Innehållsförteckning för June 2016 från Street Machine

IF YOU’RE one of the many attempting to #lstheworld, then Street Machine LSX Tuner #3 is for you. It’s jam-packed with tips and tricks to make your LS-powered ride run better, turn more heads and go faster. Whether your car is a seven-second drag strip weapon, weekend cruiser, burnout beast or daily driver, there’s something for everyone. On the cover of this issue is Dustin Goldsmith’s absolutely mental VE ute (which we’ve seen before in the April ’16 issue of SM), plus 11 other brand-new feature cars. And man, what a diverse bunch! Motorsport is covered, with drags, circuit and salt, plus there’s a bunch of classic cruisers running LS power, an insane twin-turbo Lexus IS200, and Wade Wagstaff’s stunning show ’n’ go VZ ute. But for pure class and…

15-21 MAY, ALBERT PARK, VIC Aussie Muscle Car Run, Albert Park. Contact Meaghan (03) 9949 5803. 21 MAY, LAIDLEY, QLD Laidley Charity Show ’n’ Shine & Ute Show Swap Meet, Laidley Showgrounds. Contact Barbara 0412 140 239. 21-22 MAY, BRISBANE, QLD 46th Queensland Hot Rod Show, Convention Centre, South Bank. Visit qhrp.org. 22 MAY, MITCHELL, ACT 10th Annual EJ-EH National Capital Show ’n’ Shine 2016, Exhibition Park. Contact John 0408 631 972. 22 MAY, PRAIRIEWOOD, NSW VW Nationals 2016, Fairfield City Showgrounds. Contact David (02) 9534 4825. 22 MAY, RYLSTONE, NSW Annual Rylstone Swap Meet, Rylstone Showground. Contact Peter 0429 441 220. 27-29 MAY, BENALLA, VIC 40th Historic Winton, Winton Motor Raceway. Contact Noel (03) 5428 2689. 28-29 MAY, TAREE, NSW Weekend on Wheels, Jack Neal Oval. Contact (02) 6551…

PASSION comes in many forms, and the twin obsessions of Brisbane’s Mark Dearlove are quite diverse: vintage Redline BMX and old-school Chevrolet. With an impressive collection of both, Mark has come a long way since cutting his teeth on a Kmart-spec Amaroo pushie and KE10 Corolla! 01: THIS KE10 Corolla is a 1968 model, just like Mark. “My dad bought it in ’84 to teach me how to drive” Mark says. “He truly bought it off a little old lady; it had 9000 miles on the clock and was his daily for many years. It’s still in the family, with just over 100,000 miles now. I graduated to a 1974 RT104 Corona with an 18R and four-speed – if you pulled the air cleaner off it sounded like it had…

SELLER’S REMORSE AFTER seeing John Strachan’s magnificent Holden panel van (John Strachan – My Life With Cars, streetmachine.com.au), I wonder how many other readers are, like me, kicking themselves in the butt for foolishly parting with a car for very few dollars that is now a classic or an ideal customiser? I once sold an HZ panel van for $1800 in good nick (bought it for $1200), and an XW Fairmont with 302 Windsor for three grand – I cried as it drove away! Hindsight is useless, but I have learned my lesson, and my kids will have to bury me in my 50-year-old pony car. I just hope they wait ’til I’ve carked it! Geoff Scard, email…

LIKE a lot of us, Leigh Haintz got a fat one for tough street machines when he was a teenager, promising himself that one day he’d own a car like the ones he saw cruising around his hometown of Geelong. And, also like many of us, it took another decade or so for the ambition to become action. “I bought it locally off a bloke” says Leigh of this HG Monaro, which he picked up 14 years ago. “It’d done a lot of street cruising and some racing but the owner had let the rego lapse and he’d put it in a shed for nine years. “I’d had a look at another one at a swap meet but it was full of bog” he recalls. “And then on the way…

