Date: 24/02/04
This is what we started with - a slightly unloved FC sedan. Previous owner lost many parts he sent away for refurbishment, like the chrome and some interior bits and as a result gave up on it.
Date: 24/02/04
This poor old four door and too much roof sedan was bought for $500. There was no shopping around- I went and bought the first one I saw. The guys were good enough to chuck in some extra doors in the deal. No motor or box, but later I found it had a HR front and rear end. Lots of spares were sold off to pay for some other bits I needed.
Date: 24/02/04
This car was bought in 1996 about April. The back end in standard form stripped of all its goodies gave me some idea of what I wanted to achieve. At this stage I knew I would chop and two door it.
Date: 24/02/04
The first order of the day was to remove the centre pillar for the two door conversion. I started this one easter (1996).
Date: 24/02/04
The two dooring commences. I removed 6" of door and added 12" on - astute observers may notice that this is not the final shape we ended up with trial and error. Note jack stands keeping it all level.
Date: 24/02/04
Roof is sat back in place for a photo opportunity.This height is a bit low.Leaning in of pillars commences. NOTE I do not slice and dice the roof to line up the pillars- its far better to move the pillars by relief cuts at the base and using a ratchet tie down strap as a 'come-along' ... Also note the door frame is not chopped as yet.
Date: 24/02/04
Roofs on and rear door cut, relieved of excess inches in lenght and is welded up. Note headlight work has started here too.
Date: 24/02/04
Here the headlight (EH & 1953 CHEV TRUCK & a piece of sheet steel) has been blended into the front guard. Sad part was the originals were not rusty. The entire front sheet metal came from the donor FE I bought for $175. The car I was building ended up with most of this FE in it. A bit like the original axe- five new heads - four new handles.
Date: 24/02/04
The tailights are base formed from FC door tops welded together to make a tail fin. Rear panel is removed and replaced with one from the donor FE. Take note on how many parts from this donor FE end up in the mix.
Date: 24/02/04
Hmmm two door pillarless any one? Here you can see the Celica seats mounted and right side needs filling in. Note one headlight is completed and one is not. Got some altitude reduction via spring removal until I could afford dropped stubbs. Rear screen has been laid foward at this stage.
Date: 24/02/04
Here I am oxywelding the centre pillar- gee I have aged well since this picture.I no longer use this type of tip for oxy welding .I now use a Henrob 2000 torch for oxy welding. I have also done the custom arial at this stage.
She had not long given birth to our first son Harold at this juncture. The 1982 Caddy Tailight has been frenched into the left side .. The FE beaver pan is in place.... At this point Kim thinks the car is for her. NOTE: rear screen is laid forward
Date: 24/02/04
Ahh my lovely Kiwi wife. She has aged even better since these pics. (Well I've got to say that now havent I?)
Date: 24/02/04
Kerrrhist...look at the flamin ugly centre pillar!!! Glad we did away with this eventually! Some of my designs got chucked out. You got to let a wine sit to develop the flavour (a kim -ism)
Date: 24/02/04
Tailight profile.I would take these pics to peruse later to determine if I had "the look'. Good thing I did because this pic helped me determine the yet to be built conti kit and extended rear bar. This was the first rendition.
Date: 24/02/04
I was still relatively happy with the profile at this stage... good thing good taste took over... as you will see much later.
Date: 24/02/04
How cool is this pic? The Model A in the background ...nearly finished.... (327 Chevy powered) FC Kustom in fore ground being worked on. Ahhh them's was the days...
Date: 24/02/04
I was getting a sneaking suspicion at this stage that I did not have the desired sleek look I was after. Note the EJ (broadside taxi service)in the background, man that car was fun for skids-could pull a wheelie at the drop of a clutch. Also used to put the boy to sleep at odd hours of the night and general paddock basher.Sold it for $1000 with another EJ later on & went to the wreckers after giving up its mechanicals.
Date: 24/02/04
This is the first rendition of the conti kit. We tried to make it like a 1956 Pontiac with split rear bars, but it did'nt really work out. Look at that taxi sitting there waiting to play.
