Innehållsförteckning för February 2018 från Street Machine

26 JAN, YARRA GLEN, VIC Aussie Classic Car Show, Yarra Glen Racecourse. Visit aussieclassiccarshow.com.au. 26-28 JAN, MELBOURNE, VIC Victorian Hot Rod Show, Royal Exhibition Buildings, Melbourne.Visit www.hotrod.com.au. 26-28 JAN, LAUNCESTON, TAS Powercruise #65, Symmons Plains Raceway. Visit powercruise.com. 27 JAN, ST HELENS, TAS Wheels, Wine & Dine, Georges Bay Esplanade. Visit facebook.com/StHelensCarShow/. 27-28 JAN, KANDOS, NSW Kandos Street Machine & Hot Rod Show, Simpkins Park. Contact (02) 6379 4066. 27-28 JAN, KWINANA BEACH, WA Motorvation, Kwinana Motorplex. Visit motorplex.com.au. 03 FEB, KWINANA BEACH, WA Hot Summer Nights, Kwinana Motorplex.Visit motorplex.com.au. 04 FEB, LAUNCESTON, TAS Heartkids Car & Bike Show, Entally House. Contact Kylie on 0448 983 587 or email xbfan@bigpond.com. 04 FEB, ROCKLEA, QLD Brisbane Car Show, Rocklea Showgrounds. Contact qldcruising@gmail.com. 04 FEB, BACCHUS MARSH, VIC David Calleja Memorial Car…

THE beaming, round-faced man in the photograph looks like he could be your elderly uncle, or maybe someone you knew once who worked in a bank. He wears a neatly adjusted tie and a white collared shirt, and his overalls, also white, are immaculate. Surely this is no motorsport daredevil. Yet he sits in front of a primitive rollbar, with a dragster’s cowl in front of him, racing slicks either side. On the edge of the photo you can just glimpse the back of a Chrysler wedge engine. This is none other than Eddie Thomas, and his many nicknames – ET, Big Daddy, Fast Eddie – hint at his achievements. Despite a brief racing career of just four years, Thomas was one of the most significant figures in the birth…

IT’S tempting to solve problems with overkill, like curing overheating with a fresh engine. But there are smarter blokes out there who take a more analytical approach, and Quentin Feast’s seven-second, street-registered LH Torana proves the benefit in studying data before making changes. If you doubt that, he’s got three Drag Challenge wins and an undefeated record at that event to back him up, along with a PB of 7.75@178mph at the car’s first test outing after recent upgrades. His Wild Plum ’74 LH Torana has evolved over time to become the 1300rwhp twin-turbo, LS-powered monster it is today, though it had a big birthday before Drag Challenge 2017. In fact, Quentin and a crew of close mates managed to build a fresh engine (twice), swap to a new transmission,…

FAMILY and friends are often important influences when it comes to what ride you choose to build. How often do you hear about folks building a particular car because ‘my parents had one’ or ‘my brother’s mate took us to school in one’, or – my personal favourite – ‘the guy up the road used to drop massive burnouts in one’. These core influences at an impressionable age can forge a lasting affinity with a certain make and/or model, irrespective of popularity; how else do you explain Renault or Austin Kimberley enthusiasts? Take 31-year-old Charlie Beatty, for example. His grandparents, Alan and Joan, spent many a day ferrying around a young Charlie in their pride and joy, a dark green KB Chrysler Centura, and he was smitten for life. “My…

SUMMERNATS 31 was awash with brand new builds, especially in the Elite Hall, where nine new cars were unveiled to the world as part of the Great Meguiar’s Uncover. There was a good mix of hot rods and street machines lurking beneath the sheets, with everything from a mega-horsepower late-model Monaro skid car to a 60s show rod-styled Ford tudor. But the fresh metal was by no means limited to the unveil cars. Amongst the new stuff we found a bunch of killer Toranas, a couple of early Falcons and a blown EH ute. There were skid cars, street cars, show cars, pro tourers, pro streeters and rods; something to please punters of every persuasion. Some old favourites returned to the fray to battle it out with the new offerings;…