AARON’S TAKEN THE CAR FROM A FOUR-CYLINDER 30HP SLUG TO SOMETHING CAPABLE OF AN 8.84@152MPH PASS YOU have to wonder about the sanity of a bloke who stuffs a 408-cube small-block Chev into a little Ford Popular – and then goes and straps a couple of giant turbos to it. Then you find out the guy’s a Kiwi, and it all makes sense. Aaron Thomas is the pilot of this little Pommy dragstrip terror, and he’s managed to take his ’54 Ford Popular from a four-cylinder 30hp slug to something capable of running the quarter-mile in 8.84@152mph, making it one of the quickest street cars in NZ. Yep, this crazy machine is registered and does get driven on the street, and it’s not as frightening as you might think: “It…

THEY TRAVEL FROM ALL OVER THE COUNTRY TO PARTAKE IN THE SOCIAL RITUALS OF CRUISING, DRINKING AND CATCHING UP IN THE middle of March each year, an annual migration of Moparphiles (Tightarsus valiantownus) occurs, with hundreds of vehicles and thousands of fans making their way to Albury-Wodonga on the NSW/Victorian border for Chryslers On The Murray. Most begin their yearly journey on the Friday morning, and they travel from all over the country to partake in the social rituals of cruising, drinking and generally catching up with those they haven’t seen in the past 12 months. The increasing age of the flock and largely male population precludes the usual mating rituals, but they do consume large amounts of fermented drinks over the course of the weekend. Unfortunately natural attrition claims…

THERE IS A LOT TO BE LEARNED FROM ICON’S OBSESSION WITH DESIGN AND ATTENTION TO DETAIL THAT CAN BE APPLIED TO HOME BUILDS ANYONE who is into cars usually has a bucket list of dream machines they’d like to build. Unless you have a Jay Leno-type budget though, you need to be a talented, dedicated and supremely driven person to get anywhere close to ticking them all off – think Rod Hadfield and Norm Longfield for a couple of blokes who have gotten close. Now, picture yourself owning a 40,000-square-foot shed, filled with the best machinery and staffed with 47 talented craftsmen. Outside, you’ve got 30 or 40 unrestored and heavily sunbaked classics in various states of decay, waiting for their time in the shop. Your job is to come…

TOM MCGILTON AND LARRY LARSON SCHEMED TO BUILD A TWIN-TURBO,2500HP CRUISER TO RUN AT HOT ROD DRAG WEEK LOOK, let’s just get this out of the way right up front. What Tom McGilton did to his brand-new ZL1 Camaro is crazy. When the local Kansas City Chevy dealer, Van Chevrolet, told Tom it was getting a 2013 ZL1, he bought it. “But when I told the salesman what my plan was for the car, he wanted me to give it back” he says. But he didn’t. Instead, he drove it to Larson Race Cars in Oak Grove, Missouri. Once there, he proceeded with his plan, which was to tear it completely apart. He took out the entire interior, windows, suspension – everything. Then he and Larry Larson schemed to build…

THE street car argument is sure to flare up again after Tristan Ockers and the ProFlo team ran a 6.95@199mph in the MINCER Capri at Street Machine Supernats. Witnessing this car going down the track is quite an experience, with the blower cranking out a merry tune all the way. “We have been playing with the four-link between rounds” ProFlo’s Paul Sant says. “We have not had to touch anything else but the car has been twitchy and TO has been fighting for his life. We are yet to really lean on the tune-up and so far we have only been spinning the motor to 8000rpm and 42lb of boost.” Sadly the 510ci Oldsmobile donk broke a rod over the finish line on that 6.95 run in Sydney, and the…

I LIKE THE IDEA OF PRESERVING HISTORY. THE SHED IS MEANT TO BE A STEP BACK IN TIME FOR PEOPLE STEPPING into Terry Dalton’s shed is like being dropped into the pages of one of those I-SPY books for kids. One’s eyes are torn all over the shop – old painted signs, die-cast replicas, soft-drink bottles, petrol bowsers, arcade games. There’s a jukebox, an F1 simulator and even a six-seater in-shed cinema. There’s more stuff packed in here than some museums, and right in the centre sit six gorgeous hunks of classic metal. Built on Terry’s property south-west of Christchurch, New Zealand, the shed contains artefacts from all over the world. It all started with an enthusiasm for ’57 Chev memorabilia, which then grew into a larger obsession. What Terry…