Date: 24/02/04
Yeah BABY! Whos smilin'at ya?! The EJ and many others gave up overiders for that toothy grinUsing the standard FE grille surround (its that original it still has its factory chrome!). Custom indicators made from $4 swap meet items are frenched into the FE guards.Front bar is standard FE. A lot of FE in this FC!
Date: 24/02/04
I borrowed a motor from the wreckers to set up the front end and eng mounts. Also set up the trans tunnel with a HQ trans tunnel.The wreckers let me oxy this out of a Statseman. The car I was cutting this out of caught fire and I waited patiently in line at the counter to ask for an extiguisher.Needless to say they did not see the funny side with an inferno now encompassing five cars.Did not want to be rude did I? I still ask them for their oxy set...has an extiguisher attached to it now... dont know why...
Date: 24/02/04
This is my 1948 Chev truck doing its job... I have long sisnce sold the truck.. I built this one in 1992... Powered by a blown 400 Chevy all mounted on a HJ Holden chassis ran soley on gas in the end and towed beautifully- also chopped 3". Was wifes only transport this truck. Got a few questions from people trying to figure out what the car on the back was.
Date: 24/02/04
My mate Mick lifts the car up to get to the underside... Mick now has his own FC project... waiting for me to want to work on it. When no money changes hands the wait is rather long.
Date: 24/02/04
Coming home again. it becomes apparant to me that the sandblasting has warped all the areas that I have done heat shrinks on. Seems the metal has been destressed too much....bugger!-more work! This is not caused by heat but rather by blasting two sides of a panel. Lesson learned here by all -but why did we have to learn on MY car?.
Date: 24/02/04
Goofy looks dont help get the job done. At this stage I was not sure the subframe was going to come off again- it did.
Date: 24/02/04
if you look closely you can see the trans tunnel in place -All oxy hammer welded. A two person job.
Date: 24/02/04
The grey on the car is PPG EPOXY Primer. A two part primer with a re- active thinner. It seals up everything and acts as an adhesion promotor for any body filler. Back then we used a lot of GMH Black for things like chassis and underbodies. I still was not sure if I was going to finish this car or scrap it- (not a lot of dollars spent to this stage)
Date: 24/02/04
Subframe and extremities blacked. This was not the final solution but rather to keep it all in perspective. We have changed our car building techniques somewhat.
Date: 24/02/04
No body work finished but this is the first time it starts to look like a car. The EH headlights are frenched and the bonnet is extended with metal conduit to french the grille. The indicators and tail lights frenched also the arial frenched... Fries with that? Frenching is the term given to recess something with an edge to finish it off...
Date: 24/02/04
The conti kit is on the way to being worked out. The rear bar was finalised by cunning joinig of two rear bars cut into pieces and bits swapped from side to side. The rear pan has been formed utilising an FE ( theres that car again!) spare tyre recess. The rear bar side mounts have been moved back to suit the new bar.
Date: 24/02/04
Finished in white hi- fill primer the rear is taking shape..from the tailights down any way. This shot better shows the rear pan.. Note the twin exhaust has been fitted here It splits over the diff and is made from 2" stainless.
Date: 24/02/04
With the Caddy tailights in place I was getting a better idea as to the finished product.
Date: 24/02/04
Well I SAID the subframe had to come off again... We ended up powdercoating it and everthing else we could unbolt... brackets, front end etc... The car was driveable (sort of...) I had a brumby fuel supply from a 5 litre can and a 350 holley on the engine. It all worked though. The ignition was dodgy at this stage too. I painted the fire wall in the final colour we were planning on using. NO-ONE had ever sen a colour like it a the time,nows its every where. oh well... this is why I changed it after a few years on the road.
Date: 24/02/04
Flipside.The HR rear end is wearing a sway bar. (This did not stay either.) Air bags need this to go and as a result of air bags we dont need a sway bar. The fuel tank has been deleted and the top serves a purpose of filling a hole. The underside is finished in a special tar spray mix I concocted. Exhaust is made but not fitted. Rims are powdercoated red and shod with Dunlop d8 tyres, which in turn- let me down eventually- with a bubble forming in one of the tyres. I have recently replaced them with Goodyear NCT. Seems after 7 years they age and start delaminating. The White wall flappers never saw the road either.