THE Summernats 31 Burnout Masters final was a title fight of epic proportions. The various Masters feeder competitions held across Australia throughout 2017 had funnelled the best of the best into the ’Nats to compete for ultimate Burnout Master honours. Added to this pool were the top five cars from last year’s Masters and the winner of the 2017 Burnout Championship, as well as the cars that had survived the Last Chance Wildcard Shootout held on Thursday. In short, there were killer cars and gun drivers coming from every direction. Come Sunday, it was down to nine cars (Wildcard qualifier Jason Schmidt made the top 10 but had issues with his FRASHR Commodore so had to pull out of the final) to battle it out for the $15,000 first-place prize…

FOR the longest time, turbocharged race cars were considered the underdog by many in the street car scene. Lacking the power of the blown and bottled cars and with agricultural turbo technology lifted from already outdated diesel truck engines, these cars were admired for achieving with what they didn’t have as much as for what they did. But fast-forward a few years, and here you have Craige Lewis and his killer twin-turbo TD Cortina running regular seven-second passes on the strip and cruising on the street! It all started for Craige about 10 years ago when he was out looking for an XW Falcon, but instead stumbled upon this Cortina. “It had just 59,000km on it with a tough 347 Windsor in it and it was very neat. I found…

OUR trip to Adelaide for Street Machine Drag Challenge came with a bonus – the Adelaide Auto Expo was happening just before our event kicked off. Never ones to look a gift horse in the mouth (or any other orifice), we headed out to Wayville Showgrounds in the Turbo Taxi and set up shop on the Tuff Mounts stand. Running over Friday and Saturday, the Expo featured some of the coolest local SA rides, as well as a decent helping of cars from interstate. While the main show area was indoors, there was also a killer display of cars outside, which climaxed with a Zippel Cruise on the Saturday night that attracted hundreds of cool American rides. TOP FIVE ELITE 1 ST Grahame Barker Holden FX ute 2 ND Michael…

FOR 27 years, the picturesque holiday town of Bright, in the Ovens Valley of north-east Victoria, has surrendered one weekend in November to the revheads. Decades on from its inception, Bright’s Iconic Rod Run still has plenty of mojo, with the town welcoming a lot of newcomers and plenty of regulars to the 2017 festivities. The roads gleamed with chrome bumpers, with custom streeters alongside the traditional hot rods and rat rods, and an abundance of classic Aussie and American muscle cars. The traditional centre of the event is the town’s clock tower, but Bright has had some major streetscape remodelling recently, so the prized parking positions around the tower were even more sought after than usual. The changes didn’t affect the cruising though, and the event organisers placed hay…

01 STEER YOU STRAIGHT AS WELL as being a delicious biscuit, the Montecarlo is also a stylish new steering wheel model from MOMO. The Montecarlo has been engineered to provide a comfortable driving experience. It features a generous anatomic grip and is wrapped in high-quality top-grain black leather, complemented by the black aluminium spokes and black horn button. The Montecarlo is made in Italy from the highest-quality materials. Aftermarket hubs are available for fitment. Visit Fuel Autotek online at fuelautotek.com.au for more information. 02 START SOMETHING MSD’s DynaForce starters feature all new components, starting with a 3hp motor. This power is used to crank over the reduced 4.4:1 gearset to deliver great torque to the engine’s ring gear to get the engine turning. The compact housing clears most headers and…

PEOPLE involved in engine building are particular by nature; it’s the key to their success. So when an engine builder/ tuner decides to build a car, you can count on it being something pretty special, and this VF Valiant coupe, built by Bundaberg-based Mick McDonald, would be one of the best VFs this scribe has seen. Mick bought this car when he was 15 and has owned it for 29 years, 11.5 of which were spent building it into what you see here. So yes, it’s taken some time, but when you get into the quality of the build and components, you can appreciate why. The attention to detail is just overwhelming. Aside from immaculate paint and panel, the engine is just an animal and the driveline is all Mopar.…

