Innehållsförteckning för September 2017 från Street Machine

PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE THROUGH the pages of your magazine I would like to congratulate Steve Alldrick of Deluxe Rod Shop on winning the Laurie Starling Excellence award at this year’s Meguiar’s MotorEx [see page 70]. This award is recognition of metalwork skills and innovative work, and there is little doubt that Steve is the Chip Foose of Australia. His dedication and contribution to rodding is obvious. Congratulations Steve, we are proud of you. Carol & Rod Hadfield, email COVER ME I’M FROM Adelaide, and I am rebuilding an old cover car you featured in the early 90s. It’s a Verdoro Green HG Monaro GTS that had its tunnel-rammed engine and all the extras painted gold and ran Cheviot-style Center Lines. The number plate on the car is RDK215 and was…

01 GARY MYERS XA COUPE AUG 2017 GARY Myers’s naturally aspirated XA GT coupe, XACUTER, has been reborn with some blown bad attitude – say hello to the 1000hp AGROXA! The heart of the Falcon is that manic engine, based off a Dart Windsor block that spans a 9.5-inch deck height and 4.125-inch bore, but de-stroked to 360ci using a Callies crank, CP pistons and Crower rods. Gary needed it to rev to 8000rpm, and it certainly does! “During the powerskids in Cairns recently we saw the engine get to 10,000rpm a couple of times,” he laughs. Gary’s ready to test AGROXA’s mettle, with his eyes on a Burnout Masters spot at Summernats 31. 02 BRENDEN ‘BUBBA’ MEDLYN VH COMMODORE JAN 2017 WHILE the rest of the world is busy…

THE EVENT HAS BEEN SOLD TO OUT THERE PRODUCTIONS – THE ANDY LOPEZ-FRONTED BUSINESS THAT OWNS AND RUNS SUMMERNATS IT’S the biggest and arguably best show of its kind in Australia, but as the curtain closed on the 2017 running of Meguiar’s MotorEx, MotorActive Managing Director Bruce Morrison took the stage to deliver some important news. From 2018 onwards, MotorEx would be under new management. The event has been sold to Out There Productions – the Andy Lopez-fronted business that owns and runs Street Machine Summernats. “We knew the show could go a lot further, but we can’t do it on our own,” Bruce said. “We want to stay involved in it, but we now have a new partner. We think that combined we can do a much better job…

THE Chrysler faithful were treated to two days full of Mopar goodness in late July at the Ipswich Motorsport Precinct, west of Brisbane. Saturday’s Mopar Mayhem powered on with race and cruise sessions at Queensland Raceway’s circuit track, while Mopar Sunday’s action lit up the drag strip, dyno and show scene the next day at Willowbank Raceway. Both are fantastic as standalone events, but when the planets align for them to cohabitate for the same weekend, the boost to attendees is significant and just the catalyst needed to inspire travellers from further afield. It also allows for a welcome social element, with many locals choosing to camp nearer to the tracks for convenience, which offers the chance to shoot the breeze after hours with likeminded folks. Mopar Mayhem is now…

IF YOU want easy power at a bargain price, it’s hard to ignore Ford’s twin-cam turbo Barra six. Jason Waye, the man behind Muscle Garage and Tuff Mounts, certainly sees the appeal. He set out to build a Barra-powered VS ute for $10,000 that would run 10s at Street Machine Drag Challenge, and found the engine swap comically easy. “The VS had been sitting in front of a mate’s shop for about a year and was being used as a dump,” Jason says. “I geed him up by saying I’ll put a Barra in it, and one day he rang me and told me to come get it. “The ute was a roller with no motor or ’box, but at some stage it’d had an RB30 in it so the…

I’D ALWAYS BAGGED OUT WEBBY, SAYING: ‘HOW HARD CAN THIS DRAG RACING THING REALLY BE?’ AND IT’S REALLY HARD! YOU might think you recognise Yvette Webb’s nanna-spec small-bodied Torana, because it’s a dead ringer for one we’ve featured previously, and there’s a good reason for that. See, Yvette’s hubby is Tony ‘Webby’ Webb, who runs an 8.5-second poo-brown LJ Torry known as CULPRIT. It’s a beastly turbo-fed 355-cuber and currently second on the 8.50-indexed APSA X275 record list, 0.003 seconds behind Terry Seng. But although it looks similar, this is not the same car. It is, in fact, a non-identical twin. “The LJ was a gift from Tony last year,” Yvette says. “He’s randomly surprised me with a few cars over the years.” Tony bought the car from Nicki and…

