Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2016 i Street Machine

JEFF Lutz is one of planet Earth’s most revered street car drag racers. Having been the perennial bridesmaid at Hot Rod Drag Week, he scored his breakthrough win in 2014 aboard the Evil Twin, a lightweight, heavy-hitting, composite-bodied replica of his infamous all-steel, matte black ’57 Chev. In a bid to stay abreast of the competition, Lutz fronted up at Drag Week 2015 in a full-scale Pro Mod Camaro with number plates, and while it didn’t finish the event, it managed a 6.05@251mph, which is the quickest and fastest pass at Drag Week. These days Lutz is just as well known for his involvement with the hit TV show Street Outlaws, and when he and the Evil Twin landed Down Under for special guest appearances at various Powercruise events, we…

THE Sydney Hot Rod & Custom Expo is on at Rosehill Racecourse, 14-15 May. The star of this year’s event is none other than Chip Foose (above), of Overhaulin’ fame. Punters will have the chance to meet Chip, grab an autograph and watch him at work. Chip will also award four of his favourite cars a Chip’s Pick trophy – that would be a nice feather in the cap! Pin-up queen Sabina Kelley will also be appearing at the show and hosting the pin-up pageant. Other attractions will include live tattooing and airbrush displays, a bunch of the awesome bikes from Mad Max: Fury Road, a heap of trade stands and of course, stacks of killer rods, customs and street machines. And to top it all off, every single paying…

R ON (Blake) is a hot-headed petty thief on a path of self-destruction. He mixes compulsive lying with a penchant for daydreaming, all while trying to fast-track his way to a rich and famous life. He is spurred on by his sleazy best mate, Phil (Haywood), who offers endless bad advice while ferrying the pair around the streets of Adelaide in a custom Holden panel van. The only reality in Ron’s world is trying to support his ageing mum (Edwards), but after struggling to hold down a job, he chooses to withdraw further into his own fantasy world. A recurring sighting of a silver Porsche results in a chance meeting with an on old family friend, Annie (Raymond), who pilots the car thanks to her sugar-daddy, Cassidy (Tingwell). Ron finds…

LIKE A BOSS CONGRATULATIONS to Perth’s Chris Bitmead and the incredible team behind his XBOSS XB Falcon, which made the Great Eight at this year’s Detroit Autorama – the first Aussie car to do so. While it didn’t take out the top prize of the coveted Ridler Award (won by Billy and Debbie Thomas’s 1939 Oldsmobile), XBOSS certainly made an impression on the Yanks, with a huge crowd around it all weekend. It even took out the Outstanding Car of Show award. Check out how it all went down on streetmachine.com.au; we’ll have a full feature on the car next issue. But for now here’s some of the reaction to XBOSS from our Facebook page. Daryl Williams – This is by far the best car ever built in Australia. Wow!…

STICK A JACK UNDER T HE RIGHT REAR CORNER AND THE RIGHT FRONT WILL LIFT OFF THE DECK, SUCH IS THE TORSIONAL STIFFNESS IT TAKES balls to plonk a near-new VE SS-V ute on a chassis table and chop the floor out of it, but Dustin Goldsmith is a man of conviction. An ex-professional Superbike racer, fabricator by trade and proprietor of Goldy’s Trailers on the NSW Central Coast, Dustin is adept at going fast and has always been handy with a welder, but 14LOZ was an undertaking the likes of which he’d never before attempted. “I raced Superbikes for 15 years and won multiple championships at different levels, but after a while it got too political and it just wasn’t fun anymore” he explains. “I did a Powercruise event…

ALL THE COOL KIDS RUN TURBO LS ENGINES THESE DAYS, BUT I’VE LOVED MY HOLDEN V8S SINCE DAY ONE; YOU JUST CAN’T BEAT THE SOUND THEY MAKE WHEN it comes to building a quick street car, there is more than one way to skin a cat these days. As Steve MacGregor will attest, sticking with a naturally aspirated Holden V8 is by no means the easiest or most economical approach, but when your weapon of choice is a cool-as-hell, period-styled HZ Premier, keeping it pure of heart is an all-important consideration. As the proprietor of Warragul Exhaust Centre, Steve is in the business of getting tough street cars to make the right kind of noise, and he reckons there are few sweeter sounds on this earth than a well-warmed, high-compression…