THE INTENTION WASN’T TO MAKE POWER; IT WAS TO GET IN AND DRIVE WITH NO DRAMAS, AND GET THE KIDS INVOLVED QUEENSLAND sparky Brock Pilkington and his family built this wicked turbo Toyota six-powered EH almost by accident. You see, while many set out to build sleepers with big horsepower in mind, Brock was actually chasing reliability and something family-friendly for weekend cruises! “The intention for the EH wasn’t to make power; it was to get in and drive with no dramas, and get the kids involved,” Brock says. “It takes the fun out of it when you are broken by the side of the road or when you’re spending money breaking stuff. “The EH wasn’t in too bad condition when I bought it,” he continues. “We only gave the…

WHAT better way to power a freshly rebuilt HK Monaro than with a 1000hp, Whipple-blown small-block? The larger radial-entry Whipple superchargers are fast emerging as an alternative to traditional 71-series blowers, and as Sam from Westend Performance explains it, that’s for good reason. “This customer wanted to make over 1000hp on pump gas, and in my experience, intake temps end up too high with an older-style Roots blower,” he says. “To get an 8/71 to make 15psi on this engine we’d have to overdrive it at 12-15 per cent. It would then be operating well out of its efficiency range, whereas this Whipple 510R should make 20psi at 1:1.” The 510R is a powerful unit – an 8.3-litre twin screw blower that Sam says is roughly equivalent to a 14/71…

A FRESH START > A PCYC PROJECT TO REBUILD AN OLD HOLDEN AS WELL AS SOME YOUNG LIVES REGIONAL Australia may offer more natural beauty than the average urban landscape, but regional areas also tend to suffer from greater youth unemployment and a lack of opportunities. As a result, young people can fall into bad situations involving drug abuse and crime. Project Rebuild was launched in 2014 by Senior Constable Matt Ellis and the Cessnock PCYC Youth Command as a way to affect positive change among young offenders and youth at risk. It began with a number of local kids being involved in the rebuilding of the PCYC centre itself, with some of the participants ending up with building apprenticeships. The initiative’s latest project has seen five local boys aged…

HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL JUST wondering if you are going to put Springnats 2017 in your magazine? I’ve bought the December and January issues hoping it would be in it but I am very disappointed that there was nothing. It was an awesome weekend with heaps of beautiful machines there, including my husband’s WB one-tonner, which took out Best Street Ute! I’m hoping I’ll see something in the near future. Marita Davidson, email HAPPY New Year, Marita! We would love to cover Springnats in full force every year but with so many shows on the calendar it isn’t always possible. Happy to include a pic of the WB here, though! DRAGGIN’ WAGONS JUST started reading the January Street Machine (my Christmas present) and was wondering if there’s ever been a drag…

Van Dusen stuffed a couple in a shipment of Moon items from the States. When South Australian parts manufacturer Speco put its business up for sale, Thomas jumped at the opportunity and was soon marketing his expanded range of parts under the Speco-Thomas brand. The business’s first employee was young hot rodder Greg Goddard, who had built the nation’s first dragster in 1958 from crude parts he’d thrown together, and then made a much more professional effort later that year with a car built around the sidevalve motor from his ’34 coupe. Eddie had been out to the drag strip at Pakenham to see it in action, but only really became interested when American circuit racer Chuck Daigh was billeted at Thomas’s place in 1962 and explained the popularity of…

ALTHOUGH CAPABLE OF NEAR LIGHT-SPEED, ALEX WANTED THE XY TO BE SOMEWHAT SUBDUED. THAT’S WHY THE SIX-POINT ’CAGE WAS PAINTED BLACK, TO BLEND IN WITH THE GT-STYLE INTERIOR WITH an 8.60@158mph from his tough XY Falcon at a recent Calder outing, Alex Moshopoulos can now tick ‘Run an eight and drive it home’ off his bucket list. “I’ve been chasing it for a while,” a very satisfied Alex says of breaking the eight-second barrier. “I always knew the car had it in it. In fact, I think it’s got an 8.40, maybe even an 8.30 in it. You have to get the right night; the track has to be prepped properly, and the air has to be good as the turbos definitely love the night air. It also has…