LIKE THAT IT’S OLD; IT KEEPS ME DRIVING WELL. SO MANY PEOPLE TUNE OUT WHEN THEY DRIVE MODERN CARS NIK Warde spent her youth around old Holdens, happily helping her dad in the shed with his cars and Harleys. While she remains a GM-H enthusiast, she now also appreciates the finer offerings of other makes. Like this ’65 Ford Galaxie Country Sedan, for example. Nik was already a keen wagon fan when she was seduced by this roadside beauty, and while the purchase wasn’t smooth sailing, the love story definitely has been. How’d you get the Gal? I needed to replace my modified V6 VS wagon when my hubby Cam and I saw the Gal sitting on the side of the road for sale, in Bright. We snoozed and missed…

AS WE go to print, there are just three weeks until the Red CentreNATS, and the list of things still to do on our MX-5 is longer than the things we’ve done. But the turning point is near, and with most of the heavy lifting already done by the crew at All Race Fabrications, we’re on track to have our twin-turbo LS1-powered beast cruising the streets of Alice Springs from 1 September. So why build a twin-turbo LS1 Mazda in the first place? Well, the main attraction of the Red CentreNATS is they will give you a permit to drive just about anything on the street. So we wanted to build something so mental that it couldn’t be street-driven anywhere else – and this thing is going to be nuts.…

26 AUG, EUDLO, QLD Eudlo Car & Motorcycle Show ’n’ Shine, Eudlo State School. Visit facebook.com/ eudlocarandmotorcycleshow. 26 AUG, NOBLE PARK, VIC Rats, Tatts & Pin-ups, Sandown Park Hotel. Visit facebook.com/kingpinkuztums. 26-27 AUG, WILLOWBANK, QLD Brisbane Jamboree, Willowbank Raceway. Visit willowbankraceway.com.au. 27 AUG, JIMBOOMBA, QLD Jimboomba Auto Extravaganza, Hills International College. Phone 0422 513 686. 27 AUG, MELBOURNE, VIC German Auto Show, Victorian Deaf Education Institute. Email germanautoshow@vwclub.com.au. 27 AUG, TEWANTIN, QLD Corey Lawson Memorial Car Show, Noosa Sports Complex. Contact Mick on 0417 843 227. 27 AUG, SCORESBY, VIC Wagon Nationals, Caribbean Gardens. Email wagonnationals@gmail.com. 27 AUG, SILVERWATER, NSW EH Holden Car Club Show ’n’ Shine, Silverwater Park. Visit ehholdencarclubofnsw.org. 27-28 AUG, HAMILTON, VIC Hamilton Undercover Automotive Swap Meet, Hamilton Showgrounds. Contact Heather on 0428 289 502. 01-03 SEP,…

A DAM Shears is a salt-of-the-earth kind of guy. Wise beyond his 44 years and the last of a slowly dying breed of Aussie larrikin, he loves a beer and a yarn and is of the ilk that thinks ‘social media’ is a group of friendly reporters. A staunch GM fan, he has long bled Holden-engine Rocket Red, though his earlier years tell a different tale. Cutting his teeth around the backroads of Bathurst, Adam now calls sunny Townsville home, where he continues his love of all things mechanical and ardent passion for anything old-school. 01: THE young Adam wasn’t too keen on school. “I struggled to read and write, like a lot of 14-year-old country kids, but to me, the Street Machine story on Rex Webster’s FJ spoke volumes,”…

DREAM COMING TRUE FIRSTLY, great work on such an iconic magazine. I can thank Street Machine for me leaving school and becoming a mechanic in the mid-80s. Your mag has inspired many builds and performance additions to my vehicles. Secondly, I reckon my current build has a great story. This will be my once-in-a-lifetime build: my favourite, a Holden HQ Monaro. I purchased this one-owner HQ LS Monaro from Des Thompson from Thompson Dyno Tuning late last year. Des is well-respected in the industry and held hillclimb records in the Gunnedah area back in the 80s in his Torana with a supercharged 186. The car had been stored covered in a shed for about 20 years. It had a blown 350 Chev, Turbo 400 and a 10-bolt diff. No rust,…