WHEN I GOT THE UTE IT WAS ROLLING ON FORD PATTERNS ALL ’ROUND, WHICH IS BLASPHEMY FOR A START WHEN Glenn Muller bought a clean Humpy shell off a mate back in 2003, he didn’t set out to build one of the smoothest retrotech conversions you’ve ever seen. And yet here we are. “I’ve had Monaros and vans, and I started in EH wagons; I love Holdens, but it wasn’t until late in the build that I worked out exactly what this is” Glenn explains of his early-build 50-2106 (the official code of the FX ute, as opposed to the more well-known 48-215 code of the sedan version). As number 248 off the Pagewood production line in 1951, it represents the very beginning of the long and proud line of…

WHEN you’re talking about Pro Street racing in Australia, you’re more than likely referring to the Australian Pro Street Association; they feature some of the toughest street ’n’ strip machines in the country. There’s just something about steel-bodied cars trying to put massive horsepower down through narrow tyres that gets the blood pumping. Nitrous, turbos, blowers, or all-natural bulk cubic inches – these guys and girls have them all. It’s some of the best racing around, so it was a little disappointing to see a small crowd and a limited field of racers at the season opener at Calder Park Raceway. There’s no doubt that Powercruise coupled with the Lights Out event in Sydney on the same weekend drew away a bunch of spectators and some potential entrants, but even…

HOLDEN ENDED UP BEING MY BRAND OF CHOICE, BUT EVEN SO, I’VE NEVER BEEN ANTI-FORD. I LOVE A COOL CAR NO MATTER WHAT BADGE IT WEARS AS THE local manufacturing of our iconic Aussie cars slowly draws to an end, I feel compelled to share my thoughts on this truly shitty situation. I never would have imagined an Australia where kids could grow up without a rear-drive, locally manufactured car, built for our country. Even if you’ve never owned a locally produced Holden or Ford, you have always known someone with a Falcon, Commodore, HQ or Statesman. Always. And that is about to end. In my opinion, the whole Ford versus Holden rivalry is directly responsible for these brands ending Aussie manufacturing. All the bogans who’ve chanted “Fords suck”, “Holdens…

THE BODY PATINA IS TOO COOL TO TOUCH; IT’S DEFINITELY NOT GETTING PAINTED LOUIE O’DONNELL 21, CHRISTCHURCH, NZ I’VE had my ’49 Mercury for three years now. I imported it from the States, where it had been sitting in dry storage since 1967! The car had been owned by one family from the Colorado area since new, and it was a daily driver until the motor blew in ’67. Then they stripped her out and locked it away in a shed. It was only pulled out in 2013 and that’s when I imported it to New Zealand. The body had the rusted patina look to it, which is what I was after, but most of the interior was missing and it had no engine. It also had rusted sills, which…

MEETING Rachael Durbridge is an inspiration. Honestly, she could do motivational talks. It’s not that she preaches from a soapbox, it’s more the way she’s just grabbed life by the balls and followed her passion. Rachael, from Gawler in South Australia, is a qualified automotive technical paint advisor, and beneath her calm and friendly manner is a confidence that comes from knowing who she truly is. Backing this up is a great talent for laying down lacquer and the prep work that goes along with it; she can colour-match to a T, and knows all the technical stuff behind it. As a teenager Rachael knew exactly what she wanted from life. “I love art and I love cars” she says. “I was happiest hanging out with my brother Chris on…

IF YOU were paying attention to our social media coverage back in late February, you may already know all about this stunning XB Falcon coupe. If not, then check this baby out. She’s called XBOSS, and recently took the US by storm when she debuted at the Detroit Autorama. Don’t worry, we’re not reporting on some Yank that pinched one of our most legendary muscle cars and turned it into a squillion-dollar show car. This car is true-blue Aussie – West Aussie to be precise – and is the creation of Chris Bitmead and a handful of very talented craftsmen. If you’re unaware of what makes the Autorama such a big deal, and wondering why someone would build a car in Australia and then ship it halfway around the world…

THE plans for Red CentreNATS 2016 are well underway. The event is running on the Fathers’ Day long weekend of 2-4 September in Alice Springs, and it is going to be massive. The structure of the event will stay broadly similar to last year’s debut show, but with a few tweaks to tighten things up. One of the signature features of Red CentreNATS is the temporary permits available for wild cars to cruise the streets, and this has been expanded for 2016. “Last year the NT Minister for Transport asked me what the government could do to make Red CentreNATS bigger and better next year” Summernats’s Andy Lopez says. “I mentioned to him that some of the really wild burnout cars, like Kynan Hall’s DVLXC, just couldn’t meet the 100dB…

