade Me, I bit the bullet after many sleepless nights and started the mammoth task of building one from scratch. I never realized what a massive job it was going to be, and there were a few times where I’d had enough and thought about selling it before it was finished.” How hard could it possibly have been, building a fibreglass-bodied version of perhaps the most desirable hot rod in the world? As it turned out, pretty damn difficult given the sheer amount of custom everything required to make it happen. Turtle, who sometimes responds…

My first trip to Hastings’ Thunderpark was at the end of the ’70s, when I drove my Anglia panel van with no functioning fuel gauge from Wanganui to see Wild Bill Shrewsberry’s wheel-standing ‘LA Dart’. I wasn’t too far off in the fuel estimation, but a length of dowel for measurement will only take you so far and, in this case, I ran out near Pakipaki just south of Hastings. This led to a lessthan-stellar sleep in the back of the van — despite the shagpile carpet — on the side of the road during one of Hawke’s Bay’s hottest summers. It was worth it, though; I was hooked after seeing the US wheel-stander in action plus the nitro funny car of local Brett Wilson and impressive runs from the…

Gavin and Jenelle Green are familiar faces at Masterton Motorplex, either helping out other competitors or campaigning their tough HK Monaro. At the first Masterton Motorplex Comp meet of the season, however, they turned up with something that surprised many. The car they unloaded from the trailer is an ex–Grant O’Rourke Pontiac Firebird top doorslammer direct out of Australia. Interestingly, the pair didn’t go out to purchase the car; initially they purchased the motor from Lucky Belleri’s Camaro and blower, hat, and fuel system from Maurice Fabietti, to drop into their Monaro, before changing tack and purchasing the Firebird rolling chassis thanks to some advice from Grant Downing. The chassis was built by G-Force Race Cars in New York and originally ran a Camaro body and was campaigned for a…

Yet again, the annual BurgerFuel Port Road Drags held in Lower Hutt by the Cam County club started with a bang and finished in a cloud of tyre smoke, just as any good drag racing event should. The guys and girls of the club have been running this event for many years now and have definitely got the formula right, with a great mix of street cars duking it out for bragging rights and competition cars creating massive amounts of noise and smoke to entertain the huge crowd, some of who were getting their first fix of V8 action for the summer. An event as popular as this always fills up fast, and this year, number 52, was no different. Entries are capped to keep things at a sensible level,…

At any historic race meeting around the country at any given time of the year, you will no doubt bump into a member of the Rush family, with one of their spectacular historic race cars in tow. The Rush Collection in the Manawatu is home to a plethora of vehicles of all makes and models, but it’s the Formula 5000 or Can-Am single-seaters that they own that steal the show, whether parked up in the family museum or hard on the brakes into a hairpin. At a certain point, seeing important historic race cars turning up at tracks in a box behind a modern tow car just wasn’t cutting the mustard anymore. Tim Rush decided that something a bit more period looking was needed. The family also wanted the flexibility…

It may come as a surprise to learn that, when Enzed Central Muscle Cars (CMC) group turned up to race at Pukekohe for the third round of the season, they were heading into the relatively unknown. We say this because, for the first time for the majority of the competitors, they would be embarking on a journey of immense speed and have no idea how to prepare themselves for it. The cars had been at Pukekohe just a few weeks before, but, this time, turns five, six, and seven — which are the turns that were created on the back straight when the Virgin Australia Supercars group returned from their Hamilton street race sojourn — would be removed and the competitors would have the thrill of racing at Pukekohe’s full…

themotorhood.com SEMA SILLINESS The SEMA Show is the greatest automotive fantasyland you can ever dream of. Aimed specifically at the trade, it fills the Las Vegas Convention Centre to the brink in the first week of November every year. Earlier in this issue, you’ll have seen a small handful of the standout vehicles from this year’s event, but that’s truly just the tip of the iceberg. Over the years we’ve run various coverage from the event, showcasing some of the weirdest, wildest and most jaw-dropping creations present. When you get a chance, jump onto themotorhood.com and search Sema to check it out. SCRATCH BUILDING A WILLYS Modifying an old car is never easy, but the reality is that it’s a lot simpler than building a car from scratch. Craig Jefferson…

Fancy a Camaro drag or race car but not the drama of finding a decent bodyshell? Now there’s another option. Real Deal Steel, a company predominantly known for its Tri-5 Chev replacement bodies, has unveiled just the thing at the SEMA Show — race-specific Camaro bodies. The cars are produced expressly with no floor, no inner or outer wheel wells, and no firewall, making them perfect for drag or circuit builds in classes that require steel panels. They offer more complete shells too, should you be that way inclined, going as far as offering them with doors and a boot lid. Better still, you have a choice of firewalls, stock, and mini-tub options. A race car shell will set you back just shy of US$10K.…