NOBODY SUSPECTS IT’S PACKING 1200HP. I CAN PULL UP AT THE SERVO AND JUST PUTT AROUND WITHOUT ATTRACTING TOO MUCH ATTENTION HAVING owned plenty of strip-only weapons, John Huysmans thought it was about time he built himself a registered one. That’s how this tough-as-nails, XY-fronted XW ute came about. “Nobody suspects it’s packing 1200hp,” says John, from Orange, NSW. “I can pull up at the servo and just putt around without attracting too much attention.” The 50-year-old has been playing around with race cars since he was 15. “I just love racing; it started with an 11-second LJ – I was very young and it was way too quick,” John laughs. A few other cars followed, before John moved onto a 351 Windsor-powered Capri that won a lot of races,…

BRAD BOUGHT HIS VN WHEN HE’D JUST TURNED 17, AND IT’S FAIR TO SAY IT BORE THE BRUNT OF HIS DESTRUCTIVE P-PLATE YEARS IT SEEMS odd to refer to a car with plastic bumpers as a classic, but that’s exactly what the VN Commodore SS has become. Just like the VL Calais before it, the VN SS has come of age and emerged as a cult favourite. Good examples are increasingly difficult to come across and values are heading steadily north; some will even be eligible for historic rego next year! Brad Phillips bought this one when he’d just turned 17, and it’s fair to say it bore the brunt of his destructive P-plate years. “Two weeks after I bought the car it was defected and I’d lost my licence,”…

 THERE are three things that John Hutchings loves: Fords, Windsors and tunnel-rams. And he combined them when creating this beautiful and bad-arse XK Falcon ute. I SPOTTED THE XK FOR SALE OVER EAST AND IT HAD A LOT GOING FOR IT: THE V8, NINE-INCH AND SOME NICE CUSTOM TOUCHES It’s not the first time John’s built something along these lines. For over 30 years he owned an original XW GT Falcon – you know, back when you could own a GT and modify it and people wouldn’t string you up from the nearest tree. Admittedly it was mostly engine mods, but it ended up being a little bit too angry for the street. All you GT lovers out there can put your keyboards down – John ended up doing a…

WE REBUILT THE FACTORY BLOCK SO IT’S STILL MATCHING-NUMBERS , EVEN THOUGH NOTHING INSIDE IS ORIGINAL GEORGE ANASTASIOU has been a Camaro fan for a long time. “I’ve wanted one since I was only 12 years old, after a guy in our neighbourhood bought a red ’68 with a crazy big-block and four-speed,” he remembers. “It was the toughest thing I’d ever seen. So I decided that one day I’d own one – though I had to wait 30 years.” George located his ’67 RS in the States as a restored, matching-numbers, two-owner car. “It was a clean body with no rust, the interior was a great colour and in top condition, plus the previous owner photographed the complete resto, which was the key to my purchase.” The car landed…

FOR those who didn’t catch our feature on Mark Riek’s sensational FX Holden ute in the June 2015 issue of Street Machine, we’ll run you through the highlights. She’s a superbly restored old girl, powered by what’s probably the most high-tech Holden grey motor in existence – at least since the days of the Waggott twin cam and the like. Built by Geoff Scott from Geoff’s Auto Studio, it displaces 2458cc (or a whisker under 150ci), with the bottom end consisting of a lightened and modified crankshaft, a set of conrods pinched from a Mitsubishi 4G64 four-cylinder, and 81mm ACL pistons that would otherwise have ended up in a Mazda. The camshaft is from Waggott, with .500in of lift and 232@50 duration, and the head is the factory grey casting…

IN CASE you missed the memo, I’ve been building a VL Commodore to take on this year’s Street Machine DragChallenge. The aim is to run low 10s (possibly high nines) reliably, with the good old Nissan dirty 30 boosted by a Turbonetics 64/65 billet-wheel turbo. We’ll be running a Haltech Elite ECU, which will control the flex fuel system as well as the ICE Ignition coil-pack set-up. We’re also using a full suite of goodies from Turbosmart, including a Race Port blow-off valve (yes, a VL with a blow-off valve – crazy, I know) and a Hypergate external wastegate. Last time we checked in with my RB30 build at Powerhouse Engines we were machining the block ready to receive its new forged Spool rods and pistons. We started with a…

SAY what you want about Pixar’s Cars franchise (and it’s repeatedly been reviewed as the weakest in the studio’s résumé), but the previous two Cars flicks have at the very least been technically brilliant, visually astounding and chock-full of automotive in-jokes. Anyone who reviews them without gushing over Cadillac-inspired mountain ranges, Whitworth bolt-bearing villains and the offer of a “free Lincoln Continental breakfast” at the Cozy Cone Motel just doesn’t get cars. Cars 3, which has recently been released in Australia, is a welcome return to the sentimental, sepia-toned, Route 66-inspired feel of the original film. Now a veteran of the track, race car Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson) is still consistently at the pointy end of the field, jostling for podium positions amongst a core group of respectful…