THERE are some cruel people out there who may refer to a car as a turd rolled in glitter. Clint DiGiovanni’s ’69 Capri is the opposite of that. While it wears TURD number plates and might look a bit shitty on the outside, there’s plenty of stuff beneath that well-worn exterior that shines. Just so we’re clear, this is not PROTOURA, Clint’s Capri that we featured in SM, Dec ’11. While that car underwent a fairly considerable makeover since we featured it, Clint hasn’t gone completely mad and jumped on the patina bandwagon. “I just wanted one of each. I’m starting a collection,” he admits. “I bought the shell for a couple of hundred bucks and thought I’d keep it as a spare outside the shop. It sat under a…

TUFF Street has always been the epicentre of cruise-route burnout action at Summernats, and while the punters were none too impressed by the added safety barriers in place at Summernats 31, there was still plenty of Tuff Street mayhem to revel in across the weekend. Entrants who were smashing tyres on the cruise route were promptly dealt with by security, but that’s always been the price you pay for your five minutes of infamy. From a competition perspective, the quality of the cars that made it through judging was on point. With only two trophies to hand out per class (Street Tuff, Pro Tuff and Comp Tuff), it was as difficult as ever for the judges to pick a winner, and plenty of knockout cars had to miss out on…

A DAM Rogash and the boys from MPW Performance were back to oversee an action-packed Horsepower Heroes dyno comp at Summernats 31. Once again a yellow Torana sedan prepared by Jake’s Performance took the overall win, but this time it wasn’t Jake Edwards’s own turbo big-block Chev-powered example, but Paul Allen’s Roots-blown car – the first time in the event’s history a traditional blower-equipped car has won the big prize! Paul, Jake and good mate John Whyte whipped the single four-barrel carb and manifold off the 572-cube big-block Chev in Paul’s yellow LX sedan, replacing it with a 14/71 from The Blower Shop and mechanical methanol injection. It had made 560hp aspirated, but almost doubled that figure on Saturday at Summernats with 1036hp to qualify for Sunday’s finals. Then it…

IT HAS been a quite a while since I’ve made the pilgrimage to the SEMA Show at the Las Vegas Convention Centre, but I was ready for a big one. The event is a trade show rather than a public car show, so you’ll need to be a member of the auto industry in some form to nab an invite. That said, there is plenty to see outside the halls if you just show up as a tourist, including hundreds of show cars, drift demonstrations and – on the final day – the SEMA Ignited outdoor extravaganza. For first-timers from overseas, SEMA can be overwhelming – especially when daytime trips to the show are followed by a full immersion in the temptations of the Vegas strip after dark. The craziness…

WHAT do you do after you’ve spent an idyllic day cruising the twin townships of Yarrawonga and Mulwala on the Victoria/NSW border in your sparkling hot rod, as part of the Lake Mulwala Rod Run? You wake up refreshed and head south a notch to Wilby for some eighth-mile, heads-up, grudge-match drag racing. Around 30 competitors and hundreds of nostalgia drag racing fans turned up for some old-school, laidback lunacy. Some racers were just there to do a couple of passes, but the diehards stayed and raced all day. With the event strictly for pre-1965 cars, everything from a T altered to an FX Holden rolled through the gates to battle it out. The engines powering these beasts were just as varied – everything from a triple-carbied six-cylinder grey motor…

RICHARD WILTSHIRE HQ HOLDEN “THE goal with this HQ was for my son and I to build a classic street machine, do all the work ourselves – particularly the engine – and have it completed in time for his Year 12 formal. We succeeded, and with time to spare! I purchased the rolling shell online in 2011 with most of the bodywork and paint complete. As I travel a lot for work, all the parts had to be sourced online; throughout the build I never once set foot in a performance store, but I knew my postie by name! The engine is a 400ci Dart block, with full forged internals from Scat and SRP. A pair of blower-referenced Holley 650s sit on top of the Blower Shop 6/71 supercharger. A…