While the real Mysterion hot rod built in 1963 was destroyed, the example built by Jeffrey Jones is known to be the most authentic replica of this car ever built. The only difference between the genuine Ed Roth creation and his is that Jeffrey’s version actually runs. The car was recently auctioned as one of a collection of cars cleared out by the Petersen Automotive Museum and exceeded its estimated sale price by fetching US$246K. The replica was the subject of a book that showcased the construction and work involved in fitting the twin 390ci engines, twin transmissions, and two welded-together diffs. At present, as we go to print, the buyer remains unknown. We can only hope it’s gone to another museum where it can still be seen by visitors…

Hi NZV8, I’m 28 now and I’ve been into Holdens my whole life. Growing up I fell in love with VL Commodores. I’ve owned many of them over the years. Back in 2001, when I was 11, my father and stepmother went to the Kumeu car show and took a picture of this VL. I was so blown away by it that after they put in the family photo album I stole it without them noticing. I’ve had the picture for 17 years. A couple years ago I started building a replica of the car in the picture. It was the exact same colour, same engine (304 V8), same model (Royale). Sadly, I had to sell it before I could complete it, due to living arrangements. Over the years as…

The fact that Tim Rush had to build a Morris transporter, seen in this issue, is a solid clue that this isn’t the only cool car in the Rush family collection. We’d go so far as to say that the family have one of the most significant collections of old race cars in New Zealand. Tim’s dad Terry Rush is first and foremost a collector and secondly a New Zealand motor racing historian, unless it’s the other way around. Either way, his collection is pretty damned impressive. We took a look through the various cars and memorabilia in the Feilding-based collection in Issue No. 97, back in 2013. For those who missed that article, we’ve just uploaded it online. Simply search ‘Rush family’ at themotorhood.com to check it out.…

Ged Crombie’s no stranger to building tough B-body Mopars, having been involved with his fair share of them over the years, and now he’s in the throws of piecing together another. The ’65 Coronet is a bit special to Ged, as he purchased it with his late brother around nine years ago. Ged’s business, Gedz Garage, took off soon after, so the brothers only got as far as stripping the car down before he passed away. Ged never got the chance to teach him how to do skids. Although the car has since run as quick as 13.5 seconds down the quarter with Ged’s son Bodhi at the wheel, he’s decided recently to take it to the next level as a tough street and strip machine. The rear end has…

5–6 JANUARY NZ VINTAGE GAS: DRAGSTALGIA Formed by hardened nostalgia drag racers, NZ Vintage Gas is a new class in New Zealand that looks to the gassers of the ’50s and ’60s — cars with jacked up fronts and lowered rears for weight transfer under launch. In those days, big burnouts, dry hops, and wheel stands were a staple — the kinds of things that crowds flocked in to see — and all the cars were known by the names emblazoned on their sides. NZ Vintage Gas is about replicating those good ol’ days, with an aim to make drag racing fun again — for both the public and the drivers! The class creates a friendly, competitive environment with smiles, banter, and serious drag racing all mixed together — the…

The success of an event can usually be measured by the number of people supporting it, both as entrants and as spectators. If that is the case, then this year’s running of the Level One New Brighton Rockabilly Show and Shine, its fifth year, was a roaring success: an awesome turnout of vehicles and strong crowds staying around for the duration of the early November event. As usual, the weekend of entertainment started on Friday evening, with vehicles gathering at Bishopdale Village Mall, Christchurch, for a cruise across the city to New Brighton Mall to park up and enjoy a cold one at the new Level One Craft Beer and Coffee Bar. Wet and cold weather on the night didn’t help proceedings, but some could call that the calm before…

Just before last issue went to print, the LJ Torana of Jason McKillop dropped into the nine-second zone to become the newest member of NZ’s Quickest Streeters list. The 421ci small block Chev used assistance from nitrous oxide to get there. Having aimed for a nine-second pass right from the outset, Jason was understandably thrilled with the achievement — although he commented to NZV8 that he didn’t think it would be quite as hard as it was. Just a week later, long-time drag racer Roger Binnema also joined the list — not in the somewhat-insane small block Chev-powered Honda that we all know him for, but in a slightly milder 1968 Pontiac Firebird. The Firebird has been in the Binnema stable for only six months, but since then has undergone…