Date: 24/02/04
You can really see the damage from the sand blaster here. I later heat shrunk all this damage out again. Here I am trying to save the roof line as it was really starting to bug me. I added FC Ute (from the dead one across the road) door corners and whilst I was at it I canted the B pillar. Two weeks this took to get right! Later it got thrown away and done again.It was still too fat...
Date: 24/02/04
Well one day after some careful planning I walked into the work shop and broke out the cut off saw. I got some funny looks from a mate that was working with me at the time and without saying anything I proceeded to cut. (18 months of work going down the tube here.) This pic exemplifies the way the roof was running up hill at the back. It had to go- good tastes and ideas where beginning to flow liberally after this act. At least I took the LPG tank out first.
Date: 24/02/04
The parcel tray had to go too, which was a relief as it was one bit that didn't work out as planned. The donor FE came to the rescue yet again.
Date: 24/02/04
I heavily braced the car from with in this time around. I also added Chassis rails underneath to tie the front and rear rails together For this I used 50 x50 mm rhs. The dash at the time was a timber version I had a mate make. I did not like it so I sold it.
It dosent matter how much something costs or how long it took to build - if it dosent work or is wrong then its gotta go!
It dosent matter how much something costs or how long it took to build - if it dosent work or is wrong then its gotta go!
Date: 24/02/04
The donor FE gave me its Rear tulip panel ( panel between boot and rear screen). This allowed to return this part of the car back to standard. The rear window you can see in the shot is a VW Type 3 Station Wagon tailgate, with its bum cut off. I never did unscrew the catches and they are still there to this day burried under all the fabricated body work!
Date: 24/02/04
I was starting to get the message through to myself to keep pushing the car outside to get some better vision of the flowing lines. All this fabrication is add -lib. I was just making it fit as I went. Soon I worked out that if did not fit - dont force it! Secret to flowing looks is to let it work itself out and stand back and visualise the end effect. The conti kit was sat in place to aid in this end vision.(pardon the pun).
Date: 24/02/04
I sat the new rear screen opening in place and viewed from the side. Profile was still battling with its self, but I felt I was on the right track. Note the canted b pillars have been discarded.
Date: 24/02/04
To assist in the side profile I quickly knocked up these bits of masonite masked and painted to simulate glass.. Design was starting to come together.I re- worked the door frames and replaced them here as well.
Date: 24/02/04
Now some wildness was starting to happen. I had also bought some side cuts of VW TYPE 3 Fast Back from the wreckers and this was to form the rear side windows. I pie cut the entire roof skin and removed some serious metal from the rear most of the roof This allowed me to escape the bulkiness of the FC rear roof. The rear 1/3 of the roof was cut away to allow the fitting of another bit of roof ( yes from the donor FE). I took this from the front of the FE roof and spun it 180 degrees and used it to fill the back of the roof where I had just cut away the old humpy bit.
Date: 24/02/04
Here you can see the massive amount of modification taking place. The new parcel tray/tulip panel is place . The FE roof skin is ready to be added and the rear window is balancing there like an unfinished bridge.There are remnants of the old roof still lurking and these were soon to be removed.
Date: 24/02/04
And by smoko time it was all back together again. (smoko time several weeks later). This is a vastly different look to the first awkward attemps. The patience needed for this is driven by the desire to get it right at what ever cost to sanity and time. The C pillars were formed from more bits of the FE donor roof. These were taken from the side and dropped into place. I was quite pleased at this point in time as the car was starting to look finished. Problem was no one knew it was a Holden any more...
Date: 24/02/04
White walls gone. still I thought it need something more. Roof was happy at last but it needed something to accentuate it. What though?
Date: 24/02/04
How about some skirts? (For the car not me) This is an EK Wagon roof I rescued from a dam at the end of my road was to be the basis. Remarkably, the steering box and column is from the same car! It was above the water line and has proved to be a good thing. This roof will give up some steel profiles to form the all steel skirts. The farmer though I was joking when I told him I wanted the roof to make some skirts with. He understood when I took the finished car to him. Here you can see I have sanded back the paint,rust and lichen to reveal some shiny steel to cut my skirts from.