CHRIS CHRISTOU IS AUSSIE BURNOUT ROYALTY THANKS TO HIS TOUGH-AS XY FALCON AND HIS FLAMBOYANT STYLE ON THE PAD. WE CATCH UP WITH ONE OF THE GENUINE ICONS OF THE SPORT CHRIS Christou and his Electric Blue Phase III GTHO are the stuff of burnout legend. Thanks to his fist-out-the-window driving style and a tough-as-nails 351 Cleveland under the bonnet, Chris and his Hoey took out back-to-back Summernats Burnout Championships in 1990 and 1991, featured on the Summernats 8 cover and was included in Street Machine’s list of the All-Time Greatest Falcons (Aug 2013). Although now retired from burnout duties, HO 775 still takes pride of place in the Christou garage. SM caught up with Chris for a chat about the life and times of two true-blue legends. The Phase…

SUMMER’S FADING I HAVE been going to Summernats since the seventh event; I used to buy a season pass and stay there for four days straight. These days I go for a few hours on the Saturday, and to be honest I didn’t even bother this year – at $90 for a day pass, it’s almost what a season pass used to cost and there is simply not enough entertainment at the show anymore to justify it. The straw that broke the camel’s back was without a doubt no burnouts being allowed on the cruise route. I have always wanted to enter a car into Summernats, and am making the final touches to my YB Cosworth-powered Mk2 Escort, but I doubt I will be entering it unless there are changes…

IN KEEPING WITH RHYS’S PLANS TO SKID THE FALCON, THE STROKED 427CI WINDSOR SMALL-BLOCK IS PLENTY TOUGH EVERY long-term Street Machine reader would remember the hugely successful Real Men Smoke Eagers ad campaign, starring Mr Double Fist himself, Chris Christou and his tyre-demolishing Electric Blue Phase III GTHO. Well they say the apple never falls far from the tree – this gorgeous XR Falcon belongs to Chris’s 27-year-old son, Rhys. Rhys openly admits that as a young lad he wanted to follow in his father’s tyre-frying footsteps. Being the supportive type, Christou Sr was only too happy to both encourage and facilitate. “At age 14, me and Dad went out and got me an XA K-code coupe” Rhys says. It was earmarked as a skid pig, but Rhys ended up…

THE SPECTATORS WERE CLOSE ENOUGH TO FEEL THE FLAMES AND COP A LOAD OF SWEET TYRE SMOKE AFTER seven years of mixed weather and rainouts, the organisers of the Ultimate Burnout Challenge, Clint Ogilvie and Steve Loader, decided to shift the event to Ballarat in search of better weather. It was a risky decision to move further away from Melbourne, but it paid off with a beautiful day and a brilliant turn-out of smoke-deprived revheads. On the burnout side of the equation, 110 cars showed up to destroy tyres, with an almost equal split between blown and naturally aspirated entries. Another 90 pampered rides rolled out for the show ’n’ shine, and almost 5000 people rocked up to check out the day’s action. This year, UBC spectators were closer to…

THE NEW ORGANISATION HAS ALLOWED ANYTHING PRE-1977 TO PARTICIPATE, SO THERE’S BEEN INCREASING INVOLVEMENT FROM THE STREET MACHINE FRATERNITY. NO COMPLAINTS FROM US! OVER 25 years, the Bright Rod Run has become one of the most popular events of its kind in Australia, held in the alpine township of Bright, 300 clicks north-east of Melbourne. The run was founded by the Northern Suburbs Street Rod Club, who managed the event each November until 2012, after which they decided to move it to Lake Mulwala. But given the large tourism boost the run brought to the town each year, the Bright community decided to continue the tradition themselves, with the event now overseen by the Bright Rod & Kustom Club. With the new organisation allowing anything pre-1977 to participate, there’s been…

BUILDING a car on a budget can be a hallenge, but Glenn Grant has twice resurrected a sweet piece of Aussie motoring history with nothing but patience, tenacity and a few mates. “The Sundowner was my first decent car” explains Glenn of his love for Ford’s diminutive Escort panel van, as he bec ons me into his immaculate shed. “I loved Escorts, and I needed something to carry my bikes.” He’s not kidding; any wall not covered in vintage Ford memorabilia has a pushie leant against it. Glenn bought the van you see on these pages for $1200 as a roller back in 99. “It was Monza Red and looked pretty good” he says. “So my mate Graham tson of Boss Automotive encouraged me to get a motor to match”…