EASY REMOVAL OF ENGINE Many Mustang and Falcon owners will know that pulling the engine out isn’t quite as simple as it should be, thanks to the welded-in strut tower braces these cars come fitted with from the factory. Chook’s helped solve that issue in the Futura by removing the stock item and replacing it with a removable export brace, allowing easy removal of the engine should the need arise. Brandism is alive and well in smalltown New Zealand; it’s a movement that is propagated by people such as Robert ‘Chook’ Fowler. You see, Chook, like many other small-town folk, has an obsession with the Blue Oval. If it’s not a Ford, he’s not interested in parking it in his garage. That’s not to say he’s totally one-eyed — he’ll…

CONCEPT: TASH COLLINS ILLUSTRATION: ASH WESTMORELAND — HEROPRINTS.CO.NZ By now, you’ll no doubt have seen and read all about Tash Collins’ awesome ’55 Chev Nomad. The car is the perfect mix of flawless looks and drivability. There’s plenty of room in the car for the whole family, and the LS2 under the hood fires it up no worries at the turn of the key. What if Tash wanted something with a bit more go, though? Well, we suspect that her husband Todd’s been colluding with her here, as she states that the pair wouldn’t mind building a pro-street ’68 or ’69 Pontiac GTO. We’ve seen Tash and Todd’s style, and they’re not the type of couple to go halfway. No, if they were to do a GTO, it’d need to…

With the success of Powercruise events, not just in Australia but also in New Zealand and now in the US too, it’s no surprise that people are starting to think about creating their own driving event. Over the past few years, that idea has grown, and the result has been events that are great for enabling car lovers to really experience the full potential of their vehicles. Aussie Assault, as the name may suggest, is one such event — and, no, you don’t need to be fair dinkum to enter, but you do need a car of Australian descent. Run by the team at Choice Events and Promotions and sponsored by Adens Tyres among other smaller sponsors, the event kicked off for the first time in 2017. Come December 2018,…

A surprise announcement at the club barbeque following Round 2 of the 2018–2019 Enzed Central Muscle Cars (CMC) series caused much excitement: the class has potentially been invited to attend the Virgin Australia Supercars meeting at Philip Island as a support class in 2020 Previously when CMC has headed abroad, it has been combined with its Australian equivalent, Touring Car Masters (TCM), but, as TCM doesn’t generally attend the Phillip Island round, CMC would end up as a stand-alone class, giving drivers the chance to make the most of this legendary circuit. It’s not confirmed yet, but we sure like the sound of where this is heading.…

Ford’s 2019 Virgin Australia Supercars Championship challenger has completed its first test at Queensland Raceway. The car, which met with mixed feedback to say the least, was built with support from Ford Performance, Ford Australia, and the Ford Asia Pacific Design Studio. It ran faultlessly throughout the test session. Freshly crowned Supercars champion New Zealander Scott McLaughlin and teammate and fellow New Zealander Fabian Coulthard were given the chance to drive the vehicle as part of a battery of tests to prepare it for Supercars’ stringent homologation programme. The new-for-2019 Mustang will be the first coupe to enter Supercars under the current regulations and the first two-door involved in this level of Australian Touring Car Championship racing for more than two decades. Homologation testing will begin around the time this…

Hey Todd, I pored through NZV8 recently and it struck me that you guys only think of V8s as American or Australian. I look out my window and see a huge array of V8s that could make a good sideline piece. In the driveway and garage are: a Rolls-Royce Silver Spirit 6.8-litre V8. Rolls never said what horsepower they produced but, if fuel-consumption relates, it’s a lot! A 2012 Jaguar XJ five-litre 420hp, a 2007 Mercedes ML550 5.5-litre V8 with 380hp, XK8 Jag four-litre V8 (same as Aston V8 Vantage), [and a] Mercedes CLK 430 4.3-litre quadcam alloy V8 — a sweet motor. My other cars are much more your normal V8s: Sandman, GT Falcon, ’57 Cusso, and Chrysler Imperial. Just a thought for your readers. Cheers, Dave You’re a…

Drivers in the BNT V8s Championship will compete for a special award when the series visits the South Island in January. The Jason Richards Memorial Trophy has been awarded to drivers in the New Zealand V8 Championship since 2012, in memory of the Kiwi Supercar legend. Jason Richards was well-regarded on both sides of the Tasman, taking part in the V8 series for 10 years. He was a three-time New Zealand Touring Car Champion. Richards passed away from an aggressive form of cancer in 2011. Such was the popularity of the driver amongst his peers that there are actually three trophies bearing his name. One is awarded at the New Zealand round of the Virgin Australia Supercars Series, while another is contested at Nelson’s KartSport club. The BNT V8 /…