Date: 24/02/04
Using a hammer and dolly I dressed a rolled edge around the perimeter. I first made a pattern from masking paper.(like any good dress maker would do). This was transferred to the roof and cut out with some air shears. The rust on the inside was removed first b4 fitting to the car too.
Date: 24/02/04
One brainwave was to figure out what cars had flat looking wheel arches. Then it hit me one lunch time I was pouring of pics of some Mercury Customs... VW! Off to the wreckers yet againto get some VW Kombi side cuts to get the flatish wheel arches from. I like the VW steel. (thats all they are good for with me.) These were to be added in to ontinue the sill line reveal and to assist in hiding the rear wheels. Real Kustoms have no back wheels- hence the skirts. These are not spats - spats are removable- skirts are permanent and much larger. You can notice the curve downwards. this is why I used the wagon roof to get that curve to go under the car, plus the roof has shape. (Something thats needed other wise a flat panel would buckle and look wrong).
Date: 24/02/04
I have the skirt and wheel arch ready for placement and once I marked where it was to live, I ground back the primer for something to weld it all to.
Date: 24/02/04
All welded in. The front of the skirt was formed as an opening and the lip of the wheel arch continues the lip on the sill theme.
Date: 24/02/04
With all the body work finished on the skirt and a coat of primer the finished article follows the theme of the car and mimicks the styleline of the hip and the angle of the tail fin. Time to break out the 56 Dodge Lancer hubcaps (repro I bought froma trip to the states).Flush buttons (now known as Brazilian Buttons) replace the door handles- tricky things to fit but worth it.
Date: 24/02/04
The bonnet has been stripped back to bare steel to address the fact it kept going rusty due to some poor repairs in its previous life. I normally wont send the bonnet to the sand blasters due to a fear of them stuffing it up.
Date: 24/02/04
No fitted with a restored FE dash. (There truly was not much left from that donor car!). I dislike the plastic surrounds on FC dashes. I also like to use EK columns to get the steering wheel away from my eyebrows. They are 4" shorter than FC ones and they bolt straight in. The pearled steering wheel is FE with FE Horn ring and is mounted upside down so we can read the guages from where we are now seated further back. This steering wheel is now sold as I have a restored one with an EK horn button on it now. Just by pure luck the for the EK horn button to fit an FC steering wheel, the wheel has to be upside down(just as well!) Its a minor detail but its these details that count.
Date: 24/02/04
Spray polyester has been applied. We are starting to get excited now as it has been five years to get to this stage.
Date: 24/02/04
Well she wants it o the road so she makes sure she helps where she can. This is very important not to get this stage wrong. As we are filling back spray polyester we have to be vigilant to look for any irregularities. Kim is quality control. The paint jobs key to sucess relies on the preparation.
Date: 24/02/04
The panels and insides wait their turn at getting some colour.Thats the last time you will see the gas tank. Its still there but is hiding .Airbags have been fitted just prior to this stage to the rear only . Compressor and tank lives in boot down in below the deep recesses of the 1/4 panels. There has been much other work not documented.
Date: 24/02/04
-being careful to get coverage. Note the extra primer added where it was getting a bit thin from rub throughs.
Date: 24/02/04
innards are painted final adjustments made and the car is jacked up and put on stands for stability and ease of painting. It has had its final wet rub and is now ready for colour. Now days we tint the primer to suit the colour.. this just helps when you get stone chips...
Date: 24/02/04
The grey spots are some extra bits Graham th epainter found needing some more attention. The masking is something that took a whole day to apply. we did not want any dry spray inside.This was about the time Graham came and worked with me. Up until then I did all the work - body and paint.
Date: 24/02/04
Graham has applied a few coats of base coat and is tacking off any bits of dust during the painting process. This also allows him to survey how its all going.
Date: 24/02/04
Paint application is followed by the Clear coats.. two of them.. all products are PPG Deltron. Nothing but the best. The clear is the two pack part. The base coat is rather like a highly refined acrylic,it has to be clear coated within 24 hrs or its no good.