MODERN LOVE WE’VE been getting some great feedback on our new project car buyer’s guide section, Wheeling & Dealing, and our rundown on the Holden Monaro CV8 in the July mag sparked a fair bit of discussion on our Facebook page. What do you think – is the Monaro CV8 a future classic? Frankie Wren – In price? Yes. In spirit? No. Ultimately it is literally just a two-door Commodore. You could make one by cutting and welding a sedan and getting it engineered. When a V8 sedan can be had for $2K and a Monaro is more like $15K, it’s already cheaper to make one. Glenn Ponting – Early Monaros were just two-door Kingswoods; what’s the difference? Michael Stevenson – I call them two-door Commodores or Commonaros; not hating…

IT THROWS OUT 357HP AT THE TREADS, WHICH IS MORE THAN ENOUGH TO MAKE THE FLYWEIGHT GALANT A HANDFUL WE KNOW how it is – you go to a car show and get all hepped up to go home and set the world on fire with your own build. That is exactly how Wollongong’s Drew Friend wound up building an awesome LS-powered Mitsubishi Galant. Well, sort of. What started out as a simple skid-event car became a finely detailed machine that landed him in the Elite Hall Top 60 at Summernats 30. “I got excited after Brashernats a few years ago and wanted to build a burnout car,” Drew explains. “I’ve always wanted a ’69 Capri but I couldn’t find one. My dad knew of this car, which he worked…

WITH A PROVEN 10.6-SECOND PASS OUT OF THE DONK, JODIE AND DAVE RECKON LOW 10S ARE IN ORDER JODIE Guilfoyle is a respected quarter-mile combatant, having run 10s in her VH SL/E. And as the saying goes, once you’ve had blacktop you’ll never go back – or something to that effect. So for Jodie, all her cars need to pass the rigours of drag racing, if only every so often. “My first race was eight years ago in my VH at Calder,” she recalls. “I was hooked from then on! I didn’t want to go and get my timecard; I just wanted to line up again.” Her tubbed VH was a stout bit of kit too, powered by a 355ci stroker with a 3500rpm-stalled Trimatic and a tough-as-nails nine-inch.…

“IT’S GREAT TO SEE NEW NAMES SUCH AS MARK CHAPMAN, PINO PRIOLO AND KELVIN LYLE STEPPING UP AND PUSHING MORE FAVOURED TEAMS OUT OF THE TOP EIGHT” HIDDEN Valley Raceway in Darwin hosted the first round of the 2016-2017 Pro Slammer championship season, and it was a real cracker. There were 16 cars entered, which was a fantastic result, and I’m hoping that a lot of the interstate guys that turned up will start travelling to the other tracks this season. Any time you get 16 cars turning up for a meeting for eight places you’re guaranteed some surprises, and that’s the way it played out. This year is shaping up to be the first multi-car championship chase the category has seen in a long time. Let’s not take anything…

LACHLAN MORLEY 1965 AP6 VALIANT “MY NAME is Dave Lock and I am a volunteer with the Make-A-Wish Foundation in Adelaide. This AP6 belongs to a tough young guy called Lachlan Morley. He got the car in May 2014, and he and his dad worked hard to get it restored and back on the road in a year. A big thank you to Speedy Brakes, Carline Findon and Bruno from Woodville Park Autos. But in July 2015 Lachlan was diagnosed with cancer (Ewing’s sarcoma), which was in the left side of his pelvis and had also gone around his spine and into his lungs. He started treatment at the Women’s & Children’s Hospital in Adelaide and for the next three months had intense chemotherapy – three weeks on, one week…

GAG OF THE MONTH COCKSURE A FARMER decided he wanted to go to town and see a movie. When he got there, the ticket agent asked: “Sir, what’s that on your shoulder?” “Well, that’s my pet rooster, Chuck. Wherever I go, Chuck goes.” “I’m sorry sir, but we can’t allow animals in the theatre,” the ticket seller replied. So the old farmer went around the corner and stuffed Chuck down his overalls. Then he returned to the booth, bought a ticket, and entered the theatre. He sat down next to two old widows, who were named Gertrude and Beryl. The film began and Chuck began to squirm, so the old farmer unbuttoned his fly so the rooster could stick his head out and watch the movie. Gertrude noticed this and…