The heady cocktail of Caffeine & Gasoline was created from the overflow of the popular Caffeine & Classics at Auckland’s Smales Farm but its already proving a winner in its own right. The new event, also held on the last Sunday of the month but at Hampton Downs, drew in more than 200 cars. Walter Rands-Trevor of the events organizing team was delighted with the inaugural outing and the way Hampton Downs embraced the event with activities such as track cruising and go-karts. Caffeine & Gasoline was aimed at newer cars that didn’t meet the rules introduced to throttle back entries to the Smales Farm event, but the new event’s location, handy to both Auckland and Hamilton, drew in cars from further afield. Rands-Trevor says Caffeine & Gasoline already has…

Meremere Dragway, or Champion Dragway — the name more familiar to an older generation — is often also called the home of drag racing in New Zealand and has been for longer than you might think. But, by the time the official Meremere strip opened, Port Road was already in its seventh year of racing! While it’s not a quarter-mile track, and it may have started out as essentially a street sprint, Port Road is New Zealand’s longest-running drag racing venue, and, a few years back, celebrated 50 years of racing. We have put together an article on how it all came about. Search ‘Port Road history’ to check it out.…

Have you ever met one of those types of people who decides to take up a new sport or hobby and, without even trying, is great at it? Tash Collins may be one such person. You see, despite having never built or modified a car before, she’s done exactly that with her first build — this stunning 1955 Chev Nomad. Sure, it’s hard to make these wagons look bad, and she’ll be the first to admit that she’s had some help along the way, but the reality is that the vision’s been all hers right from the get-go. On first laying eyes on a Nomad around eight years ago, Tash fell in love with the shape. While she didn’t know then how rare they were, or, in turn, how hard…

She was already the quickest and fastest female in New Zealand drag racing history, having driven her twin-turbo Altered to an impressive PB of 6.34 at 218.41, but now, behind the wheel of the RC Industries — ex Gubb Racing — twin turbo dragster, Karen Hay’s gone one better. The dragster had previously run into the five-second zone with long-term driver and now owner Russell Christoffersen at the helm, but, at the second Comp meet of the 2018–2019 Meremere Dragway season, Karen pushed it to a 5.993 at 242.32mph, becoming the first Kiwi female to run a five-second pass. It wasn’t a one-off either, as she and the team backed it up the following day with a 5.991 at 239.70. Ever gracious, Karen was quick to pass much of the…

If you’ve never been to the SEMA Show, this might give you an idea of what it’s like: take the most insane car show you could ever imagine, double it, double it again, add a bunch more mind-blowing vehicles, and throw in 30km or so of walking, and you’re almost getting close. There’s really little that needs to be written about the event though, as, by now, almost all car lovers around the globe should be aware of what the event’s all about — even if it’s not, in theory, open to the public. Another staple of the event is the Mothers Shine and Choice Awards. As the name suggests, car-care brand Mothers is involved in the awards, which are not for the cleanest car or who used the most…

Chances are you’ve heard of Lloyd ‘Magoo’ Wilson — or, if not, at least you will have heard of his business, Magoo’s Street Rods. The business, specializing in turnkey hot rod builds as well as parts supply, is an offshoot of Magoo’s long-held passion for all things hot rod. In fact, the business initially came about through Magoo importing parts for his own cars and his mates asking if he could also bring back a few parts for them. Magoo’s car involvement goes back to when he was a kid living in Levin. The now-long-defunct Levin race circuit was one of his favourite haunts, and he spent many a weekend down there admiring the machinery. He also met drivers such as Red Dawson, one of his heroes at the time.…

With the number of cars that we’re given the opportunity to feature — most of which your average Kiwi petrolhead would give a left nut or breast (hey, it’s 2018) to own — we also get the occasionally unenviable task of sorting through the mounds of paperwork comprising the stories and specs behind each vehicle. And, every once in a while, there’ll be one that stands out above the rest. In the case of Michael Wallace’s track-attacking Chev Monza, it isn’t so much because of the car’s meticulous and excessive standard of build but its background — the ‘why’ rather than the ‘what’. “Dad and myself have been involved in motorsport all our life — motorbikes, karting, and car racing,” he reveals. And the family racing background goes a lot…

While the CMC drivers provide high-level entertainment for the crowd, as a club, we actually have a pretty low-level approach to things. The club is made up of people from all walks of life. Whether they are engineers, IT specialists, mechanics, small-business owners, or something else, there are two things everyone has in common: they want to race cars, and they want to have a good time. The number-one guiding principle for the club is to have fun, so people know what they are signing up for when they join. Although we’re called Central Muscle Cars, CMC has become a national club, with membership from both North and South Islands, and while we mostly race in the North Island, we venture to the South Island every second year to race…

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