Date: 24/02/04
The finished article. As glossy as it gets and this is straight of the gun, It was sort of glowing when we opened the workshop up...ITS ALIVE!!!!!!
Date: 24/02/04
Assembly of as much stuff as I could has taken place. Car is rewired and drivable. I am giving it a quick bath b4 taking it to the trimmers on the Gold Coast.
Date: 24/02/04
Lots of nice new shiny bits. Loaded onto trailer to take to the trimmers. It had not been registered nor had the engineer (Tim Bartrop) seen my new roof chop. Tim was involved much earlier in the peace and was confident I had given him enough info on the car.
Date: 24/02/04
I left the conti kit off so the trimmers did not have to work around it. Note the fender spears . Using FE ones meant it had a Holden script on them .The rears are EK Standard or commercial front guard moulds.
Date: 24/02/04
The finished interior. Wife wanted leopard skin so I told her to catch and skin them herself. Note the VT Calais handles turned upside down and the stainless trim on the door used to be a peice of straight stainless from the exterior of a VW Beetle. Floor console(early sixties Chev, we think 63 SS NOVA) houses the Trimatic shifter which came from a ToranaFront arm rests are FE and rears are FC fronts. Seats are '85 Celica with the head rests removed. Cd player hides in the glovebox.
Date: 24/02/04
My Mate Little Mick giving the car some stripes at its first show ( 2001 Brisbane Hot rod show) two days after it was finished! It passed engineering and rego with flying colours. (phew!). It won top radical custom at the this show and has remained un beaten for the last three years at this same show. The following year the car was made a star attraction and was heavily featured in and on all the promotional goodies and trophies. That was a shock to say the least! The car never saw a trailer the entire time it has been registered on the road. I Strongly dislike trailer queens and all that sail with them.
Date: 24/02/04
The difference between stock and Modified.I actually bought the stocker for these photos. I sold it three days late. Ironically I have bought two more the same colour since and sold off one to my mate who did the sandblasting for me. I now have another with same colours but built after may 1959( no blue bum).
Date: 24/02/04
A view from the front. You can spend a while picking the changes here.. BTW the rego plates on the white one are from my HG Ute put on for the pics.
Date: 24/02/04
Rear view. The boot lid on the coupe is the only standard panel on the entire car. Astute observers of this series will note that this Triton garage was not there at the beginning of the project.
Date: 24/02/04
Summernats 15 Canberra (in case you did not know the location of the countries largest bomb shelter)2002 .We drove straight from Brisbane in this car.(through the bushfires and 50 degree heat... 17 hrs !) Put it into street class judging.I was making a silent (?) protest at show ponies that are too precious to be driven too far from their trailers. I won top custom, top cruiser and top body work for my efforts. Went to Canberra again in 2004 and won top custom and top cruiser again.Did you know that flag pole cost 6 million to build? Must be holding everything together at that price. Personally I think they could have done much better with an old Holden ute with a Flag bearing mutt in the back parked on the roof. Thats what happens when they dont consult the people.No point saving them money though -they would just waste it on something else.
Date: 24/02/04
The car was featured in many magazines. Here Larry O'Tool from Graffitti Publications is doing the photo shoot for Aust Street rodding. I always try to photograph the photographers. This is in Canberra.
Date: 24/02/04
After two years on the road and 7200 Miles It was time to get away from that Gold.There was a minute crack in the left door that caused me to pull it fro the road and adress it...Got sort of carried away and addressed my boredom at the whole colour scheme. was a hard thing to do to pull a perfectly good nearly new car into the workshop and set to it with power tools.Here Graham is prepping the body for primer.
Date: 24/02/04
Goodbye gold.The colour of Cyan Blue was chosen at the 11th hour, until then I was going to touch up the areas that needed it. The primer is tinted blue for stone chips in the future.
Date: 24/02/04
One primered blue coupe.I had put it back together for one wekend of shock and awe. I took the partially assembled primered car to a show at the old Boggo Road jail. Heh, heh, heh. THAT took everyone by suprise. No one know what I was up to!
Date: 24/02/04
Base coat Cyan Blue is applied.This gives a satin finish that is very handy for picking out any imperfections..thankfully there weren't any.