THE Street Machine team has been out to Deniliquin in southwestern NSW a few times before, mostly to party at the famed Deni Ute Muster or to visit elite car crafter Shane Rowe before he moved his Southern Rod & Custom shop to the ‘big smoke’ in Shepparton. But now we have a whole new reason to visit – the Cruising Nationals. Run by the blokes from Melbourne’s Western Smash Repairs, the Nats ran for the second time in April, and boy, did it go off! This year, the weather was a lot kinder than it was to the inaugural event in 2015, attracting some 2000 reported visitors into town for the show. The event follows the now-popular formula of bringing a bunch of classic cars to a small town,…

FAMILY AFFAIR HEY guys, fantastic mag, can’t wait to get it out of the letterbox every month. My 10-year-old loves getting the wrinkled copy once I am finished, and both my boys’ walls are plastered with the posters. I am nearing the end of a three-year rebuild on a 1970 HT Holden wagon, and it took a drive down the driveway under its own power for the first time the other day. Here’s the artwork my eldest came inside and did afterwards. Very proud. The next generation is in good hands! Daniel Kearney, email…

THIS CANADIAN-MARKET MODEL NOW BEARS LITTLE RESEMBLANCE TO THE SIBLINGS IT ROLLED OFF THE PRODUCTION LINE WITH IN 1962 IT’S a fair bet many of you wouldn’t even know what a Pontiac Laurentian is, let alone seen one before. The Laurentian was built by General Motors for the Canadian market, but this long ’n’ low example now bears little resemblance to the siblings it rolled off the production line with in 1962. “When it first came in, I have to admit it was pretty ugly-looking” says Jason Bobruk of Real Steel, the Queanbeyan shop responsible for creating this masterpiece for owner Dennis Deane. “However we were confident we could turn it into a real head-turner.” Considering the stunning black Pontiac was the talk of Summernats 29 the moment the lovely…

WE HAD NO INTENTION OF BUYING A CAR AT SEMA 2014, BUT WHEN WE CAME ACROSS THIS TRUCK ON DISPLAY, WE FELL IN LOVE WITH IT GROUND-pounding American pick-ups sitting on airbag suspension have become one of the hottest trends around over the past few years, one that is perfectly encapsulated by Ben and Luke Sacilotto’s awesome 1950 Chevy 3100. With flat paint, big-inch rollers and tar-grinding ride height, it is as simple – and cool – as it gets. But DROPT’s story actually started Stateside in 2014. “My brother Luke and I travel to SEMA in Las Vegas every two years to keep up with trends and to admire the craftsmanship coming out of the USA” Ben Sacilotto says. “We have been into cars, mainly EHs, for 20 years,…

THE VH SERVED AS BENNY’S DAILY HACK FOR SIX MONTHS, UNTIL THE TIMING GEARS PACKED IT IN AND LEFT HIM STRANDED ABOUT the last place on earth you’d expect the bloke who owns this 355ci Holden-powered Commodore to work is the research and development department at the Ford Motor Company. “Yeah, I cop a bit of heat at work” laughs Geelong’s Benny Leat. “A few of the boys I work with, like Danny Busbridge with the 2WIZAS Torana, have Holdens. It’s nice having them around the workshop because there are a lot of Ford guys there, and they do hang a bit of shit on us!” Benny bought the VH as a six-cylinder SL, soon after starting as an R&D mechanic with the Blue Oval, and it served as his…

SOME MONGREL AT POWERCRUISE KICKED THE REAR GUARD IN. I DIDN’T SEE IT HAPPEN, BUT IT REALLY MOTIVATED ME TO TIDY THE CAR UP A KICK in the rear gave Alyn Blackshaw a kick in the rear. You see, some damn fool at Powercruise in 2011 had laid a boot into the hindquarters of Alyn’s self-built XB GS Falcon, and before he knew it he was neck-deep in a full-blown rebuild. “I’d originally bought an XA coupe that I stripped down and had blasted” WA-based Alyn explains. “All that was left was a block of Swiss cheese. There were fist-sized lumps of bog falling out of it and as far as I was concerned it was unsalvageable.” There was one saving grace, though – the XA coupe had come chock-full…