WE PREVIOUSLY RAN A 430CI MOTOR, BUT FOR BUDGET REASONS WE’VE NOW GONE DOWN TO THE CT525 6.2L LS3-BASED MOTOR FIRST getting into a race car at nine years old, Veronica McCann has gone on to forge a career sliding sideways on dirt. Her natural driving talent saw her hold the sprintcar 10-lap race record at the Perth Motorplex for a staggering 13 years. ‘Red Hot Roni’ has just completed her second season in the Pro Dirt Late Model Series, and we managed a quick chat with her trackside. You’ve been racing for quite a while now. What classes have you competed in so far? I started in Junior Sedans in NSW right through until I was 17. Then I moved straight into a 360-class sprintcar and then an Open-class…

ENTERTAINING viewing with documentaryesque undertones, the Francis Ford Coppola-directed Tucker explores the rollercoaster ride that was Preston Tucker’s dream to build a new fandangled American car. In the hopeful, prosperous times shortly following World War II, Preston Tucker (Jeff Bridges) is an innovative backyard engineer looking to build a car to match a freshly optimistic America. Working out of his home barn with a motley team of family and employees, Tucker is bankrolled into an assembly plant by New York financier Abe Karatz (Landau), who must instigate some frenemy moves to tame the outlandish Tucker’s business model if the latter’s dream is to become reality. Most notably, Karatz understands the heavy ties between politics and the motor industry, which he navigates by appointing a CEO, Robert Bennington (Goodman) – a…

STREET Outlaws TV stars Farmtruck and AZN smacked their freshly built Chevy short-bed into the burnout pad wall on the first day of Summernats and instantly lit up Street Machine’s Facebook pag. Wesley Nunyas – Welcome to Australia, where everything bites. Greg Brewer – Well they are more used to doing their burnouts nudged up against a wall, give ’em points for smashing both sides though! Brad Fleming – Maybe they should stick to doing static burnouts and leave the real burnout to those that know best! Jason Quinn – Driving on the wrong side of the pad, mate. Chris Miller – Good on them. They obviously were here to have fun and they seemed to be doing that. From videos I’ve seen plenty of classic Aussie cars are hammered…

May 1965 the car broke through the 140mph barrier, running 145mph, but the dragster was starting to feel old hat so Eddie bought a set of dragster plans he saw advertised in Hot Rod magazine, and set about building something a little more up-to-date. The result was a 140-inch wheelbase, aluminium-bodied car that became known as ‘Old No. 17’. It was a huge jump in appearance, technology and performance over anything else in the country. It debuted in June 1965 and ran an Australian record of 10.33 seconds, still with the 365-cube Chrysler. In July it went 9.76@150mph, the first car into the nines and over 150mph, a British Commonwealth record. Three weeks later, in Sydney, it went 9.51. While in Sydney, Eddie put his car on display at the…

ACCORDING to meteorology nerds, Australia was the hottest place on Earth during Street Machine Summernats weekend. Temp gauges rose throughout the four days, peaking on Sunday with the hottest day so far this summer, when it seemed like you could melt a set of tyres without even turning them. The searing heat and oppressive humidity made it tough for both (hu) man and machine, but rather than let it spoil the fun, entrants and attendees fought fire with fire and emerged triumphant. The Street Machine team had an especially fun time, because Scotty brought our Carnage star cars along. The twin-turbo MX5.7 was sporting a killer new wrap and a cute pair of turbo beanies, while the Turbo Taxi was rocking a whole new front end after its recent meeting…