Date: 24/02/04
This is my Good mate Darryl McKenzie. (Kiwi artist that is responsible for Hoon Auto gear and many many fine Jobs on cars). I saved up for a whole year and flew him in from Christchurch for this very task. We had No idea what was to happen. I have rubbed the clear down so he can lay down his art.
Date: 24/02/04
Laying down some flames. It was decided that Ghost flames would suit the car and accentuate its lines.
Date: 24/02/04
Outlines laid out in tape, now for a very big job of masking. this whole flaming and painting process was filmed, another thing to add on tape.
Date: 24/02/04
Flames applied an de- masked. Then remasked for the clear to go over the whole car again.
Date: 24/02/04
All assembled again and The car finally has a name;"MISS LEAD" .Darryl also did the art for the conti kit.
I am satisfied the blue is much nicer.
I am satisfied the blue is much nicer.
Date: 24/02/04
Back to Koolsville (Little Micksplace)for some more Kool tatts for the car. He is a little camera shy so the flash makes him look like he's on another planet. A hell of a nice guy, did this for Nix. Whole car and tool box took about twenty minutes using one shot enamel, this stuff when dry is non removeable.
Date: 24/02/04
Brisbane hot rod show 2003. Won top radical custom third year in a row here. I put a lot of expense and effort into the display every year.I never display the car with any more than one door open. Customs by their very nature look best diplyed closed up so the viewer gets an un interupted view of the flowing lines. Car has come a very long way from its humble beginnings. This car has won more awards and coverage than any other car for least amount of $ spent. It owes me $15 000 and five years of my life. I am anti show car so I dont have the ego that matches the car. I just enjoy cruising it and all the trophies are hidden under the house.
Date: 01/03/04
How the interior looks today.The chrome dash is a recent addition that I picked up at a swap meet for $30 in a box of other bits. Thid box 'o bits included the glove box, after a good clean up it turned out to be in perfect order!
Date: 05/05/05
wonder who this bloke is? Some wally ...Cant leave your car unnattended for long.he heh heh..found him yet fellas?
Date: 01/03/04
I deleted the pearl wheel and have now sold this. I used one of my restored standard wheels, still fitted upside down and has an EK NOS Horn button fitted. These only fit upside down FC wheels. I retained the FE horn ring. I also did away with the billet mirror and billet door knobs. I replaced these with stock items...goes better with the flavour of the car The dash top is now navy blue satin finish,so it wont relfect into the screen.
FC_Interior_3
Date: 01/03/04
A view to the rear from inside shows the WB pillar lights and the cars make -up bag,,,,
FC_Coupe_open_conti_1
Date: 01/03/04
The conti kit is a mock one only . It needs its space internally to hide the mechanism to fold it away...one of the more challenging aspects of the project...3 years designing and 18 months to make it work....
FC_Coupe_boot_interior_1
Date: 01/03/04
In the boot. The paneling hides the LPG tank and the air system. The tool box has been stripped by Little Mick....Gas struts replace the bothersome springs that where impossible to reinstall without the proper tool.
FC_COUPE_MONARO_SCUFF_PLATE_2002
Date: 01/03/04
This is a V2 Monaro scuff plate added to the custom made scuff plates ..All is stainless steel.
FC_COUPE_ENGINE_BAY_1
Date: 01/03/04
The engine bay copped a major face lift with new alloy dress up bits and new satin black two pack. A few other bits copped some two pack silver...
FC_COUPE_GRAPHIC_MISS_LEAD_1
Date: 01/03/04
The girl on my back ... Darryl did a superb job of her and it was fascinating seeing how it as done... The name "MISS LEAD " was chosen at the last minute as we could not fit 'MISS DEMENOUR" on the back...I prefer my final choice...good play on words I feel...The badge is a repro FJ item and dont fit FJ's very well . Its just enough for lifting the rear of the cars appearence.
OLD_580
Date: 01/03/04
Not very clear ...but shows the skulls that keep guard of the number plates.....
FE_REMAINS_1
Date: 01/03/04
All that remained of the donor FE is these few old bones...Its hard to believe the rest of this car is now two thirds the majority of the countries wildest FC Custom....(others description ...not mine)