IT DIDN’T MATTER IF IT WAS TYRES, ENGINES, COOLING SYSTEMS OR BODY PANELS – THE MODERN BURNOUT COLISEUM TAKES NO PRISONERS WITH the world becoming increasingly narcissistic and all about me, me, me, it’s refreshing to see a bunch of community-minded people coming together to raise money for charity – which is what Lardner Park Motorfest is all about. Well okay, it’s also about having a lot of fun smashing tyres, but by the end of the weekend-long event each year the Gippsland Tough Streeters and Drouin Rotary Club raise a lot of moolah for those in need. We’re not talking about chicken feed either; this year they raised around $65,000! Lardner Park isn’t a town; it’s an agricultural playground where the locals from Victoria’s Baw Baw shire show off…

IT IS JUST A 235CI SIX WITH A THREE-ON-THE-TREE MANUAL, BUT IT DRIVES LIKE A DREAM KYLE GRIMA 18, MELBOURNE, VICTORIA THIS is my first car, a 1960 Chevrolet Bel Air. It was dead-stock when I bought it, just a grouse original car. I bought it without even test-driving it! My old man and I lowered it ourselves and then I slapped the 14-inch Astro Supremes on it, with thin whitewalls. The finishing touch was a set of bellflower exhaust tips, which give it a wicked look, I reckon. Apart from that, I kept it completely original. It is just a 235ci six with a three-on-the-tree manual, but it drives like a dream. But as much as I like the Chev, I wanted something with two doors and a V8,…

I WANTED A MODERN COLOUR BUT WITH THE CLASSIC LOOK OF THE ORIGINAL HUBCAPS AND WHITEWALLS MELISSA DAVIS POINT COOK, VICTORIA MELISSA Davis was born into a family of Ford nuts, so it was a no-brainer that she’d become one herself. As a newly single lady, the 32-year-old interior designer and personal trainer has been cruising her sweet ’66 XP Fairmont more than ever. Rad XP! Tell us a bit about it. I had wanted an XM or XP since I was 16 years old. A close family friend had one when I was growing up; he was like the brother I never had. I was 19 years old when I bought this as an all-original second-owner car. It was metallic silver-green with a beige interior, bucket seats, 221ci six…

WIN! WIN one of three Mothers packages, including glass cleaner, carnauba cleaner wax, car wash, polishing pads, a pack of microfibre towels and more! See www.mothers.com for details.…

THE weather gods have been against the burnout brigade in recent times. Street Machine Supernats was supposed to see a Summernats Burnout Masters ticket go to another potential Master, but the rain swept in and stopped that from happening. Which means the next stop on the Burnout Masters feeder event calendar will be Brashernats Sydney on the June long weekend. The word from Summernats is that the ‘Supernats ticket’ will probably end up in the wildcard pot at Summernats 30. We’ve also got the Red CentreNATS coming up in early September, and the Summernats team are throwing a bit of tow money to worthy challengers. A few lucky entrants from UBC Ballarat, Motorfest, Gazzanats WA and Burnout King have scored tow money towards a trip to Alice Springs, and they’ll…

I RECKON THE WHOLE COUNTRY WAS PRETTY SURPRISED WHEN I GOT ELECTED, BUT THE MOST SURPRISED PEOPLE IN AUSTRALIA WERE MYSELF AND MY WIFE ONE minute Ricky Muir was a family man working at a sawmill in rural Victoria. The next he was a senator in the Parliament of Australia, a bona fide politician. And to hear him tell it, nobody was more surprised than he was. Savaged by the mainstream media early on, Ricky has since proven he’s the real deal. And he’s on our side. Street Machine caught up with Ricky for a chat. Cars obviously came before politics for you, so what got you into the car scene in the first place? I’ve always been a car nut. My uncle had an earthmoving business so trucks and…

FACTORY FLAW AS A PREVIOUS owner of John Basso’s XW panel van (SM, May ’16), it is fantastic to see it reappear in such great condition. John’s commitment to the car and the ability of Steve Alldrick and the Deluxe Rod Shop team to restore it has resulted in a car being saved that was close to lost. However, it does concern me that inaccurate information about the vehicle has been added to embellish what is already a fantastic story. The van was not an option 48 (GS pack) from the factory. I ordered a verification letter from Ford when I owned it (the letter passed with my sale), and option 48 did not appear on the options list. The van was delivered to Peter Wright Ford and then converted…

