Since the time when there were two cars in the same town, there has been drag racing — it’s the ultimate battle of man, machine and horsepower. Here in New Zealand, the original venues such as Kopuku, and even Thunder Park may be long gone, but many of those who competed there are still around, and still haven’t lost the bug.

As we read in Tony Johnson’s column over the last few issues, T-buckets, Altereds and dragsters were the weapons of choice in the early days, and with their light weight, simplicity and ability to get power to the ground, it’s not hard to see why.

The public however have always preferred cars they can associate with, and you only need to look at what American car manufacturers were doing back in the ’60s to see that the theory of race on Sunday, sell on Monday was a successful one. In New Zealand though, there wasn’t (more…)

In the last issue we followed the team from Resene Automotive and Light Industrial (RALI) as they took a beaten-up cruiser with extremely worn paint and got it into primer in preparation for painting. It was a long and involved process, but one that was made easier by having access to the right products and expertise. The team at RALI are New Zealand’s suppliers of DuPont Refinish products, so it’s these products that have been used throughout the process so far.

Getting the body straight is the time-consuming part of the painting process, even though it’s the one with the least visual effect. The quality of the preparation is essential however, as that’s what the paint itself will be adhering to, and any imperfections will greatly reduce the quality and longevity of the finish. Of course before we can even think of applying any colour, we need to sort out (more…)

Every now and then, a car comes along that defies convention, and pulls a big middle finger to normality. Dave Best’s 1965 Corvette is one such car, and while it may be new to us, Dave’s owned it and tinkered with it for over two decades now. Mind you, it’s never been as angry as it is in its current guise.

Dave tells the car’s history — “I found it in the late ’80s in Bakersfield, California. It belonged to the owner of Manuel’s Body Shop at the time and had a tunnel-rammed small block in it. It had previously raced at the ’76 Winter Nationals in Pomona. I couldn’t secure a deal at the time, and had to head home, so I entrusted Willie Roach to try and persuade the owner to sell it to me, which eventually happened right around tax time.”

Over the next 15 years Dave was continually playing with the car, and has lost count of the (more…)

As often seems the way these days, people put so much hard work into building their cars, that once completed, they’re reluctant to take them out of the shed as often as they once did. Bruce Jones, who by day is half of Auckland hot rod building business Rodz Doctr, falls squarely into that category.

After ‘retiring’ a few years back, he soon found his shed at home was full of (more…)