IN YEAR 11 I TOPPED MY CLASS IN AUTOMOTIVE TECHNOLOGY. THERE WERE ABOUT 20 BOYS AND ME IN THE CLASS! SIXTEEN-year-old Kate Symons has owned her WB flat-top one-tonner for two years, and is counting down the days to her next birthday so she can get her provisional licence. Her dad Matt runs a car club, Southern Highlands Streeters, and he’s clearly passed on the automotive love to Kate: “In Year 11 I topped my class in Automotive Technology. There were about 20 boys and me in the class” she says proudly. Where did you find this WB? I got it from Burt’s Brakes; it was their old tradies’ ute. The thing was not very good; brake lines were squished and there were ciggy butts everywhere. It was badly rusted.…

RON O’BRIEN 1957 CHEVY SPORT COUPE “THIS is my husband Ron’s ’57 Chev. It has taken him four years to restore; he is a panel beater so has done all the work himself. It was a complete shell-off chassis restoration with a full blast. Some of the custom touches include: de-badging; fabricating a Chev bowtie and welding it into the boot lid; removing the boot floor and raising it three inches to accommodate a custom fuel tank; adding an Altronics electronic paddle shift; modifying the engine bay with a customised firewall, inner guards and radiator support panel; custom bar grille; and replacing the hood birds with air vents. The car runs on an Art Morrison chassis and is powered by a 598ci big-block built by Shafiroff, with a TH400 ’box.…

THE second Cruising Nationals is on 15-17 April, in the fine southern NSW town of Deniliquin. The concept of the Nationals is for hundreds of cool cars to take over the town, with plenty of bands and a great party atmosphere – a la the Bright Rod Run and many others – but with the added attractions of eighth-mile drag racing, a burnout comp, go-to-whoa and dirt drags. The driving events will take place on the Saturday out at the Deni Aerodrome, where there will also be plane and car displays, helicopter rides, a jumping castle for the kids, trade stands and lots of great food. On Saturday night, there will be a cruise route set up in town for the entrants to strut their stuff. The event climaxes on…

24-28 MAR, MILLMERRAN, QLD Rods Inc. Millmerran Hot Rod Run, in and around Millmerran. Contact Kerry 0488 100 115. 24-28 MAR, MOE, VIC 41st Australian Van Nationals, Moe Racing Club, Waterloo Road. Contact Ian 0403 923 277 or visit vanning.org.au. 25 MAR, SUNBURY, VIC Kruze4Kids Car Show & Family Day, Langama Park. Contact Brad 0419 327 500. 25-27 MAR, DUBBO, NSW The 40th Toyota Nationals, Ollie Robins Oval, Bligh Street. Contact Danae 0429 800 005. 25-28 MAR, BUSSELTON, WA ASRF Sandgroper Street Rod Nationals, Churchill Park Trotting Complex. Visit asrf.org.au. 25-28 MAR, MARYBOROUGH, QLD 10th North Coast Campout & Show ’n’ Shine, Maryborough Showgrounds. Contact Sheryl 0417 326 150. 25-28 MAR, SHEPPARTON, VIC Shepparton Moke Muster, Victoria Lake and surrounding areas. Contact Glenn 0468 799 437 or Rhonda 0419 580…

HAPPY AS LARRY I WOULD like to congratulate Dave Cook (writer/photographer) and Andrew Goodwin (photographer) for their great and inspiring story on Mark Negri’s re-creation of drag racer Larry Ormsby’s famous XW GTHO Falcon, as well as his Ford transporter and caravan (SM, Feb ’16). More importantly, congratulations to Mark for his painstaking attempt to recreate history and bring a smile to all who were involved in drag racing in the 1960s and 70s – and to the young readers like myself who were not. Well done! Sam Lappas, email…

THROUGHOUT the 70s and most of the 80s, BF Goodrich dominated the ultra-low 50-series tyre market with its Radial T/A – the tyre of choice for Aussie street machiners. But in the late 80s, two new players entered the arena: Yokohama with its 352 range, and Bridgestone’s Eager series. To kickstart sales, Bridgestone came up with the infamous Real Men Smoke Eagers campaign. Now part of Street Machine folklore, the campaign’s ad featured Chris Christou and his tough-as-nails Electric Blue GTHO Phase III frying a set of 265/50/15 tyres in a massive burnout. Chris and HO 775 were already well known to SM readers, having lit ’em up for the mag’s smoketastic Aug/Sep 1984 cover. His trademark fist-out-the-window style (which he later evolved into the double-fist – one out the…

THE STOCK-BUT-TWEAKED THEME CARRIES THROUGH TO THE ENGINE BAY, WHERE AN LS3 HAS BEEN CLEVERLY DISGUISED TO LOOK LIKE AN EARLY SMALL-BLOCK IT’S a funny thing, but when you’re at a huge show in the US where there are thousands of stunning cars, it’s tough to find one that stops you in your tracks. There are so many cool machines to see that it takes something extra special to make you take a break and have a proper look. But Joe Yezzi’s ’74 Chevy C10 is one of those pieces of machinery that everyone loves. It has a universal appeal that attracts people of all types, from your regular Joe Public who just sees it as a nice old truck, to more discerning viewers – people like you and me…

THE MUSTANG’S CLASSIC LINES REMAIN, HIGHLIGHTED WITH A PRO TOURING-STYLED BUILD THEME IT’S JUST after six on a February evening. After a stinking 34-degree day, the sun is dropping towards the hills west of Newcastle – a gorgeous orange-tinged summer twilight. A neat-looking backyard Colorbond shed’s twin roller doors are up, revealing a wine-hued Mustang propped up on chassis stands. Partially covered with a blue dust cloth, its bonnet is up and its wheels scattered on the concrete driveway behind it. Terry Morton is in his own little world, pottering around under the bonnet. “Oh, sorry mate!” he says, realising he has company, then quickly reaches out to shake my hand. “I’m just fitting a new oil cooler ready for Powercruise this weekend.” He wipes the sweat from his forehead…

I WANTED TO HAVE MY CAKE AND EAT IT TOO – A STREET-REGISTERED ‘RACE’ CAR THAT COULD BE DRIVEN AND ENJOYED GARRY Brown isn’t a man to do things by halves. His car-building resume reads like a who’s who of high-performance drag and roundie racing. So when it came time to build a new street car, it wasn’t likely to be anything too subtle. As the proprietor of Brownie’s Race Engines in the Gold Coast’s Scenic Rim, Garry has been part of South East Queensland’s race culture since crewing as a young teen in the late 60s. “I was an avid drag racer during the Surfers years” Garry says, “and later I switched to speedway and circuit racing where I won my fair share in saloon cars, Appendix J, and…

KYLIE Perry has a grin like a lottery winner as I shake her hand. “We’re finally here!” she almost giggles. She steps back from the task of masking to take a daydreamy look at the shape of her and husband Adam’s incredible Tailspin project. Then, with an almost unbelieving shake of her head, she snaps back to reality, darting back to the front of the car to continue getting it ready for its coat of colour. As Street Machine has revealed with regular updates over the past couple of years, the building of Tailspin, a back-to-front FB Holden, has been an incredible task: from the original sketches by artist Linda Vesperman that appeared in our old Expression Session section in the early 1990s, to a mock-up created from a rusty…

01 CARB LOADING QUICK Fuel Technology has introduced its new Pro Street Q-Series and QFX-Series carburettors designed for higher-horsepower, larger-cubic-inch, street-driven engine applications. The carburettors are calibrated to provide good street manners, while still delivering maximum horsepower. For a full list of the carburettor’s features and to contact the fuel delivery experts, call Automotive Performance Distributors on (08) 8363 5566. 02 PANEL SHOW HAD a recent bust-up or just need to freshen things up? Then check out Muscle Car Parts’ Holden HQ-WB lower cowl replacement panel. Replacing the entire panel will save you many hours of fiddly, costly repairs. And the panel can be mated with matching upper cowl panels to make your ride feel new again. Get yours for $535 by calling (02) 9821 2229. 03 ROLLIN’ ROLLIN’ ROLLIN’…

MARK ALLEN LC TORANA SL BYFORD, WA MARK Allen’s LC sedan might look like it just left the bowling club, but there’s a tough Holden 355 stroker under the hood and it’s already run into the 12s. When Mark got hold of the unassuming more-door, it had already been converted to a Holden V8 with a Trimatic and a nine-inch out back. But about a month into his ownership the converter shat itself, so Mark figured he’d check out the rest of the motor. “The bearings were knackered and that was just the start of it” he says. “Pretty much everything we looked at was stuffed, so I figured we’d tidy a few things up.” In Mark’s book, “tidying a few things up” doesn’t involve a rattle can and five…