X-FACTOR IN THE May issue of Street Machine we featured Chris and Colleen Bitmead’s XBOSS Falcon on the cover and a massive 10-page feature inside. Yet even 10 pages wasn’t enough space to tell the full story of how this Ridler Award contender – and Great Eight finalist – came to be, so we had a two-part feature on our website showing how this amazing eight-year build came together. It sparked a great reaction on our Facebook page, so if you haven’t checked it out yet, head to streetmachine.com.au. Peter Chronis – What an incredibly talented human. It’s not about if you do or don’t like it, it’s about respect for the workmanship, the vision and the patience – and for the record, I love it. Bravo! Michael Stephens Rank…

AHMET LISTENED TO WHAT THE FANS HAD TO SAY AND DID HIS BEST TO MAKE THEM HAPPY WHEN the Street Machine Supernats promoter Ahmet ‘The Mad Turk’ Sehirligil announced that he had rescheduled the 22nd running of the event for fear of rain, it broke the internet. The decision was not a popular one, with punters flocking to social media to let him know in no uncertain terms that they were less than pleased. In response to the backlash, Ahmet sprang into action, liaising with Sydney Dragway management to reinstate the event. Say what you will about the initial decision – the weather was looking a bit sketchy, after all – but at least Ahmet listened to what the fans had to say and did his best to make them…

THE process of importing a modified vehicle into Australia is not exactly a bowl of cherries. The Aussie Government requires all vehicle imports to go through a Vehicle Import Approval process. As Ben and Luke’s truck is a classic, it comes under the Pre-1989 scheme, but that calls for cars to be standard, or to have been modified in period (that is, before 1989). Thankfully, there was a way around this for the boys. “Due to the modifications, it was rejected, but could be re-lodged with conditions,” Ben says. “One of those conditions was a statutory declaration stating that most of the mods were completed before 1989. Luckily, most mods were done pre-1989 by another owner, and Heath provided sufficient evidence for that, so the Australian Government finally gave us…

I LIKED THE IDEA OF BUILDING A CHARGER FOR DRAG RACING USING CHRYSLER AUSTRALIA’S STYLING EFFORTS FOR THAT TIME. I JUST ADAPTED THE R/T PROGRAM FOR THE QUARTER-MILE SOMETIMES it’s nice to dream. The US-based Ramchargers were a group of Chrysler engineers that campaigned a string of drag cars back in the day – all with the blessing of Mother Mopar – so imagine if Chrysler Australia had the coin and interest to have supported something similar here? A factory-backed Charger would have been a serious crowd-pleaser at any Aussie track in the 70s, and one look at Peter Selby’s E55 Charger is enough to make you dream of what could have been. “I liked the idea of building a Charger for drag racing using Chrysler Australia’s styling efforts for…

ADVICE IGNORED ONE day Jenny’s dishwasher broke, so she called a repairman. When he arrived, she said: “I have to go to work, so I’ll leave you to fix the dishwasher. Just send me the bill. Now, I don’t want you to be scared of my bulldog, Bubba. He looks mean, but he won’t bother you. But whatever you do, do not talk to my parrot. I mean it – don’t talk to him!” The dishwasher repairman was puzzled, but he began to go about his business and Jenny left for work. After a while, he heard a sound, and turned to see a mean, tough-looking bulldog standing in the doorway of the kitchen. But, just as Jenny had said, the fearsome brute didn’t seem interested in terrorising the repairman;…

NATHAN KATH FB HOLDEN “THIS is my 1960 FB Special sedan. I purchased the car 15 years ago after my father found it sitting in a paddock just outside a small country town. Thirteen years later, after a ground-up restoration and numerous modifications, this was the end result! It runs a Holden 331ci V8 with a 650 Demon carburettor, roller cam, and custom-made extractors courtesy of Fat Pipes in Queensland. Making it fire is an ICE distributor and two-step ignition system. Transmission is a Turbo 400 with a 4200rpm converter, finished off with a shortened nine-inch LSD running 4.11:1 gears. It has an HR Holden front end with HQ disc brakes. Brett Curran of Curran’s Custom Paint & Panel took care of the bodywork and paint; the colour is Morpheus…