WHEN it comes to burnout comps, nothing compares to the intensity of Street Machine Summernats. It draws the toughest cars and ballsiest drivers from around Australia, and, since only 10 can make it into the Burnout Masters finals, shedloads of quality combos spill over into the main Burnout Championship, which means the competition is always fierce. David Serone’s red supercharged small-block Chev-powered one-tonner opened the show with big revs and chunky plumes. A near-perfect start culminated in David banging the rear tyres off while jammed against the fence in front of the crowd. With another 80 cars in the queue behind him, Greg Burkinshaw from the NSW Central Coast glued the tacho of his supercharged 383ci Clevo in the red. The 6/71 blower and alcohol carbs were a new addition…

LIKE many other petrolheads, it started young for Peter Kulakovski. “I’ve purchased magazines like Street Machine since I was a kid,” he says. “I used to look at the pictures and read the articles when I was in high school. I was inspired to have a tough car of my own some day. Since then, I’ve worked hard and now I’m fortunate enough to be in a position to fulfil my dream of owning these cars.” In a sea of blue VKs, Peter’s blown Brock tribute stands out like few before it. Four years in the build, the level of detail and the quality of gear in the car is second-to-none. “I purchased it off an elderly lady,” Peter says. “It was a factory Holden VK Berlina V8 that had…

IT WAS a 12-year labour of love for Brian Green to get his ’57 Chevy Bel Air on the road, which might sound like a long time, but then he effectively built the car twice. The car was a South African import purchased from the Bendigo Swap Meet sight-unseen for $20,000; you’d have to be more than a little nervous waiting for the truck to arrive. “I got it freighted up to the Wollongong area near the bottom of Mt Ousley and drove it home,” Brian remembers. “It could drive, but you wouldn’t drive it very far. It got driven that one time and then torn apart and I totally redid everything – all the drivetrain, suspension, steering. It took six years to get it up and running, engineered and…

SINCE it began in 1992, Shepparton’s Springnats has evolved from a one-day event into a three-day, action-packed automotive carnival. Despite newer additions to the event like the EJ-EH Nationals, Springnats remains true to the old-school, with burnouts and all the best-loved driving events. The 2017 25th anniversary event was particularly family-friendly. The site, in the refurbished Shepparton Showgrounds, included an awesome sideshow alley with a Ferris wheel and dodgem cars (where burnouts are not encouraged). Burnouts were most certainly encouraged during Friday’s Expression Session, though. With no pressure of competition, it offered plenty of practice-and-play time for anyone wanting to start off their weekend by smashing a set of tyres. It was in Saturday’s qualifying burnouts that things got serious. The hot humid weather had cooling systems pushed to their…

“ I WAS SUPPOSED TO BE NURSING THE 245 IN MY VG HARDTOP UNTIL I BUILT A DECENT 265, BUT OF COURSE BY NURSING I REALLY MEANT JUST WAILING ON THIS THING WITH BIG PEG-LEGGER BURNOUTS” HAD a great catch-up with a few mates at the recent Asphalt Demons shindig and our conversation soon turned to comparing our 40-something aches and ailments. We quickly agreed on two important points: Firstly, we sounded like a bunch of pathetic old whingers, and secondly, we realised that the majority of our physical woes were caused by car-related shenanigans. Years of hunching over engine bays, kneeling down doing panelwork and corkscrewing under dashes to tackle electrical tasks have left all of us nursing sore backs, knees and necks respectively. That’s pretty standard fare across…

GAG OF THE MONTH HOT DOG THREE guys are sitting in a bar in front of a log fire with their dogs, and get talking about them. The first guy says: “My dog is called Woodworker.” He then commands: “Go, Woodworker!” The dog promptly grabs a log from the fire, and then uses his teeth and paws to fashion a beautiful figurine. The next guy says: “My dog is called Stoneworker. Go, Stoneworker!” The dog immediately drags a rock from the edge of the fire and carves a beautiful sculpture out of it. The third one says: “My dog is called Ironworker.” He then puts the fire tongs into the fire and gets them red hot. “Now,” he says, “I’ll just touch him on the balls